Tesla CEO Elon Musk made a rare appearance on his crypto Twitter (also known as X) timeline early Tuesday morning, praising Bitcoin’s energy consumption. This seems to indicate a change of heart several years after criticizing the power consumption of Bitcoin mining in 2021.
Musk weighs in on the debate that AI will become a “new global arms race” and talks about precious metals and Bitcoin Prices are soaring because “funding an AI arms race is ‘sneaky.'”
Downgrade trading refers to investors seeking a hedge against a decline in the dollar or other fiat currencies, such as silver, gold, or BTC.
Musk agreed, adding, “This is why Bitcoin is based on energy. You can issue fake fiat currency, and every government in history has done it, but you can’t fake energy.”
In doing so, he reiterated one of the key arguments the Bitcoin community has used to dispel criticism of its energy consumption. The rationale is that governments can create more money, but Bitcoin only goes into circulation when miners expend energy processing new blocks of transactions and earn them as rewards.
Next, one of BTC’s most vocal advocates, Michael Saylor, co-founder and executive chairman of Strategy, joined us for a chat. “The laws of nature are better than the laws of man,” he said.
Musk first mentioned Bitcoin in an interview at the Vanity Fair New Establishment Summit in 2014.
truth.
This is why Bitcoin is based on energy. It is possible to issue fake fiat currency, and every government in history has done so, but it is impossible to fake energy.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 14, 2025
The interviewer started by talking about PayPal, which was spun off from its parent company eBay at the time, and then asked Musk about Bitcoin.
“I think Bitcoin is probably a good thing, but essentially it is, and I think it’s primarily a vehicle for illegal transactions,” Musk responded. “That’s not necessarily a bad thing. It’s completely bad. There may be some things that shouldn’t be illegal.”
He added: “By the way, I don’t own a single penny of Bitcoin.”
Years later, in 2017, when people started speculating that Musk was the pseudonymous Bitcoin founder Satoshi Nakamoto, Musk denied the rumors. “It’s not true. A friend sent me some BTC (a few years ago) and I don’t know where it is,” he said on X.
In early 2021, Tesla started accepting Bitcoin as a payment method. But after a few months it stopped.
At the time, Musk criticized Bitcoin’s energy consumption, tweeting, “Energy usage trends over the past few months have been insane,” along with a screenshot of the Cambridge Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index. He went on to explain that electric car manufacturers will accept BTC again if they see “reasonable use of clean energy by miners,” adding that reasonable use means 50% of all Bitcoin miners.
Meanwhile, Tesla has held Bitcoin since February 2021, according to BitcoinTreasuries. The company’s 11,509 BTC is worth approximately $1.28 billion at current prices. Tesla, which trades on the Nasdaq under the ticker TSLA, once owned more Bitcoin.
At its peak in May 2021, Tesla’s Bitcoin treasury contained 43,200 BTC. However, the company sold some of its shares in the same month it stopped accepting Bitcoin payments, and then sold 75% of its shares in July 2022, citing “Bitcoin impairment.” At the time, the sale generated approximately $936 million.
