(Reuters) – Elon Musk on Sunday questioned the possibility of converting “large transactions” from Tesla Inc.’s balance sheet to bitcoin, according to a Twitter exchange between Musk and a well-known digital currency advocate.
Michael Saylor, CEO of MicroStrategy Inc., in a tweet to Musk, suggested that the founding billionaire and head of Tesla take the step.
“If you want to get a $ 100 billion favor to your shareholders, convert the $ TSLA balance from USD to #BTC,” Saylor wrote in his tweet. “Other S&P 500 companies would follow your momentum and eventually grow into a $ 1 trillion favor.”
“Are such large transactions even possible?” Musk replied to Saylor.
“Yes. I’ve bought over $ 1.3 billion in #BTC in the last few months and would love to share my playbook with you offline … ”he said on Twitter.
Tesla and Musk could not be reached for comment.
“All CEOs face the challenge of how to preserve and improve shareholder value in the face of this year’s unprecedented monetary expansion,” Saylor said in a message to Reuters.
“Bitcoin is the best solution to the store value problem that all individuals, investors and corporations in the world face,” Saylor said.
Shares of Tesla hit a record high on Friday on a frantic trading day as investors prepared for the long-awaited entry of the electric vehicle to the S&P 500 benchmark on Monday.
Bitcoin rose to $ 24,299.75 on Sunday, after surpassing the $ 20,000 mark for the first time last week, amid growing interest from larger investors. Bitcoin was last with $ 23.60.98, up 2.88%.
Report by Suzanne Barlyn; edition by Diane Craft