Elon Musk, who is running Tesla, SpaceX, and Twitter from recently, is often stirring up the crypto industry with his witty tweets. There’s even a proverb: “When Musk speaks, Bitcoin investors listen”.
But how did he become so influential in the world of crypto? Let’s find it out.
Musk and crypto: history of relationship
The billionaire’s attitude towards cryptocurrencies has been changing for years. First he liked them, then he turned more sceptical, claiming they were bad for the environment. But one thing is clear: Musk considers crypto’s cornerstone technology, blockchain, very important and even looks to deploy it in his businesses.
Musk is known for sharing his ideas via Twitter — a place where crypto and NFT adepts mostly dwell. Did he buy the platform to be closer to the community, is another conspiracy question.
He first tweeted about Bitcoin in 2014, mentioning it’s “probably a good thing”. There were even rumors stating that Musk could be Satoshi Nakamoto, but Elon tweeted: “Not true. A friend sent me part of a BTC a few years ago, but I don’t know where it is.”
It’s not known for sure how much Musk holds in crypto, but the billionaire himself mentioned that he owns a small amount of BTC, ETH and DOGE.
The Musk effect
The crypto market seems to react to each tweet Musk posts about crypto. According to a report by CoinSwitch Kuber, posts by Elon are usually followed by a surge in trade volumes.
This is what often happens to the most famous meme coin DOGE, which enjoys a special love by Musk. For example, this short 3-word tweet once made DOGE’s price skyrocket:
“One word: Doge” (https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1340590280848908288?s=20&t=h8t_izH3yrueZrBgIMJX4A)
Yes, soon after the tweet, the average trading volume of the coin jumped from $1,942 per minute to around $299,330 per minute. Some other market-rocking tweets included ideas of Tesla and McDonald’s accepting DOGE as payments, and of sending DOGE literally to the moon.
Interestingly, Musk never tweets with crypto price predictions or analytics. He just shares his vibe, and it makes traders go and buy coins in a frenzy.
Why do his tweets matter?
With nearly 120M followers on Twitter, Elon is a highly active media persona who likes to keep up with trends, including crypto trends. All we tend to listen to popular guys, taking their advice.
What adds him credibility in this industry is, probably, his great tech expertise and billions of dollars in the bank. People think of Musk as a person who knows a lot about technology and lucrative investments. Cryptocurrencies involve both of these aspects.
In terms of real crypto analytics, usually provided by key experts like Binance’s CZ or Vitalik Buterin, Musk’s tweets contain literally no value but just his personal thoughts about certain coins. So, what makes people follow his ideas is just a phenomenon, possibly a cult of personality.
Crypto trends and Musk
The crypto community within Twitter produces tons of memes and trends involving Elon. Many projects, as well, are trying to hype on Musk’s persona for their promo campaigns.
And he seems to be very pleased with all this.
One of the latest Twitter trends is called #ElonGoat and based around a weird news. The creators of Elon Goat Token (EGT) made a bizarre statue of Musk with a body of a goat, and delivered it right to Tesla headquarters. Elon himself has not commented on this story yet, however, EGT’s price felt a significant rise after the incident became publicly known.
Instead of conclusion
Though Elon Musk is not famous for his large crypto-related investments or projects, his words do matter for the crypto community for some personal reasons. And there’s nothing bad in this until the day when the Twitter, Tesla and SpaceX owner decides to crash the market. Hopefully, not.