HomeCryptoPayPal and Tesla: big names with crypto assets and services

PayPal and Tesla: big names with crypto assets and services

As time passes, more big companies, such as PayPal and Tesla, shake hands with cryptocurrencies by holding digital coin assets in their wallets or continuing to offer services on them. 

In this article we look in detail at the crypto assets held by payments giant PayPal and the Bitcoin holdings of Tesla, the company of billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk. 

Below are all the details. 

PayPal: about $1 billion in crypto assets on its balance sheet

According to its quarterly 10-Q report filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), PayPal reported holding approximately $1 billion in crypto assets. 

Specifically, the company disclosed that it held assets with a total value of $943 million, including Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), Bitcoin Cash (BCH) and Litecoin (LTC).

Since late last year, PayPal has seen an increase of $339 million in its portfolio of crypto assets. In fact, PayPal’s 10-Q states the following: 

“The company maintains internal records of the share of our clients’ crypto assets, including the amount and type of assets each of them owns.”

It is worth noting that outside of the cryptocurrency positions held by its customers, no other cryptocurrency holdings held by the company were found.

Furthermore, we see that although there is still no specific regulatory protection for cryptocurrency investors in the United States, PayPal has adopted a “protection” policy for users in relation to “all buying or selling activity” up to a limit of $50,000, as specified in its terms and conditions.

All crypto-legal features introduced by PayPal 

In recent years, the payments company PayPal has also introduced several cryptocurrency-related features

In July 2022, for example, it allowed customers to transfer their crypto assets to external wallets, giving them more control over the management of their funds.

In addition, PayPal implemented the ability to exchange cryptocurrencies on Venmo, a popular mobile payment service app in the United States. 

This allowed customers to move their cryptocurrencies to external wallets, taking advantage of a new ecosystem and facilitating transactions on different applications.

It is also important to note that ConsenSys integrated the functionality to purchase Ethereum through PayPal in December 2022, offering users a convenient way to purchase this cryptocurrency through the payment platform.

Tesla and the $184 million balance sheet stake in Bitcoin 

Tesla, the well-known electric car manufacturer owned by Elon Musk, confirmed that it made no changes to its holdings in Bitcoin in the first quarter of 2023, thus keeping them unchanged.

In fact, according to the latest release of financial results, the value of crypto assets held by Tesla in the first quarter of 2023 remained unchanged from the fourth quarter of 2022, amounting to $184 million.

It is important to note that this stable valuation is based on current accounting rules, which do not allow capital gains to be recorded. 

During the period under consideration, the value of Bitcoin has actually increased from $16,500 in December to about $25,000 today.

In other words, the amount of Bitcoin held by Tesla did not change during the first quarter of 2023, maintaining the same amount for the third consecutive quarter.

In terms of the stock, Tesla reported adjusted earnings per share (EPS) of 85 cents. 

However, revenue was lower than expected, coming in at $23.33 billion compared to the estimated $23.6 billion.

It is worth recalling that initially, specifically in February 2021, Tesla purchased Bitcoin worth $1.5 billion, which later in the year came to be worth about $2.5 billion.

However, in the second quarter of 2022, the company sold about three-quarters of that amount. 

Subsequently, Tesla held a total of $218 million in Bitcoin, but suffered losses due to the volatility of the asset and its own sales.

This series of actions has been viewed by some as “inconsistent.” Despite Tesla accepting Bitcoin as a form of payment for a short period of time, it later abandoned this practice due to the environmental impact of the mining process associated with this cryptocurrency. 

Currently, Tesla only accepts Dogecoin (DOGE) as cryptocurrency for some of its products.

Alessia Pannone
Alessia Pannone
Graduated in communication sciences, currently student of the master's degree course in publishing and writing. Writer of articles from an SEO perspective, with care for indexing in search engines.
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