By Alicia Maher
Elon Musk has taken his Twitter play to an entire new degree after he tweeted a poll to ask his 62 million followers whether or not he should sell 10% of his Tesla shares, which is approximately equivalent to $25 billion. The eccentric billionaire controls around 193 million units in the world’s largest producer of electric vehicles.
“Uninvested cash has recently received a lot of attention as a potential tax avoidance strategy, which is why I recommend selling 10% of my Tesla stock. Do you think this is a good idea?” — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) on November 6, 2021. In a subsequent tweet, Tesla CEO Elon Musk states that he will comply with the survey results.
As per Bloomberg Billionaire Rankings, Musk’s current net worth has risen to $338 billion, a record high for a single individual. It has almost doubled in value since the beginning of 2021, partly as a result of the ferocious Tesla surge. The tycoon also owns a controlling interest in the aerospace company SpaceX, which is reputedly worth more than $100 billion.
Taking Aim At The Billionaire Tax
Musk was outspoken in his criticism of a new Democratic-led bill that would impose yearly taxes on unrecognized capital gains, which was released last month. “They’ll soon run out of other people’s income, at which point they turn their attention to you.”- Musk said.
Over the following ten years, the Democrats predict that the effort will generate an additional $250 billion in revenue for the federal government. Republican negotiators, on the other hand, are opposed to taxing money that has not yet been earned. An investigation conducted by the non-profit journalism ProPublica in June revealed that some of the richest Americans are avoiding tax payments by taking out loans over their vast stock investments.
From 2014 to 2018, the top 25 wealthiest Americans paid a “real tax ratio” of a pitiful 3.4 % on the aggregate wealth they accumulated during the same period, according to the Tax Foundation. If Musk decides to proceed with the proposed $25 billion sales, he will be required to pay approximately 20% of the proceeds as capital gains tax.
The $25 Billion Proposition Made By Michael Saylor
Now because the Tesla CEO has the opportunity to have a large sum of money on hand, he has instantly been receiving proposals from members of the Bitcoin industry. MicroStrategy Head Michael Saylor spent little time jumping at the opportunity to convince Musk to spend all of that cash on Bitcoin, suggesting that it would safeguard Tesla from inflation. Musk refused to listen.
“Alternative strategies to examine include transforming the $TSLA financial statement to a #Bitcoin Standards and purchasing $25 billion in $BTC. If diversity is the aim, this is an option to consider. Flexibility, inflation protection, and increased potential for all investors would be provided in a tax-efficient manner as a result of this.” – Michael Saylor (@saylor) On November 6, 2021,
Saylor’s innocuous Twitter exchange with Musk, which took place in December, apparently spurred Tesla to purchase $1.5 million worth of Bitcoin. “Are such large-scale transactions possible?” – Elon Musk (@elonmusk) on December 20, 2020.