Musk, a strong Doge proponent, announced in mid-January this year that the EV company would accept Doge as payment for some of its merch like the models of its electric vehicles and the Giga Texas belt buckle. It is unclear if Tesla will accept Dogecoin for all of its branded merch. The space tech company’s online store has apparel such as children’s spacesuit onesies, unisex hoodies, T-Shirts, Caps, journals, posters, water bottles, mugs and bags.
This is by no means the first time the space company has been linked to Dogecoin. In May 2021, it was announced that Geometric Energy Corp. had booked a moon mission paid for entirely in Doge. The mission, set for this year on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, was estimated to cost 129 million DOGE ($62 million at the time). It is unclear how much, if any, Doge has been paid. The cryptocurrency, which is based on a meme featuring a Shiba Inu dog has gone on to become one of the most popular altcoins (ranked number 10 crypto at press time). It currently has a market capitalization of $11.1 million and a total circulating supply of 132.67 billion DOGE.
Following Musk’s announcement, it experienced a 9 percent spike in 15 minutes from $0.07819 to $0.08538 and continues to trade above $0.084.
In response to a tweet enquiring if Starlink subscriptions could potentially be payable with Dogecoin in the future, Musk responded with the following tweet.