Elon Musk Confirms ‘Progress’ On Wild X Crypto Rumors—Triggering A Dogecoin Price Surge To Rival Bitcoin, Ethereum And XRP

Bitcoin
BTC
and cryptocurrencies are suddenly soaring as the market braces for a Wall Street earthquake that could cause price chaos.

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The bitcoin price has rocketed to $45,000 per bitcoin this week, more than doubling through 2023, and boosting the price of ethereum, XPR and even the likes of dogecoin as traders bet a new bull run could have already begun.

Now, Tesla
TSLA
billionaire Elon Musk has said he’s making “progress” in adding payments to his social media platform X that could include bitcoin and crypto—something that will set X up for a showdown with growing crypto giant PayPal.

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X, rebranded from Twitter by Musk earlier this year, has been acquiring money transmitter licenses across the U.S., a process that has to be done state-by-state.

“Progress,” Musk posted to X, responding to an X fan account that posted a link to a report by The Street claiming X has been granted 10 licenses to move money between U.S. states and calling it a “move toward crypto payments.”

In October, a leaked “all-hands” virtual meeting at X revealed Musk’s plans to grow X’s financial services arm, with prominent voices in the bitcoin and crypto space called the plan something that could spur a “critical mass” of crypto adoption.

Musk, who has previously said he wants to turn X into an “updated version” of PayPal, has helped the price of bitcoin and other major cryptocurrencies, including the meme-based dogecoin, surge over the last few years as Musk teases crypto integration and adoption.

The dogecoin price, a bitcoin-inspired cryptocurrency that Musk was once jokingly named the “CEO” of, has surged almost 20% over the last 24 hours, following the price of bitcoin, ethereum and XRP higher ahead of a widely expected Wall Street bombshell.

PayPal has this year leaned into bitcoin and crypto, launching its own dollar-pegged stablecoin cryptocurrency after rolling out support for bitcoin, ethereum, litecoin and bitcoin cash in late 2020. PayPal’s original support for bitcoin and crypto helped kick off the 2021 bitcoin price bull run that catapulted bitcoin to almost $70,000.

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In August, Musk issued a stringent denial that X will launch a cryptocurrency of its own to rival bitcoin, ethereum, XRP or dogecoin, sparking speculation the platform could integrate existing cryptocurrencies.

Musk has said he personally holds bitcoin, ethereum and dogecoin while his electric car company Tesla holds almost $300 million worth of bitcoin and accepts the meme-based bitcoin rival dogecoin as payment for merchandise.

Before buying Twitter last year for an eye-watering $44 billion, Musk considered creating “a new social-media platform based on the blockchain” that “could have a payment system using dogecoin, the semi-serious cryptocurrency whose development he had been quietly funding,” Musk biographer Walter Isaacson wrote in an excerpt of his new book, titled simply Elon Musk, published in the Wall Street Journal.