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Electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla (TSLA) sold a worth of $936 million in Bitcoin (BTC) during the second quarter of this year.
As reported in the company’s earnings report on Wednesday, 75% of its total BTC holdings were offloaded. With roughly 42,000 Bitcoins stacked up to the value of $1.26 billion in the previous three quarters, Tesla closed the second quarter with just $218 million in BTC.
In the earnings call, CEO Elon Musk said that the decision to sell a major share of its Bitcoin holdings was made to maximize its cash position, “given the uncertainty of the COVID lockdowns in China.”
Musk clarified that “this should not be taken as some verdict on Bitcoin” and that Tesla is not ruling out buying Bitcoin again in the future. The ‘Dogefather’ also said that Tesla is still holding on to all of its dogecoin.
Following the announcement of the earnings report, Bitcoin’s price reacted immediately by dropping 1.7% but rebounded shortly once Musk appeared on the earnings call.
Tesla first announced it had purchased $1.5 billion worth of Bitcoin in February of 2021, which ignited a rally. In March of the same year, Tesla started accepting Bitcoin for payments, a move that was soon after reversed, citing environmental concerns.
Despite letting go of most of its flagship currency holdings, Tesla shares rose 0.7% in after-trading, as the company reported adjusted earnings per share of $2.27, besting analyst estimates of $1.81 a share at a revenue of $16.9 billion.