Future sales of GM products in Bitcoin will depend solely on consumers. General Motors will not be a shadow of Tesla’s footsteps, which completely embraced Bitcoin as a payment form.
Mary Barra, CEO of General Motors, a vehicle manufacturer, made a statement in the company’s report of its earnings for the fourth quarter of 2020 that, at the moment, it has zero intentions of investing or selling its products in any of the existing cryptocurrencies unless customers demand it.
Barra’s statement in the report came right after the announcement made by Elon Musk, Tesla’s CEO. Musk reported that his company made an investment of about USD 1.5 billion in Bitcoin and that it would soon be accepting payments in this currency for the acquisition of its product.
Mary Barra has shown Sympathy for GM’s decision regarding cryptocurrencies and said that the company does not have plans to work with Bitcoin nor other cryptocurrencies in the market. This decision seems to depend more on its customers than on the company itself. If they want to pay with bitcoins and the demand grows, the company will walk that way.
Mary Barra says that if there is more robust customer demand shortly, there is nothing to stop GM from doing so. General Motors differs in many ways from Tesla, mainly because GM is not a company that sells its products directly to the consumer. Instead, it does so through a network of franchised dealers, so if it desired to offer its products and services in cryptocurrencies in the future, it would first need to start a process for these types of payments with the profitable franchisees.
Accepting Cryptocurrencies is Not a Problem for other Companies
For Tilman Fertitta, his actual car company doesn’t need to accept cryptocurrencies as a payment method. Fertitta, which speaks in pro of innovation, stated in an interview with CNBC on Tuesday, February 9, that the idea of offering vehicles in Bitcoin never happened through his head but to his team of employees.
Tilman said: “We’ve always talked about being innovative and being ahead of everyone else, don’t be a dinosaur here, or you won’t last.”
CEO and sole owner of Landry’s, Inc clarified with this example that perhaps General Motors’ adoption of Bitcoin does not depend on its buyers but rather on each of its franchised dealers uniquely. Despite General Motors’ recent refusal to use bitcoins, the automotive company has previously set their investments in many other projects that guard close relationship to the technology on which Bitcoin works, Blockchain. GM is currently using Blockchain to update navigation maps in their vehicles and avoid identity fraud when buying these vehicles.
By: Jenson Nuñez
