I think it's fair to suspect something here though, and question Musks behavior these last few years. Yes, originally he wanted to save the world with Tesla and also find a new world with SpaceX (at least that was the outspoken goals), but his current dealings that skirt on legality of things, gives another side of him.

Some people who seemed to be driven by the goodness of their heart ends up chasing the same money-dragon as many before them. It's not impossible.

...we are talking about Elon Musk, right? The one who got rich founding the definitely-ethical, not-at-all-shady company PayPal? That Elon Musk?

That's why they're not actual net worth. They are not liquid and will almost never be.

Private pump and dump schemes generate real cash, that can be used.

Musk can never leverage his Tesla stocks to do anything useful near the theoretical amount he has. better get some real cash that can buy actual yachts.

this is a good point, but if I held Tesla, I would probably prefer cash. it could be that Tesla's greatest value is as a prop for BTC scams.

Teslas catch on fire randomly. Their roofs fall off sometimes. Their self-driving tech doesn't work as well as people expect, and when people get that expectation wrong, it sometimes results in them dying. The bulk of the company's revenue comes from carbon credits.

maybe he's pumping and dumping Bitcoin because he doesn't expect his wealth to last, and if he sold a bunch of Tesla stock, people would notice. a little scam to set aside a nest egg just in case the other scam doesn't pan out.

the weaknesses in this argument are SpaceX and PayPal, so I'm not totally convinced of my own position here, but I haven't seen any good counterarguments otherwise.

he could also just find scams fun for their own sake.

Maybe there was no master plan, but it would be a lot better for his personal net-worth if he went long/short on bitcoin before each tweet.

For now. Spacex is going to be the most valuable company on Earth and Mars.

― Shel Silverstein