Elon Musk says future currency will be measured in wattage and tonnage, not dollars. Analyst Charles Edwards says Bitcoin (BTC) already works that way, and it trades about 36% below its energy-based value.
Musk never mentioned Bitcoin in the interview. Still, money anchored to energy describes the one property proof-of-work already builds into the network.
What Does Elon Musk Mean by Money Measured in Energy?
Musk made the remarks to his biographer, Walter Isaacson, on The Builders podcast. The interview was taped in early August and released on October 20.
Musk argued that AI and robotics will make money and work irrelevant. However, he stopped short of predicting the end of currency.
“There will be still a currency, but I think currency will be measured in fundamental physics metrics like, power, like wattage and tonnage, mass and energy… conventional currency will not matter in the future.”
Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, on The Builders podcast
The idea is not new for him. In June, Musk wrote on X that mass and energy would take the place of dollars.
The prediction also comes from the world’s richest person. Business Insider reported his net worth at about $920 billion on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
Is Bitcoin Already Priced in Wattage?
Edwards, founder of Capriole Investments and a member of BeInCrypto’s Market Intelligence Expert Council, responded within hours. In his view, energy and price share a one-to-one relationship.
His 2019 paper derives a fair value from the electricity miners spend. The inputs are hashrate, hardware efficiency, supply growth, and a fixed dollar-per-joule constant.
Capriole argues that price tends to revert toward this Energy Value over time. Unlike scarcity-based models, it also falls to zero if every miner switches off.
At press time, BTC trades near $83,264, up 2.3% in 24 hours, according to BeInCrypto Bitcoin price data. Against an Energy Value of $131,057, that leaves a gap of roughly 36%.
Closing it would require a gain of about 57%. Historically, price ran well above the line near the 2013, 2017, and 2021 peaks.
In contrast, readings below it lined up with the 2015, 2018, 2020, and 2022 lows. This cycle broke the pattern, as BTC tracked the line through 2024 and 2025 without a speculative premium.
Miners Kept the Power On. Why Didn’t Price Follow?
Blockchain.com data shows hashrate, the computing power securing Bitcoin, topping 1.1 zettahashes per second (ZH/s) in October 2025.
Since then, the metric has dipped toward 900 exahashes per second (EH/s) under pressure on Bitcoin miners. It has now climbed back above 1 ZH/s.
Meanwhile, price nearly halved from its October 2025 record before building a floor near $60,000 in June.
The energy behind the network barely moved while its dollar price did. JPMorgan’s recent Bitcoin production cost estimate of $85,000 sits just above today’s price.
Where the Elon Musk Wattage Argument Falls Short
Bitcoin answers only half of Musk’s formula. Proof-of-work ties it to energy, but nothing ties it to mass.
Musk may also mean energy itself as the unit of account, with no token involved.
His own record cuts both ways. In May 2021, Tesla suspended Bitcoin payments for cars, citing the fossil fuels burned in mining.
Hashrate is also a proxy rather than a power meter, since newer machines extract more hashes per watt.
Even so, the debate has flipped. The energy use Musk once cited against Bitcoin now ties it closer to his vision. By that measure, BTC may resemble future money more than the dollar does.
