Tesla CEO Elon Musk's fortune has been reduced by more than $20 billion since his appearance on the popular TV show Saturday Night Live, according to Forbes.
Prior to his appearance on the show last May 9, Forbes estimated Musk's fortune to be as high as $166 billion. On the show, Musk admitted he has Asperger's syndrome and said Dogecoin is a scam.
Musk's words resulted in the price of the crypto suffering losses of 30% in one day. Last May 13, the entrepreneur announced Tesla would stop accepting Bitcoin as a payment method for its electric vehicles, which resulted in the price of Bitcoin dropping to $47,000.
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Tesla as well as other Bitcoin-related companies joined the decline. When the markets closed on Thursday night, Tesla's stock price had dropped by 15%. As a result, the fortune of Musk, who owns a 21% stake in the company, fell by $20.5 billion to $145.5 billion, according to Forbes.
Stock market experts believe Musk's recent statements are confusing cryptocurrency investors and leading to additional volatility in Tesla shares. Analysts also associate the drop in TSLA's price with news that the company has refused to expand its Shanghai plant due to uncertainty in China-US relations.