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Elon Musk ponders “high-yield” savings feature for Twitter creators
Elon Musk appears to be going back to his roots, with the Tesla CEO stating during a livestreamed meeting hosted on Twitter Spaces that the social media platform might start offering a high-yield money market account for creators. The funds could be from money earned from paywalled content.
Speculations are high that Twitter is developing a “Paywalled Video” feature that would let content creators charge users to access their work. This should place Twitter in direct competition with services like Instagram Reels, TikTok, and YouTube Shorts. Creators could utilize this functionality to charge as little as $1 for users to access their paywalled material, and they would have cash balances in their Twitter accounts as a result.
Offering a high-yield money market account on Twitter could incentivize creators on the social media platform to publish paywalled content. High-yield money market accounts are similar to high-yield savings accounts, which pay higher interest rates than traditional savings accounts. As noted in an Insider report, traditional savings accounts can offer interest rates under 1%, but high-yield savings accounts can earn over 3% interest.
While online financial services may seem utterly different from Musk’s ventures like Tesla and SpaceX, his roots actually lie in such services. In the late 90s, Musk co-founded X.com, one of the internet’s earliest online banks. X.com eventually merged with competitor Confinity Inc., and the merged companies became PayPal. PayPal was later bought by eBay, and Musk used his earnings from the transaction to fund SpaceX and Tesla.
Prior to his acquisition of Twitter, Musk had floated the idea of rolling out “X,” an “everything app” that would reflect much of the functionalities of WeChat, China’s all-in-one super app. Musk had noted that Twitter’s acquisition should accelerate the creation of an everything app like X by about 3-5 years.
Twitter’s high-yield savings feature could very well be just the tip of the iceberg for the changes that are coming to the social media platform. In previous statements, Larry Lee, Rapyd’s global head of financial networks, noted that Musk probably has the best chance at creating a “super app” of sorts. Such an app could include services such as ride-haling, food delivery, online payments, and more.
For now, however, Musk has his hands full with Twitter’s existing issues. Reports have suggested that Musk and Twitter are now focusing on addressing the platform’s problems with bots, spam, and troll accounts. Musk also has to refine the rollout of his $8 Twitter Blue revamp, which provides verification marks to users who are willing to opt-in to the subscription.
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Elon Musk
Tesla removes Autopilot as standard, receives criticism online
The move leaves only Traffic Aware Cruise Control as standard equipment on new Tesla orders.
Tesla removed its basic Autopilot package as a standard feature in the United States. The move leaves only Traffic Aware Cruise Control as standard equipment on new Tesla orders, and shifts the company’s strategy towards paid Full Self-Driving subscriptions.
Tesla removes Autopilot
As per observations from the electric vehicle community on social media, Tesla no longer lists Autopilot as standard in its vehicles in the U.S. This suggests that features such as lane-centering and Autosteer have been removed as standard equipment. Previously, most Tesla vehicles came with Autopilot by default, which offers Traffic-Aware Cruise Control and Autosteer.
The change resulted in backlash from some Tesla owners and EV observers, particularly as competing automakers, including mainstream players like Toyota, offer features like lane-centering as standard on many models, including budget vehicles.
That being said, the removal of Autopilot suggests that Tesla is concentrating its autonomy roadmap around FSD subscriptions rather than bundled driver-assistance features. It would be interesting to see how Tesla manages its vehicles’ standard safety features, as it seems out of character for Tesla to make its cars less safe over time.
Musk announces FSD price increases
Following the Autopilot changes, Elon Musk stated on X that Tesla is planning to raise subscription prices for FSD as its capabilities improve. In a post on X, Musk stated that the current $99-per-month price for supervised FSD would increase over time, especially as the system itself becomes more robust.
“I should also mention that the $99/month for supervised FSD will rise as FSD’s capabilities improve. The massive value jump is when you can be on your phone or sleeping for the entire ride (Unsupervised FSD),” Musk wrote.
At the time of his recent post, Tesla still offers FSD as a one-time purchase for $8,000, but Elon Musk has confirmed that this option will be discontinued on February 14, leaving subscriptions as the only way to access the system.
Tesla has initiated Cybertruck deliveries in a new region for the first time, as the all-electric pickup has officially made its way to the United Arab Emirates, marking the newest territory to receive the polarizing truck.
Tesla launched orders for the Cybertruck in the Middle East back in September 2025, just months after the company confirmed that it planned to launch the pickup in the region, which happened in April.
I took a Tesla Cybertruck weekend Demo Drive – Here’s what I learned
By early October, Tesla launched the Cybertruck configurator in the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia, with pricing starting at around AED 404,900, or about $110,000 for the Dual Motor configuration.
This decision positioned the Gulf states as key early international markets, and Tesla was hoping to get the Cybertruck outside of North America for the first time, as it has still been tough to launch in other popular EV markets, like Europe and Asia.
By late 2025, Tesla had pushed delivery timelines slightly and aimed for an early 2026 delivery launch in the Middle East. The first official customer deliveries started this month, and a notable handover event occurred in Dubai’s Al Marmoom desert area, featuring a light and fire show.
Around 63 Cybertrucks made their way to customers during the event:
First @cybertruck deliveries in the UAE 🇦🇪 pic.twitter.com/sN2rAxppUA
— Tesla Europe & Middle East (@teslaeurope) January 22, 2026
As of this month, the Cybertruck still remains available for configuration on Tesla’s websites for the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and other Middle Eastern countries like Jordan and Israel. Deliveries are rolling out progressively, with the UAE leading as the first to see hands-on customer events.
In other markets, most notably Europe, there are still plenty of regulatory hurdles that Tesla is hoping to work through, but they may never be resolved. The issues come from the unique design features that conflict with the European Union’s (EU) stringent safety standards.
These standards include pedestrian protection regulations, which require vehicles to minimize injury risks in collisions. However, the Cybertruck features sharp edges and an ultra-hard stainless steel exoskeleton, and its rigid structure is seen as non-compliant with the EU’s list of preferred designs.
The vehicle’s gross weight is also above the 3.5-tonne threshold for standard vehicles, which has prompted Tesla to consider a more compact design. However, the company’s focus on autonomy and Robotaxi has likely pushed that out of the realm of possibility.
For now, Tesla will work with the governments that want it to succeed in their region, and the Middle East has been a great partner to the company with the launch of the Cybertruck.
Tesla has officially launched public Robotaxi rides in Austin, Texas, without a Safety Monitor in the vehicle, marking the first time the company has removed anyone from the vehicle other than the rider.
The Safety Monitor has been present in Tesla Robotaxis in Austin since its launch last June, maintaining safety for passengers and other vehicles, and was placed in the passenger’s seat.
Tesla planned to remove the Safety Monitor at the end of 2025, but it was not quite ready to do so. Now, in January, riders are officially reporting that they are able to hail a ride from a Model Y Robotaxi without anyone in the vehicle:
I am in a robotaxi without safety monitor pic.twitter.com/fzHu385oIb
— TSLA99T (@Tsla99T) January 22, 2026
Tesla started testing this internally late last year and had several employees show that they were riding in the vehicle without anyone else there to intervene in case of an emergency.
Tesla has now expanded that program to the public. It is not active in the entire fleet, but there are a “few unsupervised vehicles mixed in with the broader robotaxi fleet with safety monitors,” Ashok Elluswamy said:
Robotaxi rides without any safety monitors are now publicly available in Austin.
Starting with a few unsupervised vehicles mixed in with the broader robotaxi fleet with safety monitors, and the ratio will increase over time. https://t.co/ShMpZjefwB
— Ashok Elluswamy (@aelluswamy) January 22, 2026
Tesla Robotaxi goes driverless as Musk confirms Safety Monitor removal testing
The Robotaxi program also operates in the California Bay Area, where the fleet is much larger, but Safety Monitors are placed in the driver’s seat and utilize Full Self-Driving, so it is essentially the same as an Uber driver using a Tesla with FSD.
In Austin, the removal of Safety Monitors marks a substantial achievement for Tesla moving forward. Now that it has enough confidence to remove Safety Monitors from Robotaxis altogether, there are nearly unlimited options for the company in terms of expansion.
While it is hoping to launch the ride-hailing service in more cities across the U.S. this year, this is a much larger development than expansion, at least for now, as it is the first time it is performing driverless rides in Robotaxi anywhere in the world for the public to enjoy.
Tesla removes Autopilot as standard, receives criticism online
Tesla begins Cybertruck deliveries in a new region for the first time
