When it comes to PayPal, Elon Musk is often described as the cofounder of the platform hailed as the pioneer of the digital payments industry. PayPal is one of the biggest reasons why Musk carries a wonder boy PR.

Let us tell you one small fun fact- PayPal is the successor of a company originally named Confinity that came into being in 1998. Interestingly, Confinity wasn’t founded by Elon Musk, rather it was a brainchild of Max Levchin, Peter Thiel, and Luke Nosek.

The first digital payments version of Confinity was launched in 1999. By that time, a remarkably similar platform called x.com had come into being. X.com was founded by Musk, Harris Fricker, Christopher Payne and Ed Ho. Musk served as the x.com CEO.

In 2000, the two digital payments firms got merged with each other. However, combining the two firms did not turn out out be very successful. Elon Musk took over as the CEO in April 2000 and was fired in October 2000.

Later, Peter Thiel took over as the CEO of the merged company and the company got rechristened as PayPal in the year June 2001. PayPal launched its first IPO in February 2002 and later eBay purchased it for $1.5 billion. Elon Musk, who still held a stake in PayPal, made a windfall gain of $180 million from the sake and suddenly became super-rich. Later, he would invest this money into other ventures like SpaceX, Tesla and SolarCity.

So, Elon Musk was not a founder of Confinity which would go on to become PayPal. When Confinity was rechristened as PayPal, he wasn’t a CEO of the entity formed by merger of Confinity and x.com. Nor was Elon Musk the CEO of PayPal when it released its first IPO or when it subsequently signed a sale agreement with eBay.

Yet, Elon Musk has become known as the founder of PayPal and the pioneer of the digital payments industry.

https://tfipost.com/2021/09/unmasking-musk-was-elon-musk-really-a-cofounder-of-paypal/

FYI - I don't care one way or another. At all. I don't dislike the man, but he isn't my hero.