Elon Musk Taps Captain Kirk to Showcase X Money

Elon Musk’s new payment app X Money has rolled out limited external beta testing this week, with early screenshots showing that users will be eligible for cashback and yield on deposits.

One of the beta testers was Hollywood actor William Shatner, who played Captain Kirk in the original Star Trek series.

Several screenshots shared by Shatner show that X Money users will be able to earn cashback on certain card purchases and earn 6% annual percentage yield on deposits. 

Another screenshot shows that deposits are held by Cross River Bank, a member of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, and are insured up to $250,000 per person.

X Money is part of Musk’s “everything app” vision

On Feb. 11, Musk said X Money would go to external beta before launching to X users worldwide. It had been in closed beta testing since at least May 2025.

The integration of crypto payments into X Money remains a mystery, however.

X Money is part of Musk’s broader vision to make X an everything app, from payments and private messaging to AI chatbot services through Grok, creator content, identity and more.

“This is intended to be the place where all money is. The central source of all monetary transactions,” Musk said in February, calling it a “game changer.”

X, Shatner to expand beta testing 

Shatner has since used the $42 Musk sent him to raise money for charity. With the permission of X, Shatner auctioned out 42 X Money beta invites for $1,000 each. 

Each of the 42 winning bidders would receive a $25 welcome gift card from X and also $1, initially sent to Shatner by Musk. 

After the first auction, Shatner and X opened up a second round of invites, auctioning out another 166 beta invites, also for $1,000.

To be eligible, users must be US residents over 18 and maintain an active X account in “good standing.”

Those who register will be able to receive a metal X Money debit card with their username from X’s partner, Visa, Shatner noted.

No sign of crypto

Musk’s appreciation for Dogecoin (DOGE) has sparked speculation in the crypto community that the memecoin could be part of X’s future, but nothing concrete has come of it, let alone any integration into X Money.

Related: Kraken wins Kansas City Fed approval for limited master account access

X Money marks a return to the payment space for Musk, having founded X.com in the late 1990s before it merged to become PayPal.

Over the last few years, X has secured money transmitter licenses in over 40 US states and registered with the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network to make peer-to-peer payments possible on the platform.

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