The cryptocurrency market surged over the weekend after President Trump announced his plans to create a strategic crypto reserve and hinted at details about the highly anticipated plan.
Bitcoin surged from nearly $85,000 to $94,000 on Sunday in the hours following Trump’s announcement on Truth Social. As of Monday, Bitcoin was trading at more than $91,400, marking a drastic increase from its three-month low of nearly $78,000 last Friday, according to CoinMarketCap
In a Truth Social post Sunday morning, Trump said a U.S. “crypto reserve” will “elevate this critical industry after years of corrupt attacks by the Biden administration.”
“Which is why my Executive Order on Digital Assets directed the Presidential Working Group to move forward on a Crypto Strategic Reserve that includes XRP, SOL, and ADA,” the president continued. “I will make sure the U.S. is the Crypto Capital of the World. We are MAKING AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”
“And, obviously, BTC and ETH, as other valuable Cryptocurrencies, will be at the heart of the Reserve,” he said in a follow-up post. “I also love Bitcoin and Ethereum!”
Several of the other cryptocurrencies called out by Trump experienced similar jumps in the market on Sunday.
Ether surged by about 13 percent at just under $2,300 on Monday morning, while XRP was up more than 15 percent, trading at $2.57 during the same period.
The rally comes just days after multiple cryptocurrencies plunged amid concerns about a breach at ByBit, a major cryptocurrency exchange. North Korea hackers allegedly stole $1.5 billion worth of digital currency from the exchange, stirring uncertainty in the market.
Uncertainty surrounding the new administration might have also contributed to last week’s plunges, observers told CNBC, despite Trump’s repeated support for the industry.
Trump has promised to make the United States the “crypto capital of the world,” and signed an executive order on digital currencies during his first week of office. The order did not explicitly lay out plans for a strategic bitcoin reserve and the market began to lag with little catalyst to push prices back up.
David Sacks, Trump’s crypto and artificial intelligence (AI) czar, said more details on the reserve will be shared at the first White House Crypto Summit, scheduled for this Friday.
Summit attendees will include founders, CEOs and investors from the crypto industry, as well as members of the President’s Working Group of Digital Assets, the White House announced last week.
