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When historians look back on Donald Trump’s speech at the bitcoin 2024 conference in Nashville on Saturday, they will surely conclude that it was a momentous turning point for the cryptocurrency industry.
After scorning digital assets as president, Joe Biden’s potential successor — and thus potentially soon again the most powerful man on Earth — was suddenly all-in on crypto.
“Never sell your bitcoins,” he said to enthusiastic applause. “On day one I will fire Gary Gensler,” he added, repeating it for good effect as the assembled cryptocurrency faithful erupted at the idea of the demise of the securities regulator who is probably the most hated man to ever interact with the industry.
Of course, Trump was trying to please the crowd, especially because he wanted their votes to help him win back the White House in November.
Trump is a long-standing harsh critic of bitcoin and a man known for backtracking or reversing his political plans almost as quickly as he adopts new ones. But his enthusiastic full embrace of cryptocurrencies this time seemed too radical for it not to be a defining moment for digital assets.
So radical, in fact, that the Financial Times soon reported that the Democratic Party’s de facto presidential candidate, Kamala Harris, had her advisers reach out to senior industry figures at entities including Coinbase, Ripple Labs and Circle to try to rebuild strained relations with the sector.
bitcoin is now approaching $70,000, its highest level since mid-June, having gained more than 1.3% over the past 24 hours. bitcoin Cash (BCH) has surged 12% to trade at $446.75 as of 10.32am EST.
Here are the key takeaways from Trump's decisive speech:
The United States should dominate the future of cryptocurrencies
Trump said his vision is for the United States to dominate the future of the cryptocurrency industry and prevent countries like China from taking over.
“If we don’t embrace crypto and bitcoin, China and other countries will, they will dominate, and we cannot allow China to dominate,” he said.
He added that China, which has banned cryptocurrency mining and trading, was making too much progress in cryptocurrencies.
His comments came just two weeks after he said the cryptocurrency industry was still in its infancy and he would not be responsible for allowing another country to dominate the sphere.
The United States will maintain a strategic reserve of bitcoin
If elected president, Trump has promised to never sell the bitcoins held by the U.S. government. Instead, these coins would be the “core of the national strategic bitcoin reserve.”
He noted that the US government holds 210,000 btc, equivalent to 1% of the total bitcoin supply in assets seized by law enforcement agents. According to Trump, the confiscated coins will become a permanent national asset that will benefit all Americans.
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President Donald J. Trump confirmed that he has diamond hands and will never sell them twitter.com/hashtag/bitcoin?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>#bitcoin at the bitcoin Conference
Watch the full conference here: https://t.co/xvuUTxF6px
— bitcoin Magazine (@BitcoinMagazine) twitter.com/BitcoinMagazine/status/1817331276350689722?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>July 27, 2024
The United States will be a bitcoin mining powerhouse
The Republican presidential candidate said he would lead the United States to become “the undisputed bitcoin mining power of the world.”
He acknowledged that bitcoin mining requires large amounts of electricity and to meet this demand he said he plans to increase the electricity supply in an environmentally friendly way.
Trump also noted that he would ensure that bitcoin miners are not subject to “certain ridiculous requirements.”
Fire Gary Gensler
If elected president, Trump said he would replace Gary Gensler as Chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
“On day one, I will fire Gary Gensler,” Trump said.
He added that he would appoint a new SEC chairman who believes the United States “should build the future, not block it.”
Following numerous lawsuits filed by the SEC against cryptocurrency companies, Gensler has often been seen as an enemy of the cryptocurrency industry.
His anti-cryptocurrency stance has even led investors like Shark Tank investor Mark Cuban to say that Gensler would cost Democrats the presidency.
Create a cryptocurrency and bitcoin advisory board
Also on Trump's to-do list if he takes office is the creation of a Presidential Advisory Council on bitcoin and Cryptocurrencies.
The council will be tasked with developing transparent regulatory guidelines for the industry. These guidelines will be “clear, simple, direct and fair,” he said.
“We will have regulations, but from now on the rules will be written by people who love their industry, not hate it,” he said.
He also announced that he would order the US Treasury Department to stop the creation of a central bank digital currency (CBDC).
Closing of Operation Choke Point 2.0
Trump’s speech also included a plan to “shut down Operation Choke Point 2.0.”
Operation Choke Point 2.0 involves an alleged plan by the US government to cripple cryptocurrency companies. Trump claimed that if elected, the US government will not sit back and watch cryptocurrency jobs and companies move to other countries.
The former US president argued that the SEC under Gensler was aiming to annihilate bitcoin and said that this was “un-American.”
Trump also stated that US President Joe Biden and Kamala Harris were waging an anti-cryptocurrency crusade that will end as soon as Trump takes office.
Trump said Harris is worse than Biden when it comes to cryptocurrencies. “She is against cryptocurrencies, by the way. She is very much against them,” he said.
bitcoin will likely outperform gold
Trump expressed admiration for bitcoin's rapid growth in just 15 years, making it the ninth most valuable asset in the world.
He noted that bitcoin, with a market cap of over $1.3 trillion, could soon surpass silver's market cap of $1.5 trillion.
“It’s already bigger than Exxon Mobil,” Trump said. “Soon, it will surpass the entire market cap of silver… One day, it will probably surpass gold.”
Trump dismissed claims that bitcoin threatened the US dollar as “retrograde” and added that the US Biden administration's policies were the real threat to the dollar.
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