- Trump announced a “crypto reserve” that will include Ripple, Solana, Cardano, Bitcoin, and Ethereum.
- The announcement led to significant price increases for the included cryptocurrencies.
- Trump courted the crypto community during his campaign, despite being an early skeptic.
President Donald Trump — who once called cryptocurrencies a “scam” — triggered a rally for several major coins on Sunday after declaring plans to turn the United States into the “crypto capital of the world.”
Trump said in a post on his social-media network, Truth Social, that he would create a “Crypto Strategic Reserve” that would include the cryptocurrencies Ripple, Solana, and Cardano. In a follow-up post, Trump said that Bitcoin and Ethereum would also “be at the heart of the reserve.”
A strategic reserve is a pool of resources that a government withholds from normal use to be used in times of crisis or supply chain disruptions. The United States has other strategic reserves, like the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, which holds oil in 28 refineries along the Gulf Coast.
“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,” Trump said in the post. “I will make sure the U.S. is the Crypto Capital of the World.”
According to the crypto-tracking site CoinGecko, Ripple jumped over 30%, while Solana and Cardano rose by 21% and 61% after Trump’s announcement. Bitcoin also rose by 9%, and Ethereum jumped 12%.
As of Sunday afternoon, Ethereum was trading at $2,500 and Bitcoin was trading at $94,069, according to CoinGecko.
Trump’s announcement followed a pledge he made in July at the Bitcoin 2024 conference, where he vowed to keep all the cryptocurrency owned by the federal government — most of which was seized by law enforcement — in a “national Bitcoin stockpile.”
Trump’s post on Sunday was his first mention of a crypto reserve rather than a crypto stockpile. A crypto reserve involves actively buying cryptocurrency, while a stockpile would hold cryptocurrency the government already owns.
From ‘scam’ to fan
Trump’s effort to create the first US crypto strategic reserve marks the apex of his 180-degree turn on cryptocurrency.
During his first term in office, Trump called crypto a “scam.”
“I am not a fan of Bitcoin and other Cryptocurrencies, which are not money, and whose value is highly volatile and based on thin air,” he wrote on Twitter in 2019.
Trump appeared to have a change of heart during the 2024 presidential election, even launching his own crypto-banking venture, World Liberty Financial, in October.
“If we don’t do it, China will do it,” Trump said at the time, referring to embracing crypto as a mainstream currency. “We have to be the biggest and the best.”
After his election, Trump and first lady Melania Trump even released their own crypto meme coins.
A political shift
His embrace of crypto during the campaign may have helped both him and some down-ballot candidates unseat their Democratic rivals.
In total, pro-crypto super PACs injected over $131 million into the campaigns of pro-crypto congressional candidates. Over 85% of those candidates won their races, according to CBS.
The Biden administration, meanwhile, generally approached cryptocurrency with more skepticism. Biden signed a sweeping executive order on cryptocurrency in March 2022 that directed the Treasury Department to assess and develop regulations for the industry.
Crypto industry leaders were also broadly critical of former Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Gary Gensler, who served under Biden.
Trump received a standing ovation at the Bitcoin 2024 conference when he promised to fire Gensler if elected. The president has nominated Paul Atkins, who was SEC chairman under President George W. Bush and is an outspoken crypto supporter, to take his place.
