Trump announces cryptocurrency reserve plan: 5 assets selected, but questioned for "ad space" and uncertain for implementation

Author: Weilin, PANews

On the evening of March 2, US President Trump announced the asset categories of the strategic reserve of cryptocurrencies on Truth Social, including XRP, SOL, and ADA. He then added that Bitcoin BTC and Ethereum ETH, as other valuable cryptocurrencies, will also be the core of the reserve.

Once the news was released, the cryptocurrency market rebounded quickly, with the five major currencies generally rising. As of 8:00 on March 3, the price of Bitcoin exceeded $94,000, up 9.71% on the day.

Trump announces 5 types of crypto assets in reserve: BTC, ETH, XRP, SOL, ADA

On March 2, amid a general market downturn, Trump suddenly released a statement on cryptocurrency reserves: "The U.S. cryptocurrency reserve will boost this critical industry after years of corrupt attacks by the Biden administration. That's why my digital asset executive order directs the Presidential Task Force to advance a strategic crypto reserve containing XRP, SOL, and ADA. I will ensure that the United States becomes the crypto capital of the world. We are making America great again!"

Subsequently, the crypto market was significantly boosted. As of 8:00 on March 3, Bitcoin was quoted at $94,338, up 9.71%; Ethereum was quoted at $2,513, up 13.41%; Solana (SOL) rose to $178, up 24.35%; XRP rose to $2.91, up 33%; Cardano (ADA) rose sharply by 72.16%. In addition, Trump's meme coin TRUMP also rose by 25.36%.

Trump had pledged to establish a "Strategic National Reserve of Bitcoin" at a Bitcoin conference in Nashville in 2024. In his keynote speech, Trump told the audience: "If I am elected, it will be the policy of my administration to reserve 100% of all Bitcoin currently held or acquired in the future by the United States government."

On January 23 of this year, within the first week of Trump taking office, he signed a crypto executive order as president, instructing the Digital Asset Working Group to study the feasibility of establishing a national crypto reserve and explore a regulatory framework for stablecoins.

“President Trump announced the creation of a strategic crypto reserve comprised of Bitcoin and other top cryptocurrencies. This is consistent with his Executive Order 14178, which he issued in week one,” David Sacks, the White House’s director of artificial intelligence and cryptography, wrote on the X platform. He added: “More news will be released during the summit.”

It is reported that President Trump will attend and speak at the first White House Cryptocurrency Summit on March 7. Participants will include well-known founders, CEOs and investors in the cryptocurrency industry, as well as members of the President's Digital Asset Task Force. The summit will be hosted by David Sacks, the White House AI and cryptocurrency czar, and managed by Bo Hines, executive director of the task force.

Is there any "interest transfer" in the tilt towards multiple assets? The implementation method still needs to be clarified

Although the latest progress in the strategic reserve of cryptocurrencies has boosted the market, some industry insiders have questioned Trump's crypto reserve plan. In particular, the inclusion of ADA has caused some unexpected reactions. According to @CryptoDoggyCN, in early February, ADA founder Charles Hoskinson announced in a live broadcast that he would meet a big shot. On February 27, he posted that he could not go to ETHDenver and had to go to Florida, where Trump's home, Mar-a-Lago, is located. @CryptoDoggyCN believes that the inclusion of ADA may be influenced by a kind of lobbying.

Some influential figures in the technology and crypto industries have criticized Trump for including cryptocurrencies other than Bitcoin in the reserve. AngelList co-founder Naval Ravikant wrote: "American taxpayers should not be 'on the hook' for cryptocurrencies that are nominally decentralized." He added: "If it has lobbyists, it's not decentralized." Aave founder Stani Kulechov also wrote: "Good news: strategic crypto reserves are in preparation; bad news: lack of DeFi; ugly news: XRP, SOL and ADA."

Alex Xu, research partner at Mint Ventures, analyzed that SOL, XRP, and ADA have been frequenting Mar-a-Lago since Trump took office, and have also provided Trump with a lot of open sponsorship, such as donations to the inauguration fund, etc. There is a high probability that all kinds of roundabout benefits will be transferred privately. This time, Trump also returned the favor and gave an open feedback, arranging an "advertising space" within the presidential authority. However, in the long run, projects such as ada and xrp can be used as reserve assets to promote. This absurd practice will only weaken the seriousness of the BTC strategic reserve itself and further reduce the possibility of the BTC reserve bill being passed at the federal level. It is one thing to let the working group advance the work, and it is another to succeed at the legislative level. The Republican advantage in the House of Representatives is very weak, and it is impossible to pass legislation to pass sol, ada, and xrp into the national reserve. The only possibility is that Trump establishes a national sovereign fund directly under the Treasury Department through the executive branch, so that the above assets can be directly purchased without federal legislation. But how likely is this? How much benefit do SOL, XRP, and ADA need to deliver to the Trump family before the president explicitly orders to buy these things with taxpayers' money?

In addition, industry insiders pointed out that in the past few months, Trump has used the words "reserve" and "stockpile" interchangeably when referring to relevant policies, but there are some key differences between them. Rebecca Rettig, chief legal officer of Jito Labs, said: "As I understand it, the reserve means that the government will hold the cryptocurrencies they have accumulated through various cases, and the reserve is ultimately what the Treasury Department decides to buy and hold."

Analyst Jason Chen said on the X platform that there is a very uncertain factor in the package of cryptocurrency strategic reserve plans: how to complete the reserve? According to Trump's extremely selfish style as a businessman, he has always adhered to the principle of not spending money if he can get it for free. It is difficult to expect him to take out real money from his pocket to buy to complete the reserve and then "pull up the market". The US fiscal deficit has reached 1.83 trillion US dollars and the landlords have no surplus food. Therefore, Trump is likely to complete the reserve in a way that does not require spending money, such as requiring the government to stop selling the BTC it holds, allowing cryptocurrency-related companies to use BTC to pay taxes, and even actively handing it over through donations.

He said that in the future, APT, SUI, MOVE, etc. may be reserved. If the money is not taken out to complete the reserve, the nature of the benefit is essentially equivalent to locking the position, that is, the funds flowing into the strategic reserve will not be sold for a long time, for example, offsetting the negative impact of the US government's market crash that everyone was most worried about before, and it will not really be like BlackRock and MicroStrategy using money to pull up the market.

Nevertheless, on March 3, Zhao Changpeng, former CEO of Binance, expressed his observations on the current market in an article on the X platform. The current market is obviously dominated by "US crypto assets" (US Coins), which have promoted the development of encryption. It is good to see any progress in the adoption of cryptocurrencies. The industry as a whole benefits and keeps building.

Coinbase co-founder and CEO Brian Armstrong said on the X platform when talking about investment strategies: "I think investing only in Bitcoin may be the best option - the simplest, and the logic behind it as the successor to gold is also clear; if people want more diversified options, they can build a market capitalization-weighted crypto asset index to keep it unbiased. But maybe the first option is the simplest."

At present, the five major categories of crypto asset reserves announced by Trump have injected optimism into the market, but its implementation methods and specific results still need time to test. The future market will further verify them, and PANews will pay close attention to subsequent developments.