Donald Trump took credit on Thursday for bitcoin crossing the $100,000 mark, a symbolic threshold exceeded overnight, one month exactly after the election of the billionaire, a major promoter of the sector, who continues to galvanize the crypto-sphere.
“Congratulations to bitcoin fans!!! 100,000 dollars!!! IT’S NO MESS!!! Together, we will make America great again,” declared the president-elect on his Truth Social network, who will enter the White House on January 20.
Around 1:25 p.m. GMT, the largest cryptocurrency by capitalization was trading at $103,192.25. It was still hovering around $69,000 on November 5, election day.
It reached a record of $103,800.45 overnight, after Donald Trump’s announcement on Wednesday of his intention to place someone close to the sector at the head of the American financial markets policeman, the SEC.
Such a level, far from being imagined 16 years ago when the currency was created, gives a little more credibility to the still controversial field of digital assets, which sees the return of the Republican leader to the White House as a boon, especially with Elon Musk at his side.
After describing cryptocurrencies as a scam during his first term, Donald Trump changed his tune during his campaign – partly financed by the sector – proclaiming his intention to make the United States “the world capital of bitcoin and cryptocurrencies”.
Ministry of Crypto
The price of the digital currency even soared by more than 8% during the night from Wednesday to Thursday after Donald Trump’s announcement that he planned to appoint Republican lawyer Paul Atkins to head the American authority of regulation of financial markets (SEC).
His name “electrified the crypto community, reinforcing optimism about a more accommodating regulatory landscape” and “a lenient approach to this booming market,” observes Stephen Innes of SPI Asset Management.
Mr. Atkins publicly criticized SEC officials last year, saying they should have been “more accommodating” with “crypto” companies and accusing them of luring entrepreneurs away from the American market.
Paul Atkins will succeed Gary Gensler, whose repressive approach to digital currencies raised eyebrows in the sector. His early resignation in November had already caused the price of bitcoin to jump.
The surge in recent weeks has also been fueled by the possibility of the creation by Donald Trump of a ministry responsible for cryptocurrencies or the intention attributed to him to create a strategic reserve of bitcoins in the United States, mainly thanks to tokens seized by the courts, which would further legitimize the currency.
“Could he be the president who allows cryptocurrencies to become widespread, will Americans be able to use them to pay their taxes? There is a greater chance that this will happen,” recently noted Kathleen Brooks, expert for the broker XTB.
Salvador and Central Africa
Many cryptocurrencies and companies in the sector saw their prices explode after the American election, like the Bitcoin service provider MicroStrategy and the exchange platform Coinbase.
Dogecoin, a crypto initially created as a joke, and which Elon Musk became infatuated with from 2019, has also ridden the wave.
Bitcoin was born in 2008 from a libertarian dream: to escape the control of financial institutions by relying on a technology (“blockchain”) which makes it possible to record transactions in a decentralized and unfalsifiable manner thanks to a network of computers in the whole world.
Over the years, bitcoin, like other cryptocurrencies, has been involved in several financial scandals, the preferred currency of hackers or to monetize illicit activities.
Today he is in search of respectability. In 2021, El Salvador was the first country to adopt it as legal tender, without convincing the population, followed by the Central African Republic. Some merchants accept it as a means of payment, as Elon Musk did for his Tesla cars before turning around.
In the United States, two new investment products (ETFs), one tracking the performance of bitcoin, the other that of ether, the second main cryptocurrency, have attracted tens of billions this year, contributing to the soaring course. (What with AFP)
