GuShiio.com Not surprisingly, the White House’s first Digital Assets Summit really had no surprises, but a show between Trump and crypto industry supporters.
Author: Weilin, PANews
Not surprisingly, the White House’s first Digital Assets Summit really had no surprises, but a show between Trump and crypto industry supporters.
At 4:40 a.m. Beijing time on March 8, US President Trump delivered a brief speech at the first White House Digital Assets Summit. He said that last year, I promised to make the United States the global Bitcoin superpower and the world’s encryption capital. We are taking historic action to make good on that promise, with our advice: “Starting today, the United States will follow the rule that every Bitcoin holder knows well-never sell your Bitcoin.”
Trump mentioned that the day before the summit, he signed an executive order to establish a Bitcoin strategic reserve and a digital asset reserve, and said that he would end the Biden administration’s “Operation Strangling 2.0” targeting the crypto industry.
Trump: “Never sell your bitcoin”, build a strategic reserve of bitcoin, end “Operation Strangler 2.0”
Trump said at the beginning that he welcomed to the first White House Digital Assets Summit. I know many of you have been fighting for this for years, and it is an honor to be with you here at the White House. Last year, I promised to make the United States the global Bitcoin superpower and the world’s crypto capital. We are taking historic action to deliver on that promise, as all of you here know.
There were many crypto policy officials and business executives present, and meeting participants sitting next to Trump were: White House Artificial Intelligence and Cryptography Czar David Sacks, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Small Business Administration Director Kelly Loeffler, SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce, House Majority Whip Tom Emmer, and Acting CFTC Chairman Caroline Pham. Bryan Steil, Chairman of the House Digital Assets Subcommittee, and Bo Hines, White House Digital Assets Policy Advisor.
It is reported that this is the first time that the United States has hosted the White House Digital Assets Summit. Speaking at this historic event, Trump said: “Yesterday, I signed an executive order formally creating our strategic bitcoin reserve, which will become a digital ‘Fort Knox’ used to store digital gold and belongs to the U.S. Treasury Department.” He emphasized that the federal government already holds a large number of bitcoins, about 200,000, which were obtained through various law enforcement actions.
Trump focused his criticism of past federal policies, particularly during President Biden’s administration, noting that the government “foolishly sold tens of thousands of bitcoins that would have been worth billions of dollars if they hadn’t.” He proposed a new guiding principle for the new administration and advised: “From today on, the United States will follow the rule that every Bitcoin holder knows well-never sell your Bitcoin.”
Trump also directed the Treasury and Commerce Departments to find cost-free ways to increase Bitcoin holdings. Trump assured attendees: “The Treasury and Commerce Departments will also explore new ways to accumulate more bitcoin for reserves, provided that there is no cost to taxpayers.”
When talking about regulatory issues, Trump highlighted plans to end Operation Choke Point 2.0 and criticized the Biden administration for pressuring banks to close accounts related to crypto-business. “Regulators are forcing banks to close the accounts of crypto companies and entrepreneurs,” Trump said. He promised that under his leadership, this practice would be ended.
Trump finally expressed his support for Congress’s legislative work on stablecoins and digital assets, and urged the passage of relevant regulations as soon as possible before the August recess to provide clear guidance. Under previous plans, the original goal was to submit legislation within 100 days of his term, but the timetable has now been extended by four months.
Failure to mention that the new policy was lower than expected triggered a brief market decline, and the guests at the meeting collectively made a scene.
After Trump’s speech, White House Director of Artificial Intelligence and Cryptocurrency David Sacks, U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Director of the Small Business Administration Kelly Loeffler, and House Majority Whip Tom Emmer all mentioned some crypto policies, but there was no disclosure of the latest developments, and they expressed their gratitude to Trump.
Among them, U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said,”In this executive order, the Treasury Department’s important responsibilities involve tax policy and risk-weighting assessment. In this regard, I can assure you that we will work closely with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to revoke and revise all inappropriate existing guidelines. In addition, we will carefully and prudently formulate a regulatory framework for stablecoins. As President Trump has directed, we will ensure that the U.S. dollar continues to serve as the world’s leading reserve currency and use stablecoins to strengthen this position.”
Gemini founder Cameron Winklevoss and Chainlink founder Sergey Nazarov, as guests present, also expressed their gratitude for the Trump administration’s shift in encryption policy.
However, due to Trump’s failure to announce more substantial progress in the encryption policy, Bitcoin prices continued to decline after the White House Digital Assets Summit, falling below the $86,000 range after the live broadcast.
In addition to the attendees mentioned above, according to previous lists, those attending the summit included Strategy founder Michael Saylor, Coinbase Joint Venture and CEO Brian Armstrong, a16z partner Chris Dixon, mining company Mara CEO Fred Thiel, BitGo CEO Mike Belshe, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse, Gemini founders Cameron Winklevoss and Tyler Winklevoss, Robinhood Joint Venture and CEO Vlad Tenev, Kraken CEO Arjun Sethi and many other crypto industry leaders.
Before this meeting, market rumors were that Trump would announce that cryptocurrency sales would be exempt from capital gains tax, but then senior White House officials confirmed that the digital assets summit hosted by Trump would not involve tax issues, but instead focus on withdrawing the restrictive policies of the former Biden administration and listening to industry feedback on regulation.
Before the White House Crypto Summit, David Sacks, White House Director of Artificial Intelligence and Cryptography, said in an interview that Bitcoin has important strategic significance to the United States due to its scarcity and long-term reserve value. When discussing strategic bitcoin reserves and digital asset reserves, it said that the reason why ADA, SOL and XRP were mentioned is that they rank among the top five in market capitalisation and does not mean that the government has a special preference or policy inclination for these assets.
According to Fox reporter Eleanor Terrett, the founder of Strategy submitted a document on digital assets to the Presidential Working Group and the SEC Cryptography Task Force. The document became one of the topics of discussion at the White House Crypto Summit, with the cover focusing on digital asset terminology, policy vision and goals. The core goals include:
- “Establish and improve the framework to promote the revival of encryption.”
- “Unleash the potential of the crypto industry and promote global economic growth.”
- “Become the world’s banker by revitalizing capitalism and the property rights system.”
In general, although no major policy progress has been announced after the White House Digital Assets Summit, the market is still very looking forward to Trump’s future encryption policy. After this historic summit, whether the Trump administration’s crypto policies can truly drive industry change will remain the focus of attention in the crypto market.
