U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Thursday to establish a strategic bitcoin reserve just a day before a planned meeting with cryptocurrency industry executives in the White House. The move has been met with varied reactions.
The reserve will be funded with bitcoin seized by the federal government during criminal and civil asset forfeiture proceedings. This was confirmed by David Sacks, a billionaire and the White House’s crypto czar, in a post on social media platform X.
Attendees at the White House summit anticipated Trump would formally announce plans for a strategic reserve incorporating bitcoin and four other cryptocurrencies. Trump announced earlier in the week the five digital assets he planned to include in the reserve, which briefly increased the market value of each. The other cryptocurrencies included in the reserve are ether, XRP, solana and cardano.
The specifics of the reserve’s operational details and the benefits it would provide to taxpayers remain unclear. Sacks indicated the federal government would implement a strategy for maximizing the value of its holdings, but did not go into detail. “The U.S. will not sell any bitcoin deposited into the Reserve. It will be kept as a store of value. The Reserve is like a digital Fort Knox for the cryptocurrency often called “digital gold””, Sacks noted.
Trump’s support for the crypto industry, which significantly supported Trump and other Republicans in the November elections, has raised concerns among some conservatives and crypto backers. These concerns involve potential benefits for an already wealthy community and the broader legitimacy of the digital currency industry.
The executive order also directed the Treasury and Commerce secretaries to devise “budget-neutral strategies” for acquiring more bitcoin without incurring additional taxpayer expenses. Sacks estimates the U.S. government currently owns about 200,000 bitcoin, and that delaying the sale of the cryptocurrency has cost American taxpayers $17 billion, though the source of his calculations wasn’t immediately clear.
Trump’s alignment with the crypto industry has also ignited conflict-of-interest concerns. Notably, Trump’s family introduced cryptocurrency meme coins and he also holds a stake in World Liberty Financial, a crypto platform.
Following the announcement, bitcoin’s value briefly declined, falling more than 5% to below $85,000 before stabilizing at around $88,107. Charles Edwards, founder of Bitcoin-focused hedge fund Capriole Investments, wrote on X that “No active buying means this is just a fancy title for Bitcoin holdings that already existed with the Govt. This is a pig in lipstick.”
Trump’s aides have stated that he has transferred control of his business ventures, which are under review by outside ethics lawyers.
