(Kitco News) – Even as the White House Digital Assets Summit continued on Friday afternoon, the cryptosphere was still digesting the implications of President Trump’s strategic U.S. Bitcoin reserve, with some judging it underwhelming due to the absence of a provision funding new crypto purchases, while others lauded the value of having the U.S. government as a long-term investor in the space.
And while gold investors have had reason to be nervous about the new administration’s crypto strategy, Trump’s crypto czar provided some limited reassurance to precious metals hodlers.
“There have been no discussions about selling gold to buy Bitcoin,” said David Sacks in an interview on Friday. “The Treasury and Commerce Departments will evaluate any future decisions regarding Bitcoin accumulation, but no official talks have been held yet.”
Sacks also took to social media to lament the money the U.S. government has lost by selling much of its seized Bitcoin over the past decade.
Over the past decade, the federal government sold approximately 195,000 bitcoin for proceeds of $366 million. If the government had held the bitcoin, it would be worth over $17 billion today. That’s how much it has cost American taxpayers not to have a long-term strategy.
— David Sacks (@davidsacks47) March 6, 2025
Whether or not the strategic reserve will prove to be a turning point for digital currencies over the long term, the crypto market didn’t get the near-term pop it was hoping for, with Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies sliding in the wake of the announcement and throughout the White House summit.
Part of the reason for this was administration officials – and Trump himself – earlier in the week teasing the possibility of a number of altcoins being included in the reserve. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick suggested the new policy would tokens other than Bitcoin.
“The President definitely thinks that there’s a Bitcoin strategic reserve,” Secretary Lutnick told Ksenija Pavlovic McAteer of The Pavlovic Today on Tuesday evening. “Now, there will be the question of, how do we handle the other cryptocurrencies? And I think the model is going to be announced on Friday when we do that.”
Lutnick made the comments on Tuesday evening ahead of the White House Digital Assets Summit, and he conceded that Bitcoin would have a special status under Trump’s plan.
“A Bitcoin strategic reserve is something the President’s interested in. He spoke about it all during the campaign trail, and I think you’re going to see it executed on Friday,” Lutnick said. “Bitcoin is one thing, and then the other currencies, the other crypto tokens, I think, will be treated differently – positively, but differently.”
Trump shared his essential stance toward a Bitcoin strategic reserve in a recent Truth Social post, which also suggested that a number of altcoins were being considered for inclusion.
“A U.S. Crypto Reserve will elevate this critical industry after years of corrupt attacks by the Biden Administration, which is why 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,” he wrote. “I will make sure the U.S. is the Crypto Capital of the World. We are MAKING AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”
“And, obviously, BTC and ETH, as other valuable Cryptocurrencies, will be at the heart of the Reserve,” he wrote in a separate post. “I also love Bitcoin and Ethereum!”
The White House Digital Assets Summit is being chaired by David Sacks and Bo Hines, and several of the leading players in the crypto sector are attending. These include Michael Saylor, co-founder of Strategy, the world's largest Bitcoin holding company, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse, Chainlink co-founder Sergey Nazarov, and Exodus CEO JP Richardson.
Trump signed Executive Order 14178 in his first week in office, which, among other provisions, aims at “protecting and promoting the ability of individual citizens and private-sector entities alike to access and use for lawful purposes open public blockchain networks […] and to maintain self-custody of digital assets” and “providing regulatory clarity and certainty built on technology-neutral regulations.”
It also states the Trump administration’s intention to take measures “to protect Americans from the risks of Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs), which threaten the stability of the financial system, individual privacy, and the sovereignty of the United States, including by prohibiting the establishment, issuance, circulation, and use of a CBDC within the jurisdiction of the United States.”
Bitcoin’s price spiked to a high above $91,000 shortly after the U.S. market open on Friday, but it slid steadily lower as the more grandiose predictions about the government’s crypto strategy proved false. King Crypto last traded at $86,751.40 for a loss of 3.53% on the session.
