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Specs’ Insights

Donald Trump says he’ll ‘never allow’ CBDC issuance if elected

The former US president said in a campaign speech in New Hampshire that he won’t allow a central bank digital currency if he gets elected.

⌐◪-◪ → Trump just promised voters that, “As your president, I will never allow the creation of a CBDC. Such a currency would give our federal government absolute control over your money”.

Love him or hate him, this is super bullish for crypto — as we now have a leading US Presidential Candidate discussing crypto on a deeper level than ever seen before.

Trump’s comment comes as the Federal Reserve explores the possibility of a CBDC, which would only happen after some form of authorizing law.

Zooming out, CBDCs are gaining traction around the world — with 130 countries, representing 98% of the world’s gross domestic product — exploring their own CBDCs.

Among those 130 countries, 64 are in an advanced phase - with the European Central Bank announcing its Digital Euro preparation phase, and China completing its first international crude oil trade with a Digital Yuan.

I definitely respect the Fed’s open-mindedness here, but agree with Trump that a CBDC would almost certainly be an Orwellian nightmare and a massive blow to Americans' freedom to transact and privacy.

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⌐◪-◪ → After trading for just a week, Bitcoin ETFs have surpassed silver ETFs in terms of total assets under management at $27.5B.

In comparison, Silver has $11.5B AUM across 5 ETFs, and Gold has $96.3B AUM across 18 ETFs — 3.5x Bitcoin.

In terms of activity, cumulative volume for the 11 spot Bitcoin ETFs surpassed $11.1B on Wednesday, with 3 players — Grayscale, BlackRock, and Fidelity — dominating with over 90% of all trading.

Interestingly enough - if you zoom out from the ETFs specifically, and look at the broader market caps for Silver vs Bitcoin, you’ll observe that Silver is still in the lead at an estimated $1.28T vs. $835M for Bitcoin.

Pretty cool to see how ETF AUM compares to the actual market caps of these commodities.

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Tether now owns $2.8 billion worth of bitcoin after recent $380 million buy

Tether bought another $380 million of bitcoin at the end of last quarter, bringing its total holdings to about $2.8 billion.

⌐◪-◪ → USDT stablecoin issuer, Tether, now owns $2.8B worth of Bitcoin after their recent $380M purchase.

Tether began purchasing Bitcoin in September 2022 and has consistently acquired more every quarter. Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino says the company will continue allocating 15% of its quarterly profits to buying Bitcoin.

This maintains Tether’s ranking as the 11th-largest Bitcoin holder in the world according to The Block.

For context, BlackRock’s Bitcoin ETF now holds $1.06B, so I guess the traditional finance (TradFi) suits still have some catching up to do with the crypto-natives.

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