Bitcoin, dogecoin: Crypto prices surge amid investor thrill about Trump

The worth of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies soared on Monday, extending a rally set off last week by the reelection of former President Donald Trump.

Bitcoin climbed 6.5% in worth in early market activity on Monday, hitting a record high as it surged history $84,000 for the first period ever. Ether, the second-largest cryptocurrency by economy capitalization, jumped more than 3%.

The euphoria also lifted lesser-known coins. The worth of litecoin increased more than 4%, while dogecoin climbed 21%.

“They’ve been collectively on a tear,” Katie Stockton, the founder of economy research firm Fairlead Strategies, told ABC information. “Much like bitcoin, we’ve seen breakouts across the cryptocurrency markets.”

The digital property boom appears to reflect investor thrill about Trump, who has vowed to bolster the cryptocurrency sector and ease regulations enforced by the Biden administration, experts told ABC information.

In July, Trump told the spectators at a cryptocurrency conference in Nashville, Tennessee, that he wanted to turn the U.S. into the “crypto financing of the earth.”

Trump promised to weaken federal oversight of cryptocurrency and establish the federal government’s first National Strategic Bitcoin savings.

Trump also said he would replace financial instruments and trade fee Chair Gary Gensler, whom many crypto proponents dislike for his robust way to crypto regulation.

“Crypto has moved a lot since the election, and to me that’s on the information of a changing regulatory surroundings,” Bryan Routledge, a professor of finance at Carnegie Mellon University’s Tepper School of Business, told ABC information.

The growth in cryptocurrency prices on Monday far outpaced the U.S. ownership economy act. In early market activity, the S&P 500 ticked up 0.25%, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 0.75%, or about 330 points. The tech-heavy Nasdaq increased just 0.1% in early market activity on Monday.

The sharp run-up of bitcoin prices marked a breakthrough for the globe’s largest cryptocurrency. However, the recent rise follows a period of stellar returns that stretches back to last year. The worth of bitcoin has soared 122% since November 2023.

Those gains have been propelled in part by U.S. approval in January of Bitcoin ETFs, or trade-Traded Funds. Bitcoin ETFs allow investors to buy into an property that tracks the worth movement of bitcoin, while avoiding the inconvenience and uncertainty of purchasing the crypto coin itself.

“If you look at how the worth of bitcoin has moved a lot over the last year, the rise over the last week is a bit stunning but the rise over the last year has been five times as stunning,” Routledge said.

The crypto industry entered this year bruised after a series of high-profile collapses and corporation scandals.

FTX, a multi-billion-dollar cryptocurrency trade co-founded by Sam Bankman-Fried, collapsed in November 2022. The implosion set off a 17-month legal saga that resulted in the conviction of Bankman-Fried for fraud. In April, Bankman-Fried was sentenced to 25 years in prison.

Changpeng Zhao, the founder and former CEO of major cryptocurrency trade Binance, was sentenced to four months in prison in April after pleading guilty to charges that his platform had enabled illicit financial activity.

The prolonged recovery of cryptocurrency in recent years has proven remarkable but it also stands amid volatility that has typified digital assets since the founding of bitcoin in 2009, David Yermack, a professor of finance at the recent York University Stern School of Business, told ABC information.

“It can drop and it can leave up very, very quickly,” Yermack said. “It’s extraordinarily volatile.”

Cryptocurrency will likely remain highly volatile even if Trump eases regulations, experts said.

Since cryptocurrency has not gained wide adoption as a means of facilitating trade, the property primarily serves as a store of worth, akin to gold, Routledge said. Such assets sometimes demonstrate sharp increases in worth due to a favorable market conditions, but they also carry substantial risks, Routledge said.

“We don’t use cryptocurrency to buy coffee,” Routledge said. “It serves as digital gold. Those types of assets tend to be fairly volatile.”