US President Donald Trump’s government order establishing a strategic Bitcoin (BTC) reserve known as for a budget-neutral technique to accumulate extra cash, which incorporates including extra BTC by way of asset forfeitures and probably changing different reserve property to the cryptocurrency.
The US authorities maintains strategic reserves masking a variety of property and commodities, together with gold, petroleum, pure fuel, overseas foreign money, medication, land, vital rare-earth minerals and even cheese.
Probably the most liquid of those strategic reserve property are petroleum, gold and overseas foreign money.
In keeping with the US Division of Vitality, the US Strategic Petroleum Reserve has roughly 395 million barrels of crude oil as of Feb. 28, with a complete holding capability of over 713 million barrels.
A visible illustration of the salt caverns that home the US Strategic Petroleum Reserve. Supply: US Division of Vitality
Assuming a worth of $67 per barrel of West Texas Crude Oil, this provides the US petroleum reserve a price of over $26.4 billion.
Information from the US Treasury reveals that the division presently holds over 258.6 million troy ounces of gold, valued at over $10.9 billion as of Feb. 28.
The Treasury Division’s convertible overseas foreign money reserves, as of Jan. 31, complete over $35 billion. Sygnum Financial institution estimates that the US Bitcoin reserve might develop BTC’s market capitalization by roughly 25%, or roughly $460 billion.
US Treasury convertible overseas reserves. Supply: US Treasury
Associated: Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent says US ought to deliver BTC onshore
Senator Cynthia Lummis requires changing gold reserves to Bitcoin
In July 2024, Wyoming Senator Cynthia Lummis launched the Bitcoin Act to the US Senate, outlining a plan for the US authorities to accumulate 5% of Bitcoin’s complete provide — 1 million BTC.
The invoice additionally proposed the US authorities maintain Bitcoin for 20 years as a hedge towards inflation.
In November 2024, Senator Lummis recommended changing some US gold reserves to Bitcoin as a budget-neutral method to buy the 1 million BTC, which might have value roughly $90 billion on the time.
BTC is the US authorities’s largest digital asset held by a greenback quantity at roughly $17.4 billion. Supply: Arkham Intelligence
Lummis had beforehand argued that the US Treasury ought to convert a few of its property to buy BTC however didn’t specify which property ought to be transformed.
White Home adviser David Sacks additionally known as Bitcoin digital gold and the not too long ago established Bitcoin strategic reserve “a digital Fort Knox” for the supply-capped, decentralized cryptocurrency.
Sacks added that the scarce nature of BTC units it aside from different cryptocurrencies as a singular retailer of worth.
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