With the 2024 election all but final, it’s clear Donald Trump, the soon-to-be 47th President of the United States, will be the most pro-Bitcoin leader in U.S. history

The big question remains, however: How effective will he be in operationalizing his strategy?

At Bitcoin 2024, Trump – as well as Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Republican Senator Cynthia Lummis – made clear that they want the United States government to buy Bitcoin. All would seem to be in a better position to enact this following the election, as the Republican Party increased its representation in government considerably.

Yet, as for how quickly the U.S. could become active in the market, that’s more murky. Since announcing the bill, Bitcoin has surged from $60,000 to a high of $86,000, and with the U.S. government soon to be buying, there’s even more incentive for the price to escalate.

Herein lies the problem: The United States has essentially telegraphed to the world that it intends to buy an asset that’s in scarce supply, without the concrete ability to do so.

Even with a majority in the House of Representatives and Senate, passing the Strategic Bitcoin Reserve Legislation 2024 will still require an act of Congress, and the agreement of lawmakers. It would seem foolish to expect this won’t be complex or time-consuming.

For example, the bill proposes revaluing the Federal Reserve’s gold holdings, as well as integrating Bitcoin into government financial systems. Questions will likely abound, as will operational challenges. Let’s remember it took all of three years for SEC Staff Bulletins to be adjusted just to value Michael Saylor’s public markets Bitcoin buying spree correctly.

This is the nature of government — slow and bureaucratic. Even with Trump, RFK, and other Bitcoin backers in positions of power, the chances that the U.S. government begins to acquire Bitcoin on January 20, 2025 seem infinitesimal. This is not saying that it won’t happen at all, just that it won’t be timely.

This is even to omit that there could be a prioritization challenge. Maybe the crypto lobby wants to move quickly on the long delayed market infrastructure bill. If so, Congress could become more consumed with the guardrails for exchanges, and redefining securities laws than the question of the strategic reserve. After all, they helped bankroll Trump’s win.

How much could Bitcoin rise in the meantime? With the bull market in full force, I’d argue that institutions and governments have every reason to become active in the market. There are many regimes around the world where the executive branch has enough power to begin accumulating Bitcoin today. They’d be foolish not to frontrun the U.S. government.

El Salvador started this process in 2021, and it has amassed over 5,900 Bitcoin. Yet, it faced 2-3 years of market headwinds, as traders countered its entries. Lest we forget El Salvador bought hundreds of Bitcoin at $60,000, a move that for years was fuel for its enemies.

Trump may yet do his part to boost Bitcoin. Yet, in telegraphing his intentions, he’s almost certainly created conditions that can be exploited by savvy traders.

Time will tell them if, among them, we’ll see other nation states.

Today, I received confirmation that another nation state is currently discussing

– a Bitcoin strategic reserve
– drafting Bitcoin mining regulations so they can improve their electrical grid and better monetize stranded energy

It's happening

— Daniel Batten (@DSBatten) November 11, 2024

The other week, I made my opinion clear that I believe Donald Trump is the best candidate for Bitcoin in the upcoming 2024 presidential election. Aaron responded, and after reading it, I feel he’s still missing the bigger picture. Aaron’s main points seem to be that Trump is just using Bitcoiners for their votes, and that he won’t follow through on his promises.

While I partly agree with the former point, I disagree with the latter. Contrary to what I’ve seen some Bitcoiners online say, I do not think Trump has to be a hardcore Bitcoin maximalist and cypherpunk to be a great Bitcoin president. Here’s why.

Trump needs all the votes he can get. Of course he is going to try and appeal to our voters, especially when most of us already have right-leaning political views. It makes sense for the Republican party to adopt freedom money, given they lean more towards the principles of freedom now, while the Democrats have become more authoritarian.

Voting for Trump, then, is a win-win. He gets more votes (some in critical swing states), and we get a better environment for our industry. Sounds like a good trade to me.

And that leads me into what I disagree with Aaron on. I believe that Trump will keep most, if not all of his promises he’s made when it’s come to Bitcoin. Because, well, most of the promises he has made seem like relatively easy things to implement. It’s not like he’s alone on the issue – there are now many pro-Bitcoin senators and congresspeople to hold him accountable.

There’s Senator Cynthis Lummis, who wants to create a strategic Bitcoin reserve (using BTC already owned by the government). There is Congressman Tom Emmer, who already wants to fire SEC Chair Gary Gensler and appoint someone better for the industry. You can go to StandWithCrypto.com to see the rest.

If elected, Trump would have loads of other, arguably more important issues on his plate to deal with. The fact that his policies would give Bitcoiners a friendly regulatory environment to build in, stop anti-Bitcoin politicians from continuing to attack this industry, all without Trump meddling in it, sounds like the perfect storm for innovation.

The fact that he’s done things like bring Bitcoin miners to Mar-a-Lago to better understand the industry is enough evidence to make this point.

I think many are overly critical of Trump because he said he wasn’t a fan of Bitcoin in 2019. But that was ages ago, and everything has changed since then. It doesn’t make sense to hate on people for coming around to Bitcoin after not being a fan of it. (I do, however, think it is ok to be critical of the non-Bitcoin initiatives Trump has promoted, like World Liberty Financial, but even that isn’t worth losing all the benefits of his presidency.)

So, why would Trump free Ross now when he already had the chance to last term?

In politics, as in Bitcoin, it’s all about incentives, and the incentives here are aligned.

This article is a Take. Opinions expressed are entirely the author’s and do not necessarily reflect those of BTC Inc or Bitcoin Magazine.