Behind Trump's Pledge to Make America the "Crypto Capital"

Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio News. Nashville was the place to be this past weekend if you were a crypto enthusiast, and even if you're more of a skeptic.

I'm in the exhibit hall at Bitcoin Nashville and now I'm gonna do a walkthrough of the Bitcoin art exhibit. Got cipher Punks of the world.

Bloomberg reporter Zeke Fox was in Music City at the site of the annual Bitcoin Conference, taking it all in.

I'm standing a little close to it. Yeah, it's definitely the assassination attempt photo, the famous one with the Trumps standing and saying fight artist statement. It says, Bitcoin, like Donald Trump, has been a polarizing figure, villainized and criticized by many. The painting consists of thousands of dots made with the ash from burnt Fiat banknotes.

There you go.

This wasn't his first time at one of these. Zeke wrote a book called Number Go Up, Inside Crypto's Wild Rise and Staggering Fall. But what was different about this year's Bitcoin conference was the lineup and who the headliner was.

Hello, Bitcoiners, thank you very much.

Hello, it's good to be with you.

It's good to be with you, Former President Donald Trump.

I'm thrilled to be here in Nashville to become the first American president ever to address a bitcoin event anywhere in the world, anywhere in the world.

His appearance at the annual conference was something of a seminal moment for what had once been a fringe financial movement, and that wasn't lost on those who bought a ticket.

I was generally excited because this is the first time where we are no longer some niche group of of funny money or fraud money, as JP Morgan likes to call us, but we're We're at the center stage.

I think it's a historical moment to, you know, have a presidential candidate that has very high chances of winning the you know, the elections, to come out here and try to wrangle votes from bitcoiners.

Right.

And it wasn't just Trump who was there. There was RFK Junior, as well as Wyoming Senator Cynthia Lummis, a Republican who plans to introduce a major bill about crypto. In fact, ten senators were there and Senate hopefuls like John Deeton, another Republican who's challenging Senator Elizabeth Warren in Massachusetts. And we've seen that voting pue crypto or bitcooling enthusiast can make a difference. And so we're in an electioneer. So it doesn't surprise me that politicians are jumping worn,

I pledge to the bitcoin community that the day I.

Take the oath of office, Joe Biden, Kamala Harris's anti crypto crusade will be over.

It will end, It'll be done. It'll be done. I'm David Gerra, and this is the big take from Bloomberg News on today's episode. Trump's conversion from crypto skeptic to crypto enthusiast and the impact that could have on the presidential race and his campaign coffers.

I don't even want to count how many crypto conferences I've been to.

Bloomberg investigative reporter Zeke Fox has been to a lot of crypto conferences. In fact, this was his third time at this particular event, which is focused exclusively on bitcoin.

So this conference is it's the Bitcoin Conference. It's actually leave a rule that you can't mention other coins while they're on stage.

Since he's been going to the Bitcoin conference, the industry has changed dramatically. His first time was back in twenty twenty one. It was in Miami, and Zeke says the atmosphere was euphoric.

Crypto was booming, and there was this sense that riches were around the corner for anyone if they really set their mind to it.

But this year, even though bitcoin prices are higher than they were in twenty twenty one, it says, the feeling at this conference was more muted.

I felt like this was a more subdued crowd and that the people here were frankly, not as excited as I expected that they had gotten Trump to come speak to them and endorse their favorite thing, Bitcoin.

Zeke spoke to a lot of bitcoin enthusiasts in Nashville trying to get a sense of how they felt about Trump.

I was walking around the exhibit hall and I saw a man sitting under there was like a giant wizard hat suspended from the ceiling that covered a seating area that's advertising this wizard themed bitcoin project. And I saw a guy sitting there with a couple of patchwork quilts that were very pretty, and I sat down and introduced myself. So could you introduce yourself? Like, where are you from?

What's your name?

Yeah?

My name is Can I just go buy a name if you if you prefer, it's okay, okay? Can you write colonel Colonel Stacker? How do you It's like it's a second colonel with a K.

Yeah, Colonel Colonel Stacker is obviously not his real name, but he told Zeke he was a truck driver from Cincinnati who makes and sells bitcoin quilts with his mind.

This looks really nice? Do you make them yourself? My mom is the quilter.

The I do this.

I'm learning how to stitch right now.

Yeah, Bitcoin quilts and pseudonyms aside. Ohio is of course a critical state in the upcoming presidential election, so Zeke asked the colonel what role, if any, Bitcoin is playing in who he votes for.

Did you in twenty sixteen and twenty twenty did you vote for Trump? Back then?

No?

You go Democrat or third party or I've always been like if anything libertarian US. Yeah, do you think you'll vote for Trump this time? It's a possibility. Yeah, I just might.

According to Zeke, this was a pretty common view everyone.

I spoke to, I'd ask them, what do you think about Trump's coming to speak here? Are you excited? Does this change what you think of him? And frankly, most people already supported Trump and now would continue to support him, or already supported RFK Junior, and we're planning to continue to support him, but open to maybe switching to Trump if they thought, you know, it is a close election, maybe you've got to be pragmatic. I mean, we've got

The only choice.

So I'm on the realm where I don't mind if RFK or Trump wins as long as Biden I guess, now, Kamala.

Those are RFK and.

Trump are in my book, I'd be happy with either candidate.

Are you going to vote for Trump this time?

You know?

I don't know, But at the moment, I'm voting for whatever the most bitcoin candidate is.

But if the attendees were luke warm, the big surprise was just how pro crypto the former president was when he had rest the crowd.

So I've never been to a Trump rally before, and I was kind of impressed with how well he worked the audience.

This afternoon, I'm laying out my plan to ensure that the United States will be the crypto capital of the planet and the bitcoin superpower of the world, and we'll get it done.

Kid Rock got a shout out, and also all the bitcoinners who are now supporting him, So the Winklevoss twins. He talked about how handsome they were.

These are great guys. They look like mail models with a brain, you know, the mail models with a big, beautiful brain.

The biggest applause line for Trump was he said that he would fire Gary Gensler, the head of the SEC. Under his watch, the SEC has sued a number of crypto companies.

One day one, I will fire Gary Gensler and a point a knew SEC Chairney.

This line was so successful that after he got some applause for it, he actually was like, oh, you guys really liked that one. So he said it again.

I didn't know he was that unpopular.

Wow, I didn't know you was that unpopular.

Let me say it again.

On day one, I will fire Gary against me.

He said, you know, if bitcoin's going to the moon, the US should lead the way. He said, you know, we can't let China dominate this industry, which is kind of weird because China has actually made moves to ban the crypto industry. But the big thing that Trump announced at the end was that the US will establish a strategic Bitcoin reserve.

That if I am elected, it will be the policy of my administry United States of America to keep one hundred percent of all the bitcoin the US government currently hals or acquires into the future.

We'll keep one hundred percent.

I hope you do well.

Please.

There was no talk of sam bankmin freed FTX, all the crypto scams that we've seen in the last couple of years, like even these bitcoinners would tell you there was like a million scams. If anything, the enforcement should have been quicker. You know, we should be saying, why didn't you stop all these crypto scams? But none of that, no, none of that. I was impressed by how successful the

Coming up after the break inside Trump's transformation from crypto skeptic to crypto enthusiast and what that means for the twenty twenty four US presidential race. When Donald Trump was in the White House, he wasn't a bitcoin booster. Far from it. But Trump's attitude changed in twenty twenty two.

Hello everyone, this is Donald Trump, hopefully your favorite president of all time, better than Lincoln, better than Washington. With an important announcement to make, I'm doing my first official Donald J. Trump NFT collection right here and right now. They're called Trump Digital Trading Cards.

Trump recognized there was money to be made in crypto, and part of his pitch was if you bought one of those non fungible tokens, you'd get a chance to meet us.

Here's one of the best parts. Each card comes with an automatic chance to win amazing prizes like dinner with me.

I don't know if that's an amazing prize, but it's what we have.

Each of those NFTs cost ninety nine bucks and they sold out, and Bloomberg Zeek Fox says Trump made good on at least one of those amazing prizes he teased in that ad.

So a few months ago there was this big gathering of people who bought the Trump cards at mar Lago. Trump was there and he said some nicer things about crypto, and I think was pleased by the response.

In the months that followed, Trump held another crypto get together at his club in South Florida with bitcoin miners, and according to Zeke, he listened as they talked about the industry.

Some people have been throwing out this idea that this is a way to win votes. I am unconvinced.

But according to Zeke, that was the message. On stage in Nashville, Trump, RFK Junior, and a handful of lawmakers appealed to the crypto community for their votes as they criticized the current president for not embracing what they see as the future of finance. But interestingly, Zeke said, several of the conference goers he talked to said they were reserving judgment on Vice President Harris.

There's been no word from her campaign officially about what she thinks about crypto.

In recent days, there have been reports Harris's campaign has reached out to prominent players in the world of crypto, and there's bipartisan pressure for her to embrace the crypto community as a potentially decisive voting block.

A group of Democrats sent a letter to Harris saying that crypto was on the top of voters' minds in swing states and that they Harris should get with the program. I just think that's really unlikely, and that honestly, the average person you've asked them about crypto has a low opinion of crypto but doesn't care that much.

Zeke left the Bitcoin conference in Nashville with a sense that just as Donald Trump's attitude toward crypto has changed, there's also been an evolution in bitcoin.

More broadly, It's supposed to be a way to resist censorship, resist the state. This idea that somehow it needs the state is anathetical to its origins, and I was kind of expecting to meet more people at the conference who felt that way.

But Zeke says that anti government, anti establishment ethos has started to fade. Now some of its biggest proponents are cowtowing to political candidates, and they're suggesting the US government should hold millions of dollars worth of bitcoin. Zeke wonders if Trump's decision to embrace crypto has anything to do with that philosophy, or if his calculus is much simpler.

A lot of industries want you to take controversial positions in exchange for their support. With bitcoiners, you just have to say nice things about bitcoin and they'll write you a check. So, in my opinion, it's kind of an easy way to raise some money.

Which is exactly what happened in Nashville. Trump spoke, he railed against regulation, he spoke admiringly of crypto's potential, and now the price of bitcoin is to almost seventy thousand dollars on Monday, not far from its record high, and Trump went to a fundraiser where tickets cost more than eight hundred grand each.

Numbers being thrown around at this fundraiser could have raised thirty or fifty million.

According to a Bloomberg analysis, crypto donors have given more money this cycle than in all the past ones put together, and that's before this weekend's haul. Zeke spoke to Mike Belshie, the CEO of bitco, who's hosting a fundraising dinner with Trump's running mate, Senator j d Vance on Monday. Thirty three hundred dollars gets you a seat. Twenty five thousand dollars secures you a place on a round table, but Belchie says he's not just courting Republicans.

So you know, there's this phrase, and I don't know who it's distributed to, but you know, first they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, and then you win. And I think for bitcoin, we're somewhere in between those last two stages, right and those people in the Republican Party that don't think cryptos are good idea. There's people in the Democratic Party that don't think crypto a good idea, but that doesn't mean that the party

But for those in attendance at the Bitcoin conference in Nashville, should Trump win or lose, they believe in one thing fervently that Bitcoin's price can only do one thing, go up.

When you look at the.

Blockchain and where this thing's going with bitcoin, and now.

With Trump support it and all these politicians getting behind it, how can you not believe?

I always said, and when I first got into bitcoin. If I could ever, if they'll politics and crypto can kind of collide together and.

I can make an impact in regards to that, that would be a dream come true.

It's coming true.

Thank you all. Have a good time with you a bitcoin and and everything else that you're playing with, and we're going to make that one of the greatest industry er.

This is the Big Take from Bloomberg News. I'm David Gura. This episode was produced by Thomas Leu and Alex Sagura, who also mixed this episode. It was fact checked by Andreana Tapia. Our senior producers are Naomi Shaven and Kim Gettleson, who also edited this episode with Mike Reagan. Our senior editor is Elizabeth Ponso. Nicole Beemster bor is Our executive producer. Sage Bauman is Bloomberg's head of podcasts. Thanks so much for listening. Please follow and review The Big Take wherever