White House Crypto Czar David Sacks said Friday that the Trump administration has not yet had any conversations about selling off reserve government assets like gold to buy up more Bitcoin—but indicated that key federal departments will soon weigh such considerations.
“There’s been no conversation about that,” Sacks was told Decrypt About potential plans to dispose of assets such as gold in order to purchase more Bitcoins for the newly-announced Strategic Bitcoin Reserve by the Federal government. “I see people speculating about that online.”
“Ultimately, it’ll be up to the Secretary of the Treasury and also the Secretary of Commerce to determine if there are budget-neutral ways of adding to our Bitcoin Reserve,” He said. “But we have not had conversations about what those might be yet.”
Yesterday, Donald Trump signed a presidential order that establishes a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve This will be the last time that we see this. The 200,000 BTC, worth roughly $17 billion at today's prices, that The U.S. is in possession of the following items thanks to civil and criminal forfeitures.
It was also stated in the order that Treasury and Commerce Departments would be affected. “shall develop strategies for acquiring additional Government BTC provided that such strategies are budget neutral and do not impose incremental costs on United States taxpayers."
Budget neutrality is a key sticking point for the White House, not only because of public perception but also because congressional approval is generally required for initiatives that involve new uses of taxpayer funds.
Earlier on Friday, a senior White House official told Decrypt that Bitcoin “deserves special treatment” over altcoins like Ethereum, Solana, XRP, and Cardano—because it is more secure, more decentralized, and doesn’t have an issuer.
You can “think of” [Bitcoin’s] $2 trillion market cap like a bug bounty—trying to find holes in the [network’s] security,” Sacks said Friday. “And no one's ever been able to do it.”
We believe it to be special.” he said.
While Bitcoin is in a league of its own in the newly announced strategic reserve, other cryptocurrencies seized by the U.S. government in civil and criminal forfeitures will be pooled to create a Digital Assets Stockpile, according to Thursday's executive order.
The White House clarified Friday that whereas Bitcoin will be held indefinitely by the U.S. government in a “Digital Fort Knox” altcoins that are in the Digital Assets Stockpile can be sold at Treasury Secretary’s discretion.
