Bitcoin soared to a record high above $82,000 on Monday on expectations that cryptocurrencies will boom in a favourable regulatory environment following the election of Donald Trump as U.S. president and of pro-crypto candidates to Congress.
The world’s biggest and best-known cryptocurrency , has now more than doubled from the year’s low of $38,505 and was last at $82,236, having earlier touched a record high of $82,527.
Trump embraced digital assets during his campaign, promising to make the United States the “crypto capital of the planet” and to accumulate a national stockpile of bitcoin.
“Bitcoin’s Trump-pump is alive and well… with Republicans on the cusp of taking the house to confirm a red wave in Congress, it seems the crypto crowd are betting on digital-currency deregulation,” said Matt Simpson, senior market analyst at City Index, referring to Republican control of both houses.
While Simpson warned that Trump’s near-term priorities are likely to lie elsewhere, crypto investors see an end to stepped-up scrutiny under U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Gary Gensler whom Trump has said he will fire.
The cryptocurrency industry spent more than $119 million backing pro-crypto congressional candidates, many of whom won their races.
In Ohio, one of the crypto industry’s biggest foes in Congress – Senate Banking Committee Chair Sherrod Brown – was ousted, while pro-crypto candidates from both the Democratic and Republican parties won in Michigan, West Virginia, Indiana, Alabama and North Carolina.
REUTERS/Ankur Banerjee and Samuel Indyk
