Trump becomes first US sitting president to speak at a crypto conference

US President Donald Trump is steadily aligning his administration with the crypto industry. On March 20, he addressed a community conference for the first time since being elected.

Speaking at the Blockworks Digital Asset Summit on March 20 in a pre-recorded statement, Trump reiterated that the US would take steps to ensure it is the “crypto capital of the world.”

The president lauded the recent regulatory shift in the crypto industry over the previous administration and added:

“Pioneers like you will be able to improve our banking and payment system and promote greater privacy, safety, security and wealth for American consumers and businesses alike. You will unleash an explosion of economic growth.”

“With dollar-backed stablecoins, you will help expand the dominance of the US dollar for many, many years to come,” the president continued.

President Trump has signed several pro-crypto executive orders, including the Jan. 23 order commissioning the Working Group on Digital Assets and another establishing a Bitcoin strategic reserve alongside a separate crypto stockpile.

Related: Bitcoin price tags 2-week highs as markets bet big on Trump crypto news

Mixed reactions to the White House Crypto Summit

President Trump hosted the first White House Crypto Summit, bringing together industry executives to discuss the future of crypto regulatory policy on March 7.

During the meeting, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the US would focus on passing stablecoin regulations and touted stablecoins as a way to ensure the US dollar remains the global reserve currency.

Speaking at the Blockworks Digital Asset Summit, Bo Hines, executive director of the Council of Advisers on Digital Assets, said that a stablecoin bill will likely be presented to President Trump in the next two months.

The highly anticipated crypto summit fell short of expectations, with the crypto community voicing mixed reactions to the summit.

Institutional investors and executives tended to characterize the historical nature of the event as a net positive for the industry, while retail investors and the Bitcoin community tended to view the event as underwhelming.

“The White House crypto summit is a gathering of rent-seeking lobbyists pushing state-approved surveillance tokens,” Bitcoin (BTC) maximalist Justin Bechler wrote in an X post.

The price of Bitcoin declined by 7.3% in the days following the White House Crypto Summit and the Bitcoin strategic reserve order, which stipulated that the government could only acquire more BTC through budget-neutral strategies.

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