Bitcoin hits $100,000 as Trump era hopes grow

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Bitcoin has surged above $100,000 for the first time, extending a dramatic rally as investors bet on greater political and regulatory support from US president-elect Donald Trump.

The price of the world’s largest cryptocurrency has climbed more than 40 per cent since Trump’s November election victory. The Republican has previously vowed to make the US “the bitcoin superpower of the world”.

On Wednesday the former president nominated crypto advocate Paul Atkins to run the Securities and Exchange Commission, the main market regulator.

The nomination added further impetus to a rally sparked by the launch of the first stock market funds investing in bitcoin in January.

“Interest in [crypto] is pretty much unstoppable,” said Geoff Kendrick, global head of digital assets research at Standard Chartered.

The cryptocurrency’s rise past $100,000 marks a dramatic change in fortune for the sector from just two years ago, when the collapse of FTX in late 2022 spurred a crisis in the market and sent the price of bitcoin plummeting to just $16,000.

Binance, the world’s biggest crypto exchange, was fined $4.3bn last year for failing to prevent money laundering, while FTX boss Sam Bankman-Fried was jailed for 25 years in March for defrauding customers.

By contrast, crypto executives and traders now predict a “golden era” for the industry under the Trump administration, betting that favourable new regulations will unleash a flood of money from big asset managers into the sector.