Bitcoin and the crypto market overall rose on Wednesday on the news that the Trump administration will reveal plans about its crypto reserve strategy later this week.
U.S Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick sparked anticipation among crypto investors after reportedly telling independent news outlet The Pavlovic Today that President Donald Trump will announce additional details for his planned national strategic crypto reserve on Friday, when the president hosts his first crypto summit at the White House.
“A Bitcoin strategic reserve is something the president’s interested in. He spoke about it all during the campaign trail, and I think you’re going to see it executed on Friday,” Lutnick told the outlet on Tuesday.
The crypto market, which has experienced a hard downturn in recent weeks, was buoyed on the comments, as investors rushed to buy digital assets ahead of Friday’s summit. Bitcoin has gained 6% in the last 24 hours. Other cryptocurrencies that are reportedly being considered as part of the crypto reserve are up as well; XRP is up 4%, Solana is up 5% and Cardano is up 12%.
Lutnick’s comments come just days after Trump announced that the crypto reserve will include Solana, XRP and Cardano, along with more recognized coins like Bitcoin and Ethereum, on his social media site Truth Social. While Trump’s announcement briefly lifted the crypto market—XRP, Solana and Cardano especially—the plan was not embraced by the entire crypto world, and spurred backlash from so-called Bitcoin maximalists who oppose the inclusion of other cryptocurrencies.
In his comments on Wednesday, Lutnick seemed to hint that Bitcoin would have a special status within the reserve. “The President definitely thinks that there’s a Bitcoin strategic reserve,” said Lutnick. “Now, there will be the question of, how do we handle the other cryptocurrencies? And I think the model is going to be announced on Friday when we do that.”
Friday’s summit will convene major industry leaders to discuss crypto policy at the White House including Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong, Chainlink Labs CEO Sergey Nazarov, and Strategy Executive Chairman Michael Saylor. Trump will be hosting the event alongside White House AI and crypto czar David Sacks, as well as executive director of the President’s Working Group on Digital Assets, Bo Hines.
If Trump does announce a detailed plan for the national crypto reserve idea on Friday, it could reshape how institutions view crypto as an investment vehicle, Les Borsai, a government crypto advisor and co-founder of asset management firm Wave Digital Assets, told Fortune.
“An official reserve announcement would elevate cryptocurrency from an alternative asset class to a strategic national resource virtually overnight, legitimizing digital assets in a way no regulatory framework could accomplish alone,” he said.