Bitcoin surged on Monday following an assassination attempt on Donald Trump as traders increased their bets on the former president winning November’s US presidential election.
The price of bitcoin rose as much as 9.1 per cent to $62,830, its highest level in two weeks, after Trump was injured in the ear during an assassination attempt by a gunman at a campaign rally at the weekend. The Republican is seen as the more pro-crypto candidate, having hosted industry executives at Mar-a-Lago and voiced enthusiasm for US-based bitcoin mining.
Trump’s campaign has also accepted cryptocurrency payments, a first for a major US political party, raising hopes of a departure from the US regulatory crackdown on the industry seen in recent years.
“The probability of a Donald Trump victory has increased significantly,” said Grzegorz Dróżdż, market analyst at currency company Conotoxia, adding that a Trump presidency would “positively impact” crypto.
The implied odds of Trump winning in November jumped shortly after the shooting, according to live trading on political betting site PredictIt.
Shares in Trump’s Truth Social media company rose 37 per cent in early morning trade in New York. Trump Media & Technology Group was taken public in March in a merger with a blank-cheque company and rallied ahead of the debate between Trump and President Joe Biden last month.
The shortening odds on a second Trump presidency were also felt in broader financial markets. US Treasury yields climbed, in a more muted version of the reaction that followed Biden’s disastrous debate performance.
Many investors believe Trump’s tax-cutting policies would drive up deficits and inflation, hitting US Treasuries and boosting the dollar, in a similar pattern to the aftermath of his election win in 2016.
The US dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of six other major currencies, was steady, having weakened so far in July as traders have raised their bets on a September interest rate cut from the Federal Reserve.
Yields on benchmark 10-year Treasuries rose 0.04 percentage points to 4.22 per cent, reflecting a small decline in price. Wall Street’s blue-chip S&P 500 and the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite advanced 0.5 per cent and 0.6 per cent.
Monday’s moves “chime[s] with the Trumpian theme given the popular narrative of his being good for business and . . . his pro-crypto stance”, said Rabobank analysts in a note to clients.
“For the markets, the complexities of the US political backdrop have been boiled down to the assumption that the weekend events will lead to an increased chance of Trump winning the November presidential election,” they added.
Bitcoin peaked above $70,000 in mid-March but has struggled to make headway since April’s so-called halving event, when the number of daily bitcoins available for miners to share for securing the bitcoin network dropped from 900 to 450. Some analysts had expected bitcoin to rally post-halving.