Trump's White House Crypto Summit Sets the Tone: Cryptocurrency Welcomes a "Regulatory Spring"

Bitcoin surged from $65,000 to $70,000 in a short period at midnight, while Ethereum saw an increase of nearly 20%. HYPE is approaching historical highs.

The spring breeze for cryptocurrencies came overnight, blowing in from the United States.

On July 20, President Trump held a roundtable discussion and public speech in the White House with executives from American finance, cryptocurrency, and technology companies, as well as heads of regulatory agencies.

The attendees were quite prominent. CFTC (Commodity Futures Trading Commission) Chairman Mike Selig, SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission) Chairman Paul Atkins, and Executive Director of the President's Advisory Council on Digital Assets Patrick Witt were present. Then there were the top figures in the cryptocurrency industry, including Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong, Intercontinental Exchange (ICE/New York Stock Exchange) CEO Jeff Sprecher, Nasdaq CEO Adena Friedman, Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev, Kraken CEO Arjun Sethi, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse, Chainlink co-founder Sergey Nazarov, and the Winklevoss twins.

The core purpose of this discussion was to emphasize that the U.S. is competing with other countries for dominance in the financial markets and AI sector, promising to ensure that the future of global fintech is established and perfected on American soil.

However, it was evident from the attendees that the cryptocurrency industry was the main focus of this event.

Cryptocurrency Legislation

Trump first talked about his achievements in the cryptocurrency industry over the past two years, such as Bitcoin reserves, but these were not very important. What mattered was his content regarding cryptocurrency legislation.

• The GENIUS Act: Trump mentioned that he signed this landmark legislation a year ago. The act paves the way for the large-scale application of compliant stablecoins pegged to the dollar, which not only solidifies the dollar's hegemonic position globally but also drives significant global purchases of U.S. Treasury bonds.

• The Clarity Act: This is currently in a critical stage of advancement in Congress. The act aims to clearly delineate between "crypto securities" and "crypto commodities" at the legislative level.

Trump called on Congress to expedite the passage of the Clarity Act to establish a clear legal framework for digital assets. Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong revealed in his speech that Congress plans to vote on the bill on September 15, and if passed, it will solidify the regulatory benefits of the past year in a long-term legal form.

Introduction of Hyperliquid and Proposal for New Cryptocurrency Financing Regulations

Next were the statements from regulatory agencies, which are equally important, as they are the regulators.

CFTC Chairman Mike Selig and SEC Chairman Paul Atkins detailed the specific progress of their respective agencies in deregulation and embracing innovation.

From the CFTC side:

• First Compliant Bitcoin Perpetual Futures: CFTC Chairman Mike Selig confirmed that the first true "Bitcoin perpetual futures contract" was launched at an exchange registered with the CFTC in May 2026.

• Introduction of Decentralized Protocol Hyperliquid: The CFTC is actively promoting a compliance framework aimed at introducing the decentralized trading protocol Hyperliquid into the U.S. in a fully legal and compliant manner.

This is also the core reason for HYPE's overnight surge.

• Protection of Prediction Markets: Federal regulators are actively intervening to prevent local state officials (such as New York Attorney General Letitia James) from overstepping their authority to interfere with compliant prediction markets, avoiding the forced relocation of such financial innovations overseas.

From the SEC side:

• Proposal for Crypto Asset Rules: SEC Chairman Paul Atkins announced that the SEC has just proposed a new set of crypto asset rules to thoroughly address the certainty issues for crypto startups in legally raising equity and capital through digital assets in the U.S.

• Capital Market Recovery and "Trump Accounts": Thanks to the rationalization of IPO thresholds, 583 companies have gone public since the new administration took office (a 75% year-on-year increase), raising $28 billion; at the same time, promoting "Trump Accounts" allows a new generation of young investors to better share in the capital market's dividends.

The new regulations for crypto asset financing are also quite important, as legal ICOs are making a comeback. For details, you can read this article: "The Biggest Benefit for the Crypto Circle, Are Compliant Token Financings Coming Back?"

Bitcoin Reserves

In the final Q&A session, there was an interesting question about whether the U.S. government would further expand its Bitcoin reserves.

Trump said he is open to the idea and will listen to the recommendations of the regulatory team.

It's all about creating positive expectations.

Another part was about AI, but not much useful information was provided. Regarding the huge electricity demand of AI, Trump proposed a fast-track approval policy that allows tech companies to build dedicated power plants (quickly approved within two to three weeks), which neither occupies the public power grid nor prevents excess power from being fed back into the traditional grid.