Here’s what happened in crypto today
Today in crypto, US President Donald Trump remained silent on digital assets on his first day in office, making no mention of cryptocurrency in his ‘America First Priorities’ agenda. Meanwhile, Bitcoin hit a new all-time high above $109,000 ahead of Trump’s inauguration. Sticking with Trump, the President’s memecoin took a tumble after his wife Melania Trump launched her own memecoin over the weekend.Trump’s ‘America First Priorities’ exclude any mention of crypto, BTCUS President Donald Trump listed his administration’s “America First Priorities” on Jan. 20, but none mentioned cryptocurrencies or his pledged strategic Bitcoin reserve.According to a White House briefing, Trump’s priorities include public safety, boosting affordability through energy independence, reforming the government bureaucracy and bringing back “American values.”Despite Trump’s pro-crypto campaign promises, digital assets weren’t listed in his priorities. Still, industry observers say crypto will feature prominently in his second term.In one of the first official announcements of the Trump administration, US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) member Mark Uyeda was appointed as acting chair of the agency. He will serve in this role until the Senate confirms the nomination of SEC Commissioner Paul Atkins as the permanent replacement for Gary Gensler.The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) also announced member Caroline Pham as the agency's acting chair on Jan 20.Follow Cointelegraph’s live blog for more coverage of Donald Trump's inauguration.Bitcoin hits new all-time high above $109,000 ahead of Trump’s inaugurationThe price of Bitcoin surged by more than 6% in minutes to a new high ahead of Donald Trump’s inauguration as president of the United States.Bitcoin (BTC) briefly surged above $109,000 on Jan. 20, breaking its previous all-time high above $108,000 recorded on Dec. 17, 2024.According to data from TradingView, BTC hit a new high of $109,036 at 6:55 am UTC before dropping below $108,000 in minutes.Bitcoin traded at $108,342 at the time of writing and is up around 3% over the past 24 hours, according to data from CoinGecko.Bitcoin’s new high came hours before Trump was to be sworn in as the 47th president of the United States at 4:00 pm UTC.Trump’s inauguration has been a major catalyst for bullish action in cryptocurrency markets. His Nov. 6 presidential victory fueled a massive crypto rally, leading to Bitcoin surging above $100,000 for the first time in early December 2024.Melania Trump memecoin launch sinks husband’s tokenDonald Trump’s self-titled memecoin Official Trump (TRUMP) dropped nearly 40% after his wife Melania launched her own self-named Melania Meme (MELANIA) token.Mrs Trump first promoted her token in a Jan. 19 X post that her husband also shared.It quickly attracted attention, and in just under four hours after launching, it reached a peak market cap of over $13 billion but has since fallen to around $10.5 billion.The Official Melania Meme is live!You can buy $MELANIA now. https://t.co/8FXvlMBhVfFUAfBo2jgks6gB4Z4LfZkqSZgzNucisEHqnNebaRxM1P pic.twitter.com/t2vYiahRn6Meanwhile, TRUMP hit a peak valuation of $14.92 billion just as MELANIA launched, which then dropped to around $7.8 billion over the next two and a half hours.TRUMP nearly halved in price over that time, dropping from a high of $74.6 to under $40 over that same time, but has since recovered to over $61 in early trading on Jan. 20.Meanwhile, the Donald Trump-backed World Liberty Financial crypto platform completed the initial sale for 20% of its 100 billion token supply and is selling an additional 5 billion tokens while hiking the price from 1.5 cents to 5 cents each.