The White House released its long-awaited report on crypto on Wednesday, detailing a number of policy recommendations that omitted a Bitcoin (BTC) reserve.
The 166-page document provides recommendations for multiple aspects of the crypto industry, including banking policy, stablecoins and countering illicit finance. The report does mention the Strategic Bitcoin Reserve, insofar as it was established back in March, but makes no mention of further development.
Bitcoin maximalists have stated that the Bitcoin reserve order should allow the government to actively purchase the asset in a strategy more akin to El Salvador.
While the crypto industry has largely welcomed the report and its potential effect on blockchain policymaking, others believe the lack of action on a Bitcoin reserve is a missed opportunity.
White House crypto report falls short on reserve plans
On Jan. 23, just three days after taking office, US President Donald Trump signed an executive order establishing the President’s Working Group on Digital Asset Markets. He set a 180-day deadline for policy recommendations.
The US government has been in pro-crypto overdrive, leading many observers to expect significant updates to the so-called Strategic Bitcoin Reserve. Following news that the White House would include an update to the reserve, Bitcoin historian and advocate Pete Rizzo advised followers to “buckle up.”
The report contains dozens of references to Bitcoin and its status as the seminal cryptocurrency that sparked the entire crypto industry, but the strategic Bitcoin reserve is mentioned only once at the very end.
Even here, the “recommendation” presented by the White House is a simple restatement of the terms laid out in the March 6 executive order, which established the reserve and its concomitant digital asset stockpile.
The Bitcoin community expressed its disappointment. CJ Burnett, chief revenue officer of Compass Mining — a US-based crypto mining hosting firm with operations in Ohio and Texas — told Cointelegraph, “The absence of any mention of a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve in today’s White House report is a missed opportunity. Markets were watching for leadership and instead got ambiguity.”
Burnett said that the lack of progress on a Bitcoin reserve creates “unnecessary uncertainty” and risks putting the US behind…
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