Bitcoin breaks above $63,000 after Trump survives assassination attempt

Bitcoin’s value rebounded to break the $63,000 level early Monday morning after pro-crypto former U.S. President Donald Trump survived the assassination attempt during his rally on Saturday.

Bitcoin is currently trading at $63,008, having risen 4.41% in the past day, according to The Block’s bitcoin price page. The wider cryptocurrency market also grew in value in the last 24 hours. Ether added 4.99% to $3,366, and Solana grew 5.75% to $153.72. Also, over the past day, the whole crypto market is up 4.17%.

“Trump survived an assassination attempt over the weekend, which the market interprets as significantly increasing his chances of winning the future election,” said Ryan Lee, chief analyst of Bitget Research. 

In the past few months, the presumptive Republican Party candidate for the upcoming presidential election has proclaimed his advocacy for the local blockchain and cryptocurrency sector. Trump’s campaign accepts cryptocurrency donations, and has vowed to support bitcoin mining in the White House. 

The former U.S. President's Trump Media and Technology Group Corp. stocks jumped 64.4% in pre-market trading on Monday after his gunshot survival became one of, if not the most, significant news events of the weekend around the world.

Trump memecoins and NFTs also soar

Various Trump memecoins and his official NFT collection also gained following the failed assassination attempt.

Existing Ethereum-based memecoin MAGA (TRUMP) jumped 50% to $9.51 after the attack, and the Solana-based misspelled token Doland Tremp (TREMP) soared 85% to $0.73. The tokens subsequently fell back to $8.12 and $0.45, respectively, on Monday, according to The Block’s prices page.

Meanwhile, a new set of Solana-based memecoins launched as the former President got to his feet, raising his fist in the air and shouting “fight.” Fight (FIGHT) has emerged as one of the most successful, gaining more than 500% over the past 24 hours to reach a price of $0.018 and market cap of $18.1 million, according to DEX Screener. Despite some initial gains, alternative memecoins referencing the incident, including The Ear Stays On (EAR) and Trump Wif Ear (WIFEAR), have both dropped around 69% over the past 24 hours.

Not to be outbid, the floor price of the former President’s Polygon-based official NFT collection, Trump Digital Trading Cards, jumped over 125% to 925 MATIC ($500) on Sunday, according to NFT Price Floor — the highest level in crypto terms since its all-time high of 1,100 MATIC ($1,287 at the time) in March 2023. The initial 45,000 NFT collection, launched in December 2022 and featuring various images of Trump, currently has a floor price of around 786 MATIC ($417).

Trump still remains committed to speaking at Bitcoin 2024

Trump, even after the shooting incident, said that he remains committed to speaking at the Bitcoin 2024 conference in Nashville later this month, the organizer said on X on Sunday.

Decentralized prediction market platform Polymarket’s bet on the winner of the U.S. presidential election shows that 71% of users bet on Trump’s victory — up from about 60% around the time of the shooting incident. Chances for President Joe Biden to win stood at 18% on the same platform.

Last Friday, the German government sold and emptied out its crypto wallet after continuous bitcoin transfers to wallets on Bitstamp, Coinbase, Kraken, B2C2 Group, Cumberland DRW and others, according to Arkham Intelligence data. The transfers appear to be linked to Germany’s plan to sell 50,000 bitcoins it confiscated from an illegal film piracy platform.

The news of the German government’s plan added selling pressure to the bitcoin market, along with Mt Gox’s payout of $9 billion worth of bitcoin repayment to creditors. Such market pressure led bitcoin to fall to lows of under $54,000 earlier this month.

Last week, Bitwise CIO Matt Hougan said the crypto industry has key tailwinds that could bring bitcoin up to $100,000 by year-end, which are positive changes in the political attitude toward crypto in the U.S., upcoming interest rate cuts by the Federal Reserve, and the strong growth in the stablecoin market.

Updated with additional details on Trump memecoins and NFTs.