CNN
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Bitcoin hit a new all-time high above $80,000 on Sunday. The world’s largest cryptocurrency rose ahead of Tuesday’s US presidential election, rose sharply immediately on election night after it became clear Donald Trump would win and has continued to rise in the days since his victory.

Bitcoin is up 80% this year, dwarfing the S&P 500’s still electric 25.7% gain this year. After briefly touching the $80,000 mark, bitcoin was trading just below it mid-morning on Sunday.

The crypto industry believes that Trump’s victory is a bullish sign for bitcoin and other digital currencies. Although Trump was once a bitcoin skeptic and once said it was “based on thin air,” he has fully embraced crypto in recent months — unlike the Biden administration, which has tried to rein in crypto.

A major reason why Trump has changed his tune on crypto: he now has a financial stake in it. In September, Trump and his children started a new crypto company called World Liberty Financial.

“It’s very young and very growing,” Trump said of the cryptocurrency industry on September 16 during the unveiling of World Liberty Financial. “I do believe in it.”

The Biden administration, on the other hand, is much more skeptical of crypto. Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Gary Gensler said in June 2021 in one of his first speeches in his then-new job that crypto was “ripe with fraud, scams and abuse.”

Gensler’s SEC sued crypto companies and worked to regulate the industry, which its chairman said he believed was at least partly made up of securities traded illegally. The SEC also worked with other regulators, including the Department of Justice, to track down crypto fraudsters – most notably Sam Bankman-Fried, the infamous CEO of FTX.

Gensler created a slow-moving — but ultimately approved — bitcoin exchange-trad fund, allowing people to add exposure to cryptocurrencies to their retirement accounts. In January 2024, Gensler’s

Trump said in August that cryptocurrencies “could define the future,” adding that he wanted them to be “mined, minted and made in the USA.” The president-elect also proposed a strategic national bitcoin stockpile, similar to America’s strategic petroleum reserve, directly purchasing and investing in cryptocurrencies as a national security measure.

Elon Musk, one of Trump’s most visible and ardent supporters, is a notorious crypto bull. Musk’s favorite coin, Dogecoin, rose more than 20% on Sunday and had been soaring all week.