Bitcoin vaulted past $120,000 for the first time on 14 July, the latest milestone for the world’s largest cryptocurrency as investors bet on industry policy wins in what been dubbed ‘crypto week’. This is a banner being used to describe a series of debates by US lawmakers that could lay the foundations for a long-sought regulatory framework on digital assets.
‘Donald Trump has talked about making America the crypto capital of the world, and now the market is hoping those words become reality’, wrote Dan Coatsworth, investment analyst at AJ Bell.
Bitcoin rose to register a record high of $123,153.22 before easing and was last noted trading at $117,124.20, marking an 11% rally over the past month. The cryptocurrency is now up more than 25% so far in 2025.
‘Crypto week’ will see US lawmakers debate a range of issues, including three pieces of new legislation; the Clarity Act, the Anti-CBDC Surveillance State Act, and the Senate’s Genius Act.
‘After years of dedicated work in Congress on digital assets, we are advancing landmark legislation to establish a clear regulatory framework for digital assets that safeguards consumers and investors, provides rules for the issuance and operation of dollar-backed payment stablecoins, and permanently blocks the creation of a Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) to safeguard Americans’ financial privacy,’ said House Committee on Financial Services chair French Hill.
Despite ongoing uncertainties around trade tariffs, economic growth and geopolitical issues, investors appear to be hedging their bets by piling into bitcoin. Even though equities have been moving higher as markets appear to shrug off the latest tariff news, investors know they cannot rule out Donald Trump taking a completely new direction with trade discussions and doing something out of the blue. There are also growing concerns about US national debt, which is high and set to go even higher.
Bitcoin is seen as a portfolio diversifier and a ‘just in case’ store of value in a similar vein to gold, albeit a highly volatile one. While bitcoin valuation is driven purely by speculation, interest continues to grow in cryptocurrency assets.
‘There are now various investment funds that track the bitcoin price and that gives investors more choice in how they get exposure. It’s made it a lot easier to take a position and that has helped to drive up demand and push up the bitcoin price,’ wrote AJ Bell’s Coatsworth.
But lots of UK investors still rely on ‘bitcoin proxies’ to gain exposure, shares in listed companies who own large slugs of bitcoin and/or other cryptocurrencies. Wall Street-listed Strategy (MSTR:NASDAQ) has seen its stock surge 50% this year and 180% over the past 12 months for this reason, regularly among the most traded US equites on the AJ Bell platform.
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