Original article: Wu Tianyi , DeThings
On January 23, US President Donald Trump signed an executive order to promote the development of cryptocurrencies in the United States and work to establish a national digital asset reserve. Venture capitalist David Sacks, known as the "Crypto Czar," signed the order with Trump.
“The digital asset industry plays a vital role in American innovation and economic development and our nation’s international leadership,” the order states.
According to CoinDesk, China is planning to replace the dollar. China and Russia have reduced their holdings of U.S. Treasuries worth billions of dollars while increasing their gold reserves. China, Iran and Russia are actively building parallel cross-border economic systems, bringing not only their neighbors into their orbits, but also their allies with whom they have a lot of trade.
At the same time, the People's Bank of China and five other departments jointly issued the "Opinions on Piloting the International High Standards in the Financial Sector in the Conditional Free Trade Pilot Zone (Hong Kong) to Promote Institutional Opening". The document mentioned "supporting mainland residents in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area to purchase qualified investment products sold by Hong Kong and Macao financial institutions through Hong Kong and Macao financial institutions, and expanding the scope of participating institutions and qualified investment products". This policy may provide an opportunity for the potential development direction of the crypto asset industry.
Bitcoin becomes a key battlefield?
Much of the executive order signed by Trump focuses on establishing cryptocurrency technology and rules and its development in the United States. One of the key elements is the creation of a working group to consider establishing a national digital asset reserve, "which may be derived from cryptocurrency lawfully seized by the federal government through law enforcement actions."
The order also outlines other key priorities for the digital asset industry, including protecting individuals and private businesses using blockchain networks from "persecution." The document details certain protections for developers and miners, noting that they should be able to freely "develop and deploy software" and "participate in mining and validation," a nod to the technical staff who protect the Bitcoin network.
The president also pledged to defend the rights of those who choose to self-custody their digital assets, meaning they don’t rely on centralized entities like Coinbase to keep their tokens, but instead use personal crypto wallets, which are sometimes not regulated by the IRS.
The order emphasizes promoting the sovereignty of the U.S. dollar by supporting the development of globally legal, dollar-backed stablecoins.
CoinDesk said that U.S. policymakers are too narrowly focused on macroeconomic tools such as sanctions and promoting the dollar as a reserve currency. Today, the real battle is happening in smartphones and global currency markets. For example, more than half of Japanese businesses accept Alipay, while more than a third accept WeChat Pay.
China continues to pay attention to the relevant Bitcoin policies of the United States. Wang Yongli, former vice president of the Bank of China, published an article in the 1st issue of "China Foreign Exchange" in 2025 titled "A Rational View of Trump's New Bitcoin Policy", in which he mentioned that Bitcoin highly imitates gold at the "currency" level, and its total amount and phased increase are completely set by the system, which is more stringent than gold (it is actually unclear how much gold reserves there are). The amount that can be used for exchange transactions is more limited, and it cannot grow with the growth of the value of tradable wealth, which does not meet the essential requirements of currency. With Trump's victory in the US presidential election, the new Bitcoin policy he proposed has received widespread attention and heated discussion. We need to calm down, look at it rationally and objectively, and avoid making subversive mistakes.
Previously, Zhou Xiaochuan, Vice Chairman of the Boao Forum for Asia and former Governor of the People's Bank of China, mentioned at the "Boao Forum for Asia New Year Outlook 2025" event that the world economic recovery in 2025 is full of uncertainties and the industrial chain is forced to reshape. Global public debt is about to exceed 100 trillion US dollars, which will increase the external financing costs and exchange rate depreciation pressure of emerging markets and developing countries. Debt poses challenges to the fiscal sustainability of developed countries. The impact of digital encrypted assets on global financial stability and financial security needs to be vigilant.
Regarding the "Opinions on Promoting Institutional Opening-up in the Financial Sector by Piloting the Alignment with International High Standards in the Conditional Pilot Free Trade Zone (Hong Kong)" jointly issued by the People's Bank of China and five other departments, Liu Honglin, a lawyer at Mankiw LLP, said that with the Hong Kong SAR government's active exploration of virtual asset supervision, such as the launch of virtual asset ETFs, it will be worth looking forward to whether these products can be included in the cross-border wealth management connect in the future.
Combined with the policy terms, if Hong Kong's crypto asset products can provide investment channels for mainland investors through the Wealth Management Connect, it will not only enrich the asset allocation options of mainland residents, but will also become an important tool to promote the internationalization of the RMB. Once the scope of cross-border Wealth Management Connect is further expanded, virtual asset ETFs or on-chain bonds may take the lead in pilot projects, opening the door to the financial application of the blockchain industry.
Different attitudes towards CBDC
It is worth mentioning that Trump’s executive order also prohibits the "establishment, issuance, circulation and use" of the US central bank digital currency (CBDC) and requires the working group to study the possibility of establishing and maintaining a national cryptocurrency reserve and a stablecoin regulatory framework.
Ordering federal agencies to halt any potential CBDC development was one of Trump’s campaign promises to the crypto industry during his presidential campaign.
Geoff Kendrick, global head of digital asset research at Standard Chartered Bank, told Cointelegraph: “CBDCs are dead in the U.S. during the Trump administration. Instead, they are going the private stablecoin route, and there is nothing the Fed can do about it.” Administration spokesman Brian Hughes told Reuters that “the Trump administration will give seats to government officials who are committed to defending the rights of the American people, putting America first, and ensuring that working people’s tax dollars are used in the most effective way.”
Such rhetoric fits with the Republican Party’s general skepticism of government involvement in the financial industry and a desire for broad deregulation of the sector. It’s no surprise, then, that CBDCs are a target, given that they are already the subject of public privacy concerns.
While some CBDC developers, such as the European Central Bank, say privacy is a top priority, few in the public seem to believe it, which has hampered CBDC efforts. According to CBDC Tracker, of the 169 CBDC projects currently underway, only four have been launched.
On the contrary, as of July 24, the e-RMB application has attracted 180 million personal wallet users, with cumulative transactions in pilot areas reaching RMB 7.3 trillion (US$1 trillion). The mBridge project entered the minimum viable product (MVP) stage in mid-2024. The project aims to explore a multi-central bank digital currency (CBDC) platform shared by participating central banks and commercial banks, built on distributed ledger technology (DLT) to enable instant cross-border payments and settlements.
The mBridge project is the result of extensive collaboration between the BIS Innovation Centre, the Bank of Thailand, the Central Bank of the United Arab Emirates, the Digital Currency Research Institute of the People’s Bank of China and the Hong Kong Monetary Authority since 2021. The Saudi Central Bank joined in 2024.
In September 2024, Reuters reported that 134 countries, representing 98% of the global economy, were exploring digital versions of their currencies, with nearly half of them in the late stages, and pioneers such as China, the Bahamas and Nigeria beginning to see a pick-up in usage. The use of the electronic yuan has nearly quadrupled to 7 trillion yuan ($987 billion).
All G20 countries are currently studying central bank digital currencies (CBDCs), with a total of 44 countries conducting trials, according to research released by the U.S. Atlantic Council think tank on Tuesday.
Dong Zhiyong, a scholar at Peking University, believes that the incentive mechanism of payment institutions is a challenge. Merchants do not need to pay fees to accept digital RMB, which is a good thing for merchants, but if it is not widely used, merchants will face additional administrative burdens and will not be able to obtain commissions from transactions, lacking the motivation to join. Therefore, he suggested establishing a reasonable charging mechanism and exploring value-added services with payment institutions.
In addition, he suggested creating an ecosystem for industrial and commercial use cases, as businesses have begun using e-RMB when processing large transactions despite low consumer acceptance. Currently, the administrative burden on retailers is being gradually addressed, and a new "smart account splitting" application is being piloted to simplify accounting and reconciliation processes.
