Not just $Trump: Several top administration officials have put their money into crypto
While much has been made of President Donald Trump's own involvement with crypto, financial disclosures show that several of his top advisors and Cabinet officials also have substantial cryptocurrency investments.
That includes Vice President JD Vance, who owns bitcoin worth between $250,000 and $500,000. Officials are generally only required to disclose the range of the value of their assets, so we don't know the exact amount.
At the Bitcoin 2025 Conference in Las Vegas last month, Vance described himself as "one only people running for office who actually owned bitcoin" when he ran for Senate in Ohio in 2022. "I still own a fair amount of bitcoin today," he said.
Among Cabinet officials, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. may be the largest holder of Bitcoin: he reported owning between $1 million and $5 million in the cryptocurrency in his December disclosure.
Others hold at least hundreds of thousands of dollars in crypto. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy reported owning between $502,000 and $1.3 million in various cryptocurrencies, while Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Administrator Mehmet Oz reported holding between $500,000 and $1 million in bitcoin.
Todd Blanche, a former personal defense attorney for Trump who now serves as Deputy US Attorney General, reported owning between $158,000 and $470,000 in various cryptocurrencies, primarily bitcoin. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth also owns between $15,000 and $50,000 in bitcoin.
Some Cabinet officials are invested in Bitcoin funds, which track the performance of Bitcoin without involving direct ownership. Among them is Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who disclosed having between $250,000 and $500,000 in such a fund. Oz and Duffy also invested in bitcoin funds in addition to their direct crypto holdings.
Other top officials used to own cryptocurrencies but agreed to sell them off. That includes Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, who reported owning between $33,000 and $145,000 in various cryptocurrencies, primarily bitcoin, which she sold off on May 13.
Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought agreed to divest his holdings of up to $15,000 in bitcoin, while FBI Director Kash Patel agreed to sell off his investments in bitcoin ETFs, which were worth between $51,000 and $115,000.
"President Trump, Vice President Vance, and senior White House staff have completed required ethics briefings and financial reporting obligations," White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement for this story. "The Trump Administration is committed to transparency and accessibility for the American people."
Ultimately, Trump remains the biggest cryptocurrency investor in his administration.
His most recent financial disclosure shows he made more than $53 million from cryptocurrency sales last year in connection with World Liberty Financial, a crypto firm that's majority-owned by Trump and his family.
Trump launched a meme-coin, $Trump, in the days before his second inauguration in January.
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"If tariffs are causing an inflation problem, then headline inflation rates ought to be accelerating," Dutta wrote. "However, overall inflation is not rising as rapidly as expected likely because nominal growth remains sluggish." Dutta points out that over the past six months, headline CPI has increased at a 1.9% annualized rate, the slowest pace seen since October 2024. In his view, July's CPI data "cements" a September interest rate cut from the Fed. Markets seem to agree for now, with traders pricing in a roughly 94% chance the Fed lowers rates in September, per the CME FedWatch Tool. "You might be thinking, why not a bigger upfront move," Dutta wrote. "Doves on the FOMC need to fight one battle at a time. There is a wide contingent of folks on the FOMC with tariff derangement syndrome, not seeing cuts at all this year. They won't be able to make the leap from no cuts to a large upfront move overnight." 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The headline Consumer Price Index (CPI) showed prices increased 2.7% in July, unchanged from the month prior and below the 2.8% economists had expected. On a month-over-month basis, prices increased 0.2%, lower than the 0.3% seen the month prior. Price increases accelerated more than expected in July. The latest data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed that on a "core" basis, which strips out the more volatile costs of food and gas, consumer prices increased 3.1% over the prior year in July, an increase from June's 2.9% and above economists' forecast for 3%. Core prices climbed 0.3% over the prior month, ahead of June's 0.2% increase but in line with expectations. The headline Consumer Price Index (CPI) showed prices increased 2.7% in July, unchanged from the month prior and below the 2.8% economists had expected. On a month-over-month basis, prices increased 0.2%, lower than the 0.3% seen the month prior. 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Intel's statement on the meeting: "Earlier today, Mr. Tan had the honor of meeting with President Trump for a candid and constructive discussion on Intel's commitment to strengthening U.S. technology and manufacturing leadership. We appreciate the President's strong leadership to advance these critical priorities and look forward to working closely with him and his Administration as we restore this great American company." Intel (INTC) is rallying premarket as Trump walked back his apparent hate for the company's CEO, Lip-Bu Tan, after meeting on Monday. Don't be fooled by the price action, however. This isn't the case like Apple (AAPL), where CEO Tim Cook kisses Trump's butt and the company is exempt from various tariffs. Intel is a fundamental disaster right now. People in the industry I talk to are unsure if the company will ever come back to a state of health, given 1) how fast AI chip development is occurring, and 2) how far behind Nvidia and AMD Intel is. Intel's statement on the meeting: "Earlier today, Mr. Tan had the honor of meeting with President Trump for a candid and constructive discussion on Intel's commitment to strengthening U.S. technology and manufacturing leadership. We appreciate the President's strong leadership to advance these critical priorities and look forward to working closely with him and his Administration as we restore this great American company." Japan's Nikkei hits record high on tariff relief, tech rally The Nikkei 225 (^N225) hit a record high Tuesday as easing US tariff fears boosted optimism, led by tech stocks and tariff relief. Bloomberg News reports: Read more here. The Nikkei 225 (^N225) hit a record high Tuesday as easing US tariff fears boosted optimism, led by tech stocks and tariff relief. Bloomberg News reports: Read more here.
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- Yahoo
With Nvidia's Q2 earnings in sight, Trump deal could boost outlook
President Trump has confirmed that the US government will receive 15% of the sale of Nvidia's (NVDA) H20 chips to China. The move, along with a similar one that will see rival Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) turn over 15% of its China revenue, adds an interesting wrinkle to Nvidia's upcoming earnings schedule for Aug. 27. China, meanwhile, is urging companies not to use Nvidia's chips, though it hasn't banned them from doing so. Trump talked up the deal during a press conference Monday, adding that Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang negotiated the Trump administration down from an original 20% cut of the company's China sales. "I think this is certainly an opportunistic moment for the administration to raise additional dollars and in the name of China's desire for access to the leading semiconductor products from the United States," Futurum Group CEO Daniel Newman told Yahoo Finance. "And while we can argue that these are not the leading chips, they're the deprecated ones, there's clearly insatiable demand in the China market for Nvidia, and to some extent AMD," he added. Nvidia said in a statement, "We follow rules the US government sets for our participation in worldwide markets. While we haven't shipped H20 to China for months, we hope export control rules will let America compete in China and worldwide." The payment, which could face legal challenges, won't show up in Nvidia's Q2 report but could boost its Q3 outlook if the administration moves quickly. While the company might not bring in as much for itself from China sales as investors had hoped, the agreement is Nvidia's current best chance to compete in one of the world's largest AI markets. "From my perspective, it is a positive for those companies. As you know, it opens a market where there's still high demand. Nvidia, especially, still has a lot of cache with its name," Forrester senior analyst Alvin Nguyen explained. Access to China now helps Nvidia in the long run Regaining access to China doesn't just help Nvidia in the near term — it also sets up the company for continued sales into the future as customers develop and deploy apps and services using its CUDA software. According to Bernstein analyst Stacy Rasgon, while rival Chinese chipmakers might match and, in some cases, exceed the H20's performance, developers are already building on CUDA, making switching to competing platforms costly and difficult. "The Chinese already have products, local products, that are actually, from the performance, better than what Nvidia is allowed to sell," Rasgon told Yahoo Finance. "Nvidia has the ecosystem advantage," he added. "The Chinese developers want to use Nvidia. They built their whole infrastructure on Nvidia. But if Nvidia is not allowed to sell, you're encouraging those local developers to coalesce around Huawei and build up that ecosystem." Rasgon, however, warned that if the US doesn't allow Nvidia to scale its AI chip's capabilities over time, developers could end up ditching the company's offerings for those of its rivals. "The longer we can keep the US guys, appropriately balancing against the national shared security concerns, playing there, the better," Rasgon said. The fear is that if Nvidia and AMD are completely boxed out of the Chinese market, China will continue to build up its AI capabilities to the point where the global market is split between US and Chinese AI companies, raising potential national security concerns. Don't expect sales to show up just yet While Nvidia may soon get the go-ahead to sell its chips into China again, revenue isn't likely to start showing up in the company's bottom line until the third or fourth quarter. That's because Nvidia will need to get its supply chain running again. The company is also still expected to see an $8 billion hit on Q2 earnings due to the Trump administration's original decision to ban the H20 chips. Nvidia saw a $4.5 billion impact from the ban in Q1. There's also the question of whether Nvidia will ultimately pick up the tab for Trump's new fee. According to Futurum Group's Newman, the company will likely pass on the cost to its customers. "My assumption is, if the demand is as significant as I believe it is, Nvidia and AMD will be able to negotiate a higher price to cover the potential cost," Newman said. Trump said during his press conference that he is also considering allowing Nvidia to ship a degraded version of its Blackwell chip technology to China. That could further boost Nvidia's revenue in the region. But it could still be some time before the chip hits the market. In the meantime, Nvidia can lean on its H20. As long as the White House doesn't ban it again. Email Daniel Howley at dhowley@ Follow him on X/Twitter at @DanielHowley.
