Trump Wants All Future Bitcoin Mined in US—Is That Even Possible?

Bitcoin mining is a big business in the US, but how big? And will Donald Trump’s return to the White House make a difference?

Last year’s president-elect said-along with numerous others pro-crypto promises– that he wanted all remaining coins to be mined on American soil.

Spoiler alert: this will be very difficult, if not impossible.

Data collected by DeMinerMag shows that U.S. miners currently account for about 40% of mining hashrate – more than any other country.

But experts told it Declutter that it is highly unlikely that the pro-crypto commander-in-chief will be able to shift the remaining 60% of the Bitcoin mining hashrate to the states.

“In my opinion, that’s impossible,” said Matthew Sigel, head of digital asset research at VanEck Declutter. He added that mining operations around the world should cease and operations in the US should take their place.

And CJ Burnett, Chief Revenue Officer at Compass Mining, which provides Bitcoin mining hosting and other services, told it Declutter that while his company was enthusiastic about Trump’s “grets” for the industry, it would be impractical to move all mining operations to the United States.

“The US lacks the electrical infrastructure, physical computer hardware (mining machines) and sufficiently low energy costs to become the only place to mine all remaining Bitcoin,” he said.

“Ultimately, Bitcoin mining remains a globally distributed network, driven by the market economy, energy availability and the regulatory landscape worldwide,” Burnett added.

To for the Bitcoin network to function as a payment network, miners work to add blocks full of data (information about transactions) to a long-running, public ledger known as a blockchain.

As Bitcoin has grown since its launch in 2009, it has become a very large and very secure computer network. It’s a lot harder to add new blocks, and mining operations are now forced to use a lot of energy to do so.

Part of the nature of Bitcoin is that it is decentralized, so anyone can get involved in helping run the network. As a result, miners are spread throughout the world, although larger companies tend to locate in locations that provide favorable (i.e. cost-efficient) conditions to support profitable mining.

Other mining hotspots include Kazakhstan, Russia and Canada.

The US became the leader in Bitcoin mining after China launched a crackdown on the industry in 2021, pushing miners elsewhere. Data from TheMinerMag shows that the top 20 US mining companies minted 3,794 Bitcoins in November alone (worth approximately $366 million at the time of writing).

And industry executives have confidence in a Trump presidency.

“Bitcoin can increasingly be mined in the US and improved US policy could certainly make it more attractive for miners to build in the US, increasing the [industry] growth,” said Ro Shirole, Chief Business Officer at mining company Blockmetrix Declutter.

Frank Holmes, executive chairman of Hive Digital Technologies, meanwhile, said that “continued support for Bitcoin innovation” would come under the Trump presidency.

And Burnett added that the change in sentiment around Bitcoin and mining has been “palpable” with the Republican victory.

So far, the results are noticeable: Bitcoin saw a boost after Trump’s victory and broke new highs shortly after the November 6 election. The largest coin is currently trading above $98,000 per coin, a jump of almost 1% in the past 24 hours, CoinGecko data shows. On December 17, it reached an all-time high of $108,135.

Many in the broader crypto industry are now expecting a more favorable business environment in the US compared to the regulatory onslaught during Democratic President Joe Biden’s administration.

Edited by Stacy Elliott