Trump's Crypto Picks Face Reality: XRP, ADA Hold Gains as Majors Slide

Two of the digital assets in U.S. President Donald Trump’s proposed crypto reserve, XRP and Cardano (ADA), have shined since his Nov. 5 election—even as others have struggled. 

XRP and Cardano were recently up 375% and 163% over this timespan, while Bitcoin has relinquished a good portion of its post-election gains and Ethereum and Solana have fallen precipitously.

XRP and ADA’s gains have come as an overhaul of the Securities and Exchange Commission has created a friendlier regulatory environment for the assets, the third and sixth largest by market capitalization (excluding stablecoins). 

Over the past two weeks, the agency—now under the direction of Acting SEC Chair Mark T. Uyeda—has dropped multiple enforcement actions against leading crypto-focused firms, including the exchanges Coinbase and Kraken. 

“Both (assets) faced existential-level regulatory threats under the Gensler-led SEC, and those have been removed,” Matt Hougan, CIO of crypto index fund manager, Bitwise Asset Management told Decrypt, referring to Uyeda’s predecessor and crypto skeptic Gary Gensler. “XRP and ADA had no shot at succeeding under the prior Commission.”

The Gensler-led SEC scrutinized the regulatory status of every digital asset in Trump’s proposed reserve, aside from Bitcoin. 

The agency sued Ripple Labs, alleging that its programmatic sales of XRP on exchanges violated U.S. securities law. It labeled Cardano and Solana as unregistered securities in lawsuits against exchanges like Coinbase. 

Though the SEC has yet to drop its ongoing enforcement lawsuit against Ripple, the move is expected after the regulator abandoned its high-profile crypto cases. It has also withdrawn an investigation into Robinhood’s crypto arm, according to the trading platform.

Bitcoin is trading at about $86,700, up about 29% from its November levels, but way down from its all-time high in January above $108,000, according to crypto markets data provider CoinGecko.

Solana was recently changing hands at about $145, down 9.3% since Nov. 5, and well off its all-time high of $293 set after Trump debuted his own meme coin in January. Ethereum has fallen 9.5% since Election Day.

Still, if Trump hadn’t named Cardano in his proposed crypto reserve, the coin might not be such a clear winner, Geoff Kendrick, global head of digital assets research at Standard Chartered, told Decrypt.

“ADA had started giving back its gains before the surprise inclusion by Trump on Sunday,” he said, referring to Cardano by its ticker name.

For XRP, Trump’s victory signaled that Ripple’s years-long court battle against the SEC was set to conclude. Kendrick said, “The jump in XRP was more catch-up related to that.”