Bitcoin eyes $70,000 milestone as US presidential election nears

Bitcoin continued its upward movement toward the $70,000 benchmark on Monday morning in Asia, as investors closely monitor the U.S. presidential election, now just two weeks away.

“The $70,000 level represents a significant psychological resistance point, being close to bitcoin’s all-time high,” said Min Jung, an analyst at Presto Research. The token reached an all-time high of over $73,700 in March this year.

The world’s largest cryptocurrency reached a high of around $69,450 early Monday morning in Asia, before retreating to $68,768 at 11:30 a.m. in Hong Kong, according to The Block’s bitcoin price page .

“With less than three weeks until election day, we expect the market's focus on this critical market event to increase further from here on,” said David Lawant, Head of Research at FalconX. “For the first time, crypto has become a mainstream political issue, engaging a broader audience.”

Trump's odds play in favor

As investors closely watch the U.S. election, the rising odds of former president Donald Trump’s victory are contributing to bitcoin's price increase, Jung said.

Trump has maintained a strong positive view toward the crypto sector. While opponent Kamala Harris has also recently announced support for crypto policies, Trump has expressed his patronage for various Web3 sectors such as non-fungible tokens, bitcoin mining and decentralized finance. 

Ethereum-based prediction market platform Polymarket shows Trump leading Harris by 21%, with his winning odds at around 60%. On FiveThirtyEight’s aggregate of traditional polls, Harris leads with 48.2%, ahead of Trump by 1.8%. Nonetheless, the gap between the two candidates in the national polls has narrowed from 3.1% on Sept. 1.

“With the focus on the US election results being front and center, the most positive outcome for crypto would be a Trump win along with a Republican sweep of House and Senate, allowing the Trump-Vance endorsed digital asset reform plans to have a realistic chance of passing through congress,” said Augustine Fan, head of insights at SOFA.org.

Following the presidential election on Nov. 5 is another major macroeconomic event: the U.S. Federal Open Market Committee meeting. CME Group’s FedWatch Tool currently predicts a 94.4% that the FOMC meeting will result in a 25 basis point interest rate cut.

“If Trump’s dominance continues and the Fed signals a more dovish stance, we could see renewed momentum for bitcoin in the weeks following these events,” Presto’s Jung told The Block.