Growing BTC reserve requires Congressional legislation — VanEck exec

Building a permanent US strategic Bitcoin reserve would likely require targeted legislation rather than executive action, according to VanEck’s head of digital assets, Matthew Sigel. Speaking at Bitcoin 2025 in Las Vegas, Sigel said the most viable path forward may involve inserting Bitcoin mining incentives into the congressional budget reconciliation process.

According to Sigel, the most effective path to growing a US strategic Bitcoin reserve would be through targeted amendments to congressional budget legislation. These could include tax credits for mining companies that use methane gas and other incentives aimed at encouraging miners to share a portion of their mined BTC with the federal government.

He argued that such an approach would allow the reserve to grow organically over time. Sigel also highlighted the limitations of executive actions in achieving this goal:

US President Donald Trump established the US Bitcoin Strategic Reserve through a March 7 executive order. According to the order, the US government can only acquire Bitcoin through budget-neutral strategies or asset forfeiture, prompting a range of different ideas on how to add to the government’s stockpile of nearly 200,000 BTC.

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Wyoming Senator Cynthia Lummis, the US lawmaker who introduced legislation for a Bitcoin strategic reserve in July 2024, proposed converting a portion of the gold certificates held by the US Treasury to Bitcoin.

Converting gold to Bitcoin would allow the US government to purchase more Bitcoin without incurring a cost to the taxpayer, Lummis said.

Bo Hines, the executive director of the President’s Council of Advisers on Digital Assets, echoed the idea in March 2025.

Hines called on the US Treasury to revalue its gold holdings, which are currently priced at just $42.22 per troy ounce, and convert a portion of those gains to Bitcoin. This strategy would also be budget-neutral, Hines said.

The price of gold reached an all-time high of $3,500 per ounce in April but experienced a minor pullback to around $3,300 on May 27.

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