Bitcoin Goes Above $85,000 As Trump Pauses Trade Tariffs for 90 Days

At the end of last week, crypto markets sighed relief as the largest asset in the cryptocurrency market, Bitcoin, finally managed to rise to its head and get out of the chains that held it in the upper $70,000 price range. The Bitcoin price easily stepped over the $80,000 threshold and continued to increase, finally surging above the $85,000 level, almost reaching $86,000.

The same happened to the US stock market, which Bitcoin is largely correlated with. This sudden surge occurred as US president Donald Trump announced a pause on the new trade tariffs imposed on the world earlier. This pause will last for roughly three months (90 days) but will not touch China, and the trade war with it continues while you read this text.

However, there is an important nuance that Trump has left out: smartphones, along with electronics, and microchips exported by China, from the new 145% fees on all Chinese goods.

Trump’s radical reversal from his previous stance

Before announcing the pause, Trump publicly stated that the governments of all the countries included in the tariff network, apart from China and Belarus, were contacting him and “kissing his ass” pleading to “make a deal.” The move with the 90-day pause came as a response to that, and Trump referred to it as “an opportunity for constructive dialogue.” He emphasized that the US wants to conduct fair trade and hopes that the three-month pause will help the US and other countries to negotiate that successfully.

This is a significant rollback from the harsh stance Trump demonstrated previously, when a week before, Trump threatened to impose extra tariffs on more than $300 billion worth of goods imported into the US, and the markets – stocks, commodities, crypto – went down steeply. While Bitcoin initially managed to resist the worsening macroeconomic situation around the world and avoided the drawdown shown by traditional markets and assets, such as the Nasdaq, Dow Jones, and S&P 500, eventually even BTC yielded to the tremendous market pressure as fears of an escalating trade war began to increase.

Bitcoin and stock markets soar on trade tariff relief and other bullish factors

Bitcoin, which had been moving sideways in the $77,000 – $80,000 price range amid the strengthening global economic uncertainty and turmoil, immediately reacted to the tariff pause and stock market surge. On Friday, it spiked by 6.26% within several hours, breaking through the $80,000 resistance and reaching the $83,930 price mark.

On Saturday, the pioneer cryptocurrency extended its growth and added nearly 4% after a small rebound. On that day, Bitcoin soared as high as to touch on 85,870. That was one of the single-day performances in many weeks. Today, BTC dropped 2.71% and then went up once again, demonstrating resilience with traders betting on it and accumulating BTC, pushing the price upwards. Aside from Bitcoin, top cryptocurrencies, such as Ethereum, Solana, XRP, and many others, went up in price significantly.

Besides, the tariff pause was not the only positive news that stimulated the overall market recovery. On Friday, the director of the Boston Federal Reserve branch announced that the Fed would certainly be ready to help stabilize financial markets should the negative conditions worsen and become disorderly. This gave a major boost to stocks and commodities, along with another positive driver – on Friday, better-than-expected Q1 quarterly earnings results from US banks were released. Also, the March US PPI report went up less than expected, relieving price pressures.

The S&P 500, Dow Jones, and Nasdaq went up by nearly 2% on Friday on that positive news.

Bitcoin’s unstable behavior

Bitcoin’s uneven trajectory as it first nosedived below $75,000, then held at $80,000, then again crashed, and finally (for the time being) has recovered above $85,000 continues to challenge narratives about its correlation to the stock market and ability to withstand macroeconomic headwinds.

Many investors and analysts tout it as digital gold, which can maintain value in times of uncertainty. Arthur Azizov from B2 Venture has recently stated that Bitcoin is evolving into a major asset class due to its reactions to the strong macroeconomic factors such as trade tariffs. Meanwhile, Bitcoin has also displayed strong sensitivity to macroeconomic turmoil, thus functioning more like a volatile high-beta asset.

Long-term bullish view on Bitcoin from influencers

Many analysts believe that the current trade tariff pause could help the Fed refrain from implementing aggressive interest rate hikes again.

Still, many analysts and investors remain bullish long-term. Among them are Binance founder and its former CEO Changpeng Zhao (CZ) and Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse. The former believes that Bitcoin will reach $1 million in the long term, while the latter stated that he looks at the BTC price in the long-term prospect as well as remains bullish.