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Trump may not like crypto, but the crypto-verse sure doesn’t miss a chance to mess with him. As proof that anything can be tokenized – no matter how trivial or influential – a derivative has just appeared on Uniswap to track the President’s health: Please welcome the Trump Health Index (THI).
Little is known about this “project” beyond its name and evolution (and, of course, its smart contract). For purists, it should be an index that goes up when the market has a positive perception of the President’s health and down when the opposite is true.
The markets are not very optimistic. The token went down from $0.957 to $0.954 in a few hours. It corrected to $0.956 – perhaps in reaction to the President’s announcement on Twitter that he was feeling well – and then dropped again to $0.955.
Trump’s Health and Bitcoin
It is no wonder why a Health Index would have some appeal for crypto traders. After all, the markets tend to be very volatile and prone to sentiment changes.
As Cryptopotato recently reported, Bitcoin experienced a sharp drop once the news spread out, but it remained relatively stable compared to previous events. BTC stayed over the $10.5k, and, right now, the world’s largest cryptocurrency is on the run for the most days over $10.000.
But this recent situation sparked a new debate about Bitcoin’s nature. Its correlation to gold (as a store of value) proved to be wrong as the precious metal spiked during those times of FUD. The token, instead, followed the stock markets (as an investment), which confused traders and analysts. Right now, the correlation between BTC and the SP500 is very high.
Crypto and Politics Sure Can Mix
Although THI’s liquidity is almost zero, so it cannot yet be taken seriously, the truth is that it would not be the first time traders speculate about the President’s future.
The crypto derivatives trading platform, FTX, offers the opportunity to speculate on Donald Trump’s political futures. The TRUMP contract would close at $1 if Trump wins the election, and at $0 if he loses.
At the moment, the outlook is not the best, especially after news of his COVID exposure. If the markets follow the President’s popularity, the COVID contagion was terrible news, causing one of the sharpest declines in the market. His well-being announcement brought some hope, but the contract is being traded at record lows for now.
In addition to derivatives, Augur loves any speculation regarding Trump’s future. The platform gives a 40% chance of him winning the elections. However, there are many bets —aka predictions— on Donald Trump.
And for the OGs, it is impossible to forget the famous ‘shitcoin’ StopTrumpCoin that was traded in Cryptopia back in the days of the altcoin madness. The token’s announcement said its goal was “to bring about world peace so that all humans are treated fairly and equally.”
The Cryptopia hack didn’t allow them to achieve such a goal as trading halted shortly after.
But the President also has his fans in Crypto Land. The TrumpCoin token has some time on the market, and just yesterday, it went up 200% after the optimism about the President’s health. But wait a second before going all-in. The spike is because of its low liquidity and, ironically, low popularity among crypto traders.
Featured image courtesy of Financial Times. This article was first published on Oct 4, 2020.
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