The Bitcoin Conference 2025, held at The Venetian Las Vegas in Nevada, garnered significant attention due to the attendance of prominent political figures and a major investment announcement. The conference featured an impressive array of thought-provoking speakers. They all had very close ties to the White House and the Trump family.

Donald Trump Jr., son of the former US president, was one of the speakers. Just last month, federal regulators found him shaking hands with newly wealthy Chris Pavlovski of Rumble Inc.

The full speaker roster included two White House advisors — senior advisor to the President, Mitch Landrieu, and National Climate Advisor, Ali Zaidi. It featured the former US president’s two sons and the U.S. Commerce Secretary’s son. A third headliner from the past administration was Allison Lee, the former Trump appointee to the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Most recently, Trump’s media group has made headlines for bringing in $2.5 billion from investors. They intend to use this funds to buy Bitcoin, making the event even more historic. This announcement is further evidence of the development of the crossover between cryptocurrency and political spaces.

Planet Money provided an audio snapshot of the conference in this episode hosted by Alexi Horowitz-Ghazi. Our original reporting team of Ilya Marritz and Andrea Bernstein, with Maggie Luthar as engineer. This episode was reported and produced by Sam Yellowhorse Kesler. Fact checking by Willa Rubin with help from Emma Peaslee. Marianne McCune was the editor, and Alex Goldmark is the executive producer.