In Trump's crypto drive, US puts GDP data on blockchain

The govt's effort initially targets nine blockchains, including Bitcoin, Ethereum and Solana

- Bloomberg

The US government on Thursday began distributing gross domestic product data on public blockchains, marking the latest Trump administration endorsement of the crypto industry.

The move, as described by Commerce Department officials, will create another avenue—not a replacement—for publishing the economic data.

The commerce department's adoption of blockchain to carry some of its most critical and market-moving economic data amounts to a US government seal of approval on the technology that's increasingly being used for trading everything from money-market funds to stocks, beyond its origins in cryptocurrency.

"The entire administration has embraced this," said Mike Cahill, chief executive officer of Douro Labs, who said he's been working with the Commerce Department on the effort for about two months. "With today's announcement we are now in a world where government data lives on blockchains, and market participants can participate in real time."

The government's effort initially targets nine blockchains, including Bitcoin, Ethereum and Solana. The plan is to put a so-called cryptographic hash of the data—essentially, a tool to verify its integrity—on those blockchains.