South Dakota Seeks to Establish Bitcoin Reserve as More States Join the Trend

South Dakota is expected to begin debating a bill that seeks to add Bitcoin to its financial reserves, a move that would officially recognize the crypto as part of the state’s assets. “I am proud to say I will be bringing a bill in the South Dakota House that would create a strategic Bitcoin reserve,” Logan Manhart, South Dakota’s State Representative, wrote on X on Tuesday. “Now is one of the few chances government has at being proactive.”

A timeframe for when the bill would be introduced into the state’s House of Representatives was not provided. Decrypt has reached out to learn more about the timing and details of the bill. The state-level push for Bitcoin reserves is closely tied to President Donald Trump’s pro-crypto stance, which has led to renewed interest in integrating Bitcoin into U.S. financial policy.

South Dakota’s move comes as at least a dozen other states plan to introduce or have proposed similar legislation, including Texas, Florida, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Arizona. Pennsylvania was one of the earliest to introduce a proposal in November 2024, followed by Florida, Texas, and Ohio in December. More states have since joined the effort, with North Dakota, New Hampshire, Oklahoma, Massachusetts, Wyoming, and Utah submitting Bitcoin reserve proposals in January 2025.

Arizona has gone a step further, approving the first leg of a Bitcoin reserve bill in its legislature that will allow up to 10% of public funds to be allocated should it pass. On his campaign trail in November, Trump pledged to establish a national Bitcoin stockpile to position the U.S. as the crypto capital of the planet. That promise took a concrete step forward last week when Trump signed his first crypto-focused executive order, creating the Presidential Working Group on Digital Asset Markets—a team tasked with exploring policies, including a national crypto reserve.

The group, led by the White House Crypto & AI Czar, will assess the reserve’s feasibility alongside other crypto-related policies. Sacks recently commented on the possibility of a Bitcoin reserve, stating, “Yeah, we’re going to evaluate that. We have not decided to do it yet, but we need to study that.” With Trump’s administration actively supporting crypto adoption, expectations are high that more states—and even other nations—will follow suit. Meanwhile, countries such as Brazil, Japan, Poland, and Russia are exploring similar reserve strategies as Bitcoin’s role continues to rise on the global financial stage.