Bitcoin has surged. Why it matters, even if you don’t have any.
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What are the key updates on Bitcoin's price surge?
Hey there, it's Shamita. I've got a quick request for you. If Apple News Today is an essential part of your morning routine, follow the show in Apple Podcasts. And if you have another 30 seconds, leave us a rating and a review too. It helps other people find our show and it helps us know what you like about it. Thanks. Good morning. It's Friday, December 6th. I'm Shamita Basu. This is Apple News Today. On today's show, why Bitcoin's wild surge in price might not be good for the greater economy. Notre Dame reopens five years after a devastating fire. And Taylor Swift's record-breaking Eros tour winds down this weekend. But first, House Republicans will have their smallest majority in history when the next Congress gets sworn in in January.
That's 220 Republican seats to Democrats' 215. But because President-elect Trump has tapped some House members for cabinet roles and Congressman Matt Gaetz has resigned, there will be a few vacant seats. So the margin will be even smaller for some period of time, which is why Washington Post congressional reporter Mariana Sotomayor told us if the party wants to advance legislation without Democrats, there's practically no wiggle room.
If they have a three-seat majority when everybody is present, they know that it's going to be really difficult for them to find agreement amongst each other on a number of policies that President-elect Donald Trump wants to get done.
At the top of Republicans' to-do list is a border security bill and an economic package to reauthorize tax cuts from Trump's first term. Lawmakers and congressional aides told Sotomayor... there's already enough disagreement on those two bills that they might wait until April when those vacant seats I mentioned get filled. Still, navigating such a slim margin will be familiar territory for House Speaker Mike Johnson.
The House Republican majority was already very narrow with five seats. There were days that there were actually more Democrats voting on the House floor than Republicans at certain points in time. There were, as we all recall, a number of Republicans who resigned early from Congress. So literally, Johnson had to manage for several months a one vote majority.
Johnson will be judged by how well he's able to navigate the serious ideological divides within his own party.
As much as Republicans may try and may ultimately be able to agree on something, it's going to be bruising. It's going to be painful.
Plus, as we learned from Trump's first term, the president is likely going to apply a lot of pressure on his party in Congress. The message being support this legislation or risk ending up on Trump's bad side.
A lot of them lived under the first Trump administration and remembered just how much Trump himself really did twist arms. A lot of Republicans are hoping that that pressure doesn't really get exerted on the most vulnerable Republicans, the ones who need to win reelection in swing districts so that Republicans can continue to keep the majority past the midterms in the next couple of cycles.
The cryptocurrency market is notoriously volatile, but this week, Bitcoin reached a milestone never before seen in the digital currency world. For the first time, it traded above $100,000. Since Donald Trump's victory in the presidential election, Bitcoin has been on a pretty remarkable rally, surging 40% in value over the course of a month. Trump has made a complete 180 on crypto since his first term. Back then, he called it a disaster waiting to happen. But these days, the Trump family is selling their own cryptocurrency token and Trump is promising to support deregulation, which has investors looking forward to him being back in the White House. But the Bitcoin surge has sparked fear among some economists and crypto critics who believe the bubble is ultimately destined to burst.
Bitcoin definitely has a history of crashing in spectacular fashion after hitting records.
That's Wall Street Journal reporter Alexander Osipovich, who covers the crypto market. And he told us a crash wouldn't just hurt the people who invest in digital currency. It could hurt all of us.
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