Earnings in his first days in office: Donald Trump won back the White House and pocketed a lot of cash amid talk of Trump’s cryptocurrency ventures. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
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Donald Trump released a digital meme on Friday that sparked a trading frenzy and led to reports that he instantly increased his fortune by tens of billions of dollars. Nonsense. These numbers are based on the theoretical price of crypto assets that President Trump cannot currently sell, so Forbes magazine has compiled them in line with its methodology of generally excluding unsellable assets from its net worth tally. It is rated as zero. But the cryptocurrencies Trump has already sold have strengthened his fortunes, adding hundreds of millions of dollars in liquid assets to his balance sheet.
How did this happen? Consider World Liberty Financial, the cryptocurrency venture that has increased the president-elect’s cash pile by an estimated $290 million over the past few days. World Liberty Financial makes money by selling tokens. The “gold paper” (Trump’s version of a white paper) explains that these tokens cannot currently be resold, there is no promise of future profit sharing, and there is little available to those who want to make money on their investments. According to the document, the first $30 million of proceeds will be kept for projects aimed at accelerating funding and bringing cryptocurrencies to the masses. But after setting aside that initial pile of cash, 75% will apparently go to Trump’s company, and 25% will be divided among other insiders, including the family of Trump’s incoming Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff. .
President Trump announced World Liberty Financial in August, but sales failed. By November 2nd, customers had only purchased an estimated $15 million worth of tokens, not enough to fully fund the project, much less start reducing revenue to Trump. But weeks after the Nov. 5 election, a cryptocurrency entrepreneur named Justin Sun, who is in a battle with the Securities and Exchange Commission over accusations of unregistered cryptocurrency sales and fraudulent market manipulation, announced that his project would be worth $30 million. announced that it had been cast. Trump would walk away with some money. Sales trickled up over the next few weeks, reaching an estimated $94 million by this Saturday, giving Trump’s entities $48 million.
Then things got wild. At 9:18 p.m. ET on Sunday, World Liberty Financial announced that it had disposed of all of the coins it originally planned to sell last year, apparently raising $300 million. It generated an estimated $206 million in sales in the 29 hours leading up to the dedication. Mr. Trump’s share at that point was about $200 million, according to Forbes’ calculations. He didn’t stop there. World Liberty Financial then revealed a new supply of tokens for sale, raising the price of each from 1.5 cents to 5 cents. By Tuesday evening, the project had raised another $117 million or so, of which an estimated $88 million went to Trump’s company, bringing his total to roughly $290 million — his from just one of the crypto ventures.
In addition to World Liberty Financial, the president is marketing a digital meme called $TRUMP that he announced on Friday, just in time to benefit from the buzz of the launch. The $TRUMP meme doesn’t even pretend to have a financial purpose. The official website urges buyers to “Celebrate your victory and have fun!” While warning that they are not buying investment opportunities. The pay structure behind $TRUMP is unclear, but it could be even more lucrative for the president than World Liberty Financial. President Trump, through a company called CIC Digital LLC, partnered with another company called Fight Fight Fight LLC to release 200 million memes Wednesday morning at a price of about $43 each. It appears that buyers will receive some kind of digital card.
There are still many unknowns, including the average price at which the president and his team sold batches of $TRUMP and the division of ownership between his company and Fight Fight Fight LLC, making it difficult to know exactly how much Trump has. It is impossible to calculate what you won from the jackpot. Representatives for Trump’s real estate business and cryptocurrency venture did not respond to requests for comment. The billionaire announced the news of the sale with great fanfare at 9pm on Friday, and $TRUMP was trading around $7 by 11pm, reaching a high of over $70 on Sunday, according to CoinMarketCap. Reached. If the president’s company held even 50% of the venture stock and sold all 200 million tokens at an average price of $7, the president would earn $700 million, on top of the estimated $290 million from World Liberty Financial. could have won a windfall. (These are all amounts before deducting any taxes he owes.)
This is something of a crowning achievement for Mr. Trump, who has spent the past four years rewriting the script for how money is made from politics. Not only did he do the same things previous presidents have done, such as selling books and giving speeches, but he also started new businesses, such as going public with the Trump Media and Technology Group. Leveraged supporters in ways. This created a Twitter knock-off that didn’t attract many users, but still managed to garner some excitement. investors. The venture’s stock price soared as soon as it hit the market, adding billions to Trump’s net worth. However, he had trouble converting that stock into cash. Even after the lockup expired, Trump did not sell the stock. He may have feared that if he sold, the stock price would fall and billions of dollars would disappear from his net worth.
His crypto venture is an antidote, initially providing liquidity whether or not the value ultimately collapses. President Trump said he plans to release an additional $800 million in TRUMP memes during his second term.
Cash is extremely important to the president. Before becoming a crypto enthusiast, he had an estimated $413 million on his balance sheet, on top of more than $500 million in legal debt. Although he is appealing the lawsuits that generated these debts (two defamation lawsuits and one fraud lawsuit), interest continues to accrue, pushing Trump’s potential payout closer to $600 million. are. In the past, such numbers might have worried him. But two days after retaking the White House, any concerns have been put to rest as his second term has already proven to be the most lucrative in U.S. history.
