Trump Launches Meme Coins Ahead of White House Return — WSJ

By Vicky Ge HuangPresident-elect Donald Trump promised a crypto-friendly administration. Days before taking office a second time, he and his family began selling new cryptocurrencies.Named $TRUMP and $MELANIA, the projects are meme coins, a type of crypto whose value is based largely on the popularity of internet memes. The tokens are available on the Solana blockchain.The president-elect's token, which was unveiled Friday night, quickly soared in value and held a market value of more than $9 billion as of Sunday afternoon, according to CoinMarketCap."It's time to celebrate everything we stand for: WINNING! Join my very special Trump Community. GET YOUR $TRUMP NOW," Trump wrote on his social-media platform, Truth Social.The post, which went live at 9 p.m. Friday, caught the crypto industry off guard. Even as the coin's value soared, some worried about its heavy insider ownership and potential for conflict of interest.Hundreds of crypto executives and political heavyweights had gathered in the nation's capital Friday night to celebrate what they expect to be a golden age for digital assets under the Trump administration. Many didn't learn about Trump's meme coin until Saturday morning, according to executives who attended the event, dubbed the Crypto Ball.On Sunday afternoon, Melania Trump followed in her husband's footsteps, posting on social media that she, too, is launching a meme coin. Some 15% of the $MELANIA tokens will be available for public distribution, according to the website associated with the token. The $MELANIA token launch, however, sent the $TRUMP coin crashing more than 45% before regaining some ground.The tokens aren't the Trump family's first foray into crypto. Trump has been courting the money and votes of crypto investors over the past year, making big promises to the industry and pledging to draft friendly legislation that would treat digital assets differently from stocks and bonds. Last year the incoming president helped launch a decentralized finance project with his sons Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump known as World Liberty Financial.Trump's new crypto projects quickly drew criticism, even among some die-hard crypto fans. A major point of controversy: 80% of the $TRUMP token's supply is owned by Fight Fight Fight and CIC Digital, an affiliate of the Trump Organization, according to the website associated with the token. Some 200 million of the 1 billion $TRUMP tokens have been released, and the rest will be sold over three years, the website said.Critics said the tokens create significant conflicts of interest for the incoming president. Foreign governments or businesses seeking to influence Washington could be inclined to buy the tokens to curry favor with Trump, they said."Before the first presidency, the huge concern was his Trump Hotel. All these years later, it has escalated to Trump crypto," said Kedric Payne, senior director of ethics at the Campaign Legal Center, an ethics watchdog group. "That just shows you the amount of ethics issues that we're going to have during this administration, if he started this even before day one."Spokespeople for Trump didn't return a request for comment.GetTrumpMemes.com, the website associated with the $TRUMP token, said it isn't political and has nothing to do with any political campaign or any political office or governmental agency.Some people in the industry saw the move as an opportunity to bring more users into the crypto world. Exchanges including Kraken and Crypto.com were swift to list the $TRUMP meme coin. Binance and Coinbase also announced plans to list the token.Some traders have made quick gains because of the $TRUMP token's blistering run.Barstool Sports founder and media personality Dave Portnoy said he bought 500,000 of the $TRUMP coin on Saturday at $24.80, according to his social-media post on X. By Sunday morning, he said he had sold his holdings, which were up 200%.The $TRUMP token "is currently the hottest digital meme on earth," said Trump's son Eric Trump in a post on the social-media platform X.Write to Vicky Ge Huang at [email protected]