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WIRED
5 days ago
- Business
- WIRED
Trumpworld Is Fighting Over 'Official' Crypto Wallet
Jun 4, 2025 1:27 PM The President's sons are feuding with the organization behind the TRUMP memecoin, as both parties claim to be involved in launching Trump-affiliated crypto wallets. Photograph: Bloomberg/Getty Images As Donald Trump and his family stretch into nearly every corner of the cryptocurrency sector, a dispute has broken out over which corporate entities are permitted to wield the Trump brand to promote the crypto products they launch. On Tuesday, the X account for the US president's TRUMP memecoin—which is administered by Fight Fight Fight LLC, formed by longtime Trump ally Bill Zanker—announced plans to launch a crypto wallet and trading platform in partnership with NFT marketplace Magic Eden. The corresponding website, first identified by independent crypto researcher Molly White, pitches the product as 'the official $TRUMP wallet by President Trump.' However, in X posts of their own, Eric and Donald Trump Jr. later repudiated the announcement, which they claimed had not been greenlit by the family. Eric Trump implied that The Trump Organization, the holding company for many of the family's business ventures and intellectual property, could take action against Magic Eden. 'This project is not authorized by [The Trump Organization],' wrote Eric on X. 'I would be extremely careful using our name in a project that has not been approved and is unknown to anyone in our organization,' he added, tagging the Magic Eden handle. In a separate post, Donald Trump Jr. revealed that a separate crypto wallet is under development at World Liberty Financial, a crypto company that he and Eric helped to launch in September last year. 'Stay tuned—World Liberty Financial, which we have been working tirelessly on, will be launching our official wallet soon,' he wrote. World Liberty Financial and Fight Fight Fight did not respond immediately to requests for comment. The White House and Magic Eden declined to comment. Eric Trump did not respond directly to questions from WIRED, saying only, 'I know nothing about this project nor is there any contractual relationship.' To some cryptowatchers, the initial wallet announcement made by Fight Fight Fight had the ring of truth about it, not least because it was coming from the organization behind the TRUMP memecoin. In the last year, despite a chorus of complaints relating to alleged abuses of office and conflicts of interest, the Trump family has forged into almost every segment of the crypto market, from stablecoins, to memecoins, crypto investment products, and bitcoin mining. To launch a crypto wallet appeared to some as a plausible next step: 'It makes perfect sense for anyone who has their eye on where the puck is going,' says Brad Harrison, head of crypto platform Venus Labs. The dispute over the wallets soon to be launched by World Liberty Financial and Fight Fight Fight, though, marks the second time in as many weeks that Trump-affilitated entities have thrown themselves into competition with one another as expansion on multiple fronts complicates the family's crypto empire. On May 27, Trump Media and Technology Group, a publicly traded company in which the Trump family owns a majority stake, announced it had raised $2.5 billion to accumulate a 'bitcoin treasury.' The deal puts the conglomerate in competition with a growing stable of bitcoin accumulation stocks, which act as a substitute of sorts for investing in bitcoin—among them American Bitcoin, the crypto mining firm launched recently by Eric and Donald Trump Jr., which is pursuing a similar strategy. The wallet conflict also underlines the inscrutability of the relationships and interplay between The Trump Organization, Trump Media and Technology Group, World Liberty Financial, American Bitcoin, Fight Fight Fight, and the Trump family. The full ownership structure of Fight Fight Fight is obfuscated by layers of corporate filings unavailable to the public. The X posts by Eric and Donald Trump Jr. on Tuesday appear to allege that, as the leaders of The Trump Organization, they reserve the right to limit the company's use of their family name to the TRUMP memecoin. Meanwhile, though World Liberty Financial has sought to underline its independence from Donald Trump's political affairs—'We're a private company having private-sector conversations,' wrote World Liberty Financial cofounder Zak Folkman in a recent statement—the wallet dispute has underscored its entanglement with the president's family brand. In his X post on Tuesday, Donald Trump Jr. appeared to present the crypto wallet soon to be issued by World Liberty Financial as the real Trump family wallet, as set against what he alleges is the unauthorized Trump-branded wallet backed by Magic Eden. In cryptoland, confusion reigns: 'Not really sure what's real and what's not,' says Tom, the pseudonymous leader of peer-to-peer crypto exchange Raydium. In the wider crypto industry, the ease with which anybody can put any name to an undifferentiated crypto product has long created problems, claims Cory Klippsten, CEO at bitcoin services company Swan Bitcoin. 'In crypto, it's far too easy to spin up scams masquerading as innovation,' alleges Klippsten, 'especially when you can hijack a brand and pump a token before anyone asks who's behind it.'
The Star
23-05-2025
- Business
- The Star
Protesters yell 'Shame!' at guests of Trump's memecoin dinner
An activist calls out an attendee of an exclusive dinner at Trump National Golf Course as he and fellow activist from Our Revolution protest influence-peddling & corruption, on May 22, 2025 in Sterling, Va. Inside, the top 220 holders of the President's cryptocurrency have paid over US$394mil for spots at an exclusive dinner with Trump. — Kevin Wolf/AP Content Services for Our Revolution Top holders of Donald Trump's memecoin and other guests were greeted by protesters as they arrived for a dinner with the president at his golf club outside of Washington on May 22, a day which saw Bitcoin extend its record high amid optimism about US government support for the crypto industry. Chinese crypto entrepreneur Justin Sun, who is working to resolve a regulatory case in the US, posted a photo on X showing him on his way to the dinner. Trump announced his own departure to the event on Truth Social, saying "The U.S.A. is DOMINATING in Crypto, Bitcoin, etc., and we are going to keep it that way!' Guests arriving for the event, which included retired NBA player Lamar Odom, were greeted outside the Trump National Golf Club near Washington by about 100 protesters within earshot of the security checkpoint where they emerged from their vehicles. Protesters screamed "Shame!' and "I hope you choke on your dinner!' and held signs with messages like "America is not for sale' and "Memecoin grifters go to jail.' Inside the event, large placards saying "Fight Fight Fight' adorned every table, an homage to the name of the company that launched the $Trump memecoin, according to photos taken inside that were seen by Bloomberg. Gift bags containing black hats and plaques, both reading "Fight Fight Fight,' were on the chairs. On the menu was a field-green salad, filet mignon and pan-seared halibut along with garlic mashed potatoes and a vegetable medley. The gathering has faced criticism from Democrats including Senators Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Adam Schiff of California, who cited conflicts of interest, and the potential of selling access to the president, particularly to people from foreign countries. "In effect he is putting a 'For Sale' sign on the White House lawn,' Senator Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut said in an interview on May 9. "The dinner crystallized and heightened concerns that we had even before the dinner was announced.' On Thursday, Blumenthal participated in a press call to discuss what was described as "unprecedented presidential crypto corruption.' To qualify for the dinner, holders of Trump memecoin had to register on an online leaderboard, which tracked their average holdings over three weeks. The top 220 holders got invited, while the top 25 were also invited to a special before-dinner reception with the president. More than half of the top holders used foreign exchanges that say they ban US users, suggesting that many of the purchasers are based outside the US, Bloomberg analysis found. One guest is Morten Christensen, who lives in Mexico and runs which tracks token giveaways. He managed to snag a seat at the dinner at a total cost of only about US$1,200 (RM5,106). In a speech at the dinner, Trump repeated his pledge to make the US the world's crypto capital, according to Christensen. "We've got some of the smartest minds anywhere in the world right here in this room and you believe in the whole crypto thing, and a lot of people are starting to believe in it,' Trump said in the speech, parts of which were posted on X by attendees. After Trump left, Sun was introduced as a speaker by Bill Zanker, who helped organise the dinner. In a short address, Sun said the industry should get behind Trump as crypto operators have been struggling with regulatory challenges for a decade, according to Christensen. Sun also posed for pictures with attendees. Over the last few years, Trump turned from being a crypto sceptic to the industry's biggest champion. After launching four collections of nonfungible tokens, Trump started his second presidential term by appointing crypto-friendly agency heads and establishing a strategic Bitcoin reserve. Trump's family has also expanded its network of crypto businesses. Last year, Trump and his sons launched World Liberty Financial, which has raised more than US$500mil (RM2.12bil). Two of his sons also got involved in a Bitcoin mining venture. Trump-related entities also issued the Trump memecoin days before inauguration. The memecoin's market cap reached nearly US$15bil (RM63.83bil) soon after its January launch, but then dropped sharply, to about US$2.9bil (RM12.34bil) currently, according to data tracker The announcement of the dinner for memecoin holders modestly boosted the coin's price. Fight Fight Fight LLC and CIC Digital LLC, an affiliate of The Trump Organization, share 80% of the total memecoin supply. Bitcoin was trading at US$111,593 (RM474,861) – just below its all-time high – at 8.47am in Singapore on Friday. – Bloomberg
Yahoo
23-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Protesters Yell ‘Shame!' at Guests of Trump's Memecoin Dinner
(Bloomberg) -- Top holders of Donald Trump's memecoin and other guests were greeted by protesters as they arrived for a dinner with the president at his golf club outside of Washington on Thursday, a day which saw Bitcoin extend its record high amid optimism about US government support for the crypto industry. NY Private School Pleads for Donors to Stay Open After Declaring Bankruptcy Can Frank Gehry's 'Grand LA' Make Downtown Feel Like a Neighborhood? Chicago's O'Hare Airport Seeks Up to $4.3 Billion of Muni Debt NYC's War on Trash Gets a Glam Squad NJ Transit Makes Deal With Engineers, Ending Three-Day Strike Chinese crypto entrepreneur Justin Sun, who is working to resolve a regulatory case in the US, posted a photo on X showing him on his way to the dinner. Trump announced his own departure to the event on Truth Social, saying 'The U.S.A. is DOMINATING in Crypto, Bitcoin, etc., and we are going to keep it that way!' Guests arriving for the event, which included retired NBA player Lamar Odom, were greeted outside the Trump National Golf Club near Washington by about 100 protesters within earshot of the security checkpoint where they emerged from their vehicles. Protesters screamed 'Shame!' and 'I hope you choke on your dinner!' and held signs with messages like 'America is not for sale' and 'Memecoin grifters go to jail.' Inside the event, large placards saying 'Fight Fight Fight' adorned every table, an homage to the name of the company that launched the $Trump memecoin, according to photos taken inside that were seen by Bloomberg. Gift bags containing black hats and plaques, both reading 'Fight Fight Fight,' were on the chairs. On the menu was a field-green salad, filet mignon and pan-seared halibut along with garlic mashed potatoes and a vegetable medley. The gathering has faced criticism from Democrats including Senators Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Adam Schiff of California, who cited conflicts of interest, and the potential of selling access to the president, particularly to people from foreign countries. 'In effect he is putting a 'For Sale' sign on the White House lawn,' Senator Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut said in an interview on May 9. 'The dinner crystallized and heightened concerns that we had even before the dinner was announced.' On Thursday, Blumenthal participated in a press call to discuss what was described as 'unprecedented presidential crypto corruption.' To qualify for the dinner, holders of Trump memecoin had to register on an online leaderboard, which tracked their average holdings over three weeks. The top 220 holders got invited, while the top 25 were also invited to a special before-dinner reception with the president. More than half of the top holders used foreign exchanges that say they ban US users, suggesting that many of the purchasers are based outside the US, Bloomberg analysis found. One guest is Morten Christensen, who lives in Mexico and runs which tracks token giveaways. He managed to snag a seat at the dinner at a total cost of only about $1,200. In a speech at the dinner, Trump repeated his pledge to make the US the world's crypto capital, according to Christensen. 'We've got some of the smartest minds anywhere in the world right here in this room and you believe in the whole crypto thing, and a lot of people are starting to believe in it,' Trump said in the speech, parts of which were posted on X by attendees. After Trump left, Sun was introduced as a speaker by Bill Zanker, who helped organize the dinner. In a short address, Sun said the industry should get behind Trump as crypto operators have been struggling with regulatory challenges for a decade, according to Christensen. Sun also posed for pictures with attendees. Over the last few years, Trump turned from being a crypto skeptic to the industry's biggest champion. After launching four collections of nonfungible tokens, Trump started his second presidential term by appointing crypto-friendly agency heads and establishing a strategic Bitcoin reserve. Trump's family has also expanded its network of crypto businesses. Last year, Trump and his sons launched World Liberty Financial, which has raised more than $500 million. Two of his sons also got involved in a Bitcoin mining venture. Trump-related entities also issued the Trump memecoin days before inauguration. The memecoin's market cap reached nearly $15 billion soon after its January launch, but then dropped sharply, to about $2.9 billion currently, according to data tracker The announcement of the dinner for memecoin holders modestly boosted the coin's price. Fight Fight Fight LLC and CIC Digital LLC, an affiliate of The Trump Organization, share 80% of the total memecoin supply. Bitcoin was trading at $111,593 — just below its all-time high — at 8:47 a.m. in Singapore on Friday. --With assistance from Helena Cheng and Muyao Shen. (Updates with comments from dinner, Bitcoin price) Why Apple Still Hasn't Cracked AI Inside the First Stargate AI Data Center How Coach Handbags Became a Gen Z Status Symbol Anthropic Is Trying to Win the AI Race Without Losing Its Soul Microsoft's CEO on How AI Will Remake Every Company, Including His ©2025 Bloomberg L.P. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Mint
22-05-2025
- Business
- Mint
Protesters Yell ‘Shame!' at Guests of Trump's Memecoin Dinner
Top holders of Donald Trump's memecoin and other guests were greeted by protesters as they arrived for a dinner with the president at his golf club outside of Washington on Thursday, a day which saw Bitcoin extend its record high amid optimism about US government support for the crypto industry. Chinese crypto entrepreneur Justin Sun, who is working to resolve a regulatory case in the US, posted a photo on X showing him on his way to the dinner. Trump announced his own departure to the event on Truth Social, saying 'The U.S.A. is DOMINATING in Crypto, Bitcoin, etc., and we are going to keep it that way!' Guests arriving for the event, which included retired NBA player Lamar Odom, were greeted outside the Trump National Golf Club near Washington by about 100 protesters within earshot of the security checkpoint where they emerged from their vehicles. Protesters screamed 'Shame!' and 'I hope you choke on your dinner!' and held signs with messages like 'America is not for sale' and 'Memecoin grifters go to jail.' Inside the event, large placards saying 'Fight Fight Fight' adorned every table, an homage to the name of the company that launched the $Trump memecoin, according to photos taken inside that were seen by Bloomberg. Gift bags containing black hats and plaques, both reading 'Fight Fight Fight,' were on the chairs. On the menu was a field-green salad, filet mignon and pan-seared halibut along with garlic mashed potatoes and a vegetable medley. The gathering has faced criticism from Democrats including Senators Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Adam Schiff of California, who cited conflicts of interest, and the potential of selling access to the president, particularly to people from foreign countries. 'In effect he is putting a 'For Sale' sign on the White House lawn,' Senator Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut said in an interview on May 9. 'The dinner crystallized and heightened concerns that we had even before the dinner was announced.' On Thursday, Blumenthal participated in a press call to discuss what was described as 'unprecedented presidential crypto corruption.' To qualify for the dinner, holders of Trump memecoin had to register on an online leaderboard, which tracked their average holdings over three weeks. The top 220 holders got invited, while the top 25 were also invited to a special before-dinner reception with the president. More than half of the top holders used foreign exchanges that say they ban US users, suggesting that many of the purchasers are based outside the US, Bloomberg analysis found. One guest is Morten Christensen, who lives in Mexico and runs which tracks token giveaways. He managed to snag a seat at the dinner at a total cost of only about $1,200. Over the last few years, Trump turned from being a crypto skeptic to the industry's biggest champion. After launching four collections of nonfungible tokens, Trump started his second presidential term by appointing crypto-friendly agency heads and establishing a strategic Bitcoin reserve. Trump's family has also expanded its network of crypto businesses. Last year, Trump and his sons launched World Liberty Financial, which has raised more than $500 million. Two of his sons also got involved in a Bitcoin mining venture. Trump-related entities also issued the Trump memecoin days before inauguration. The memecoin's market cap reached nearly $15 billion soon after its January launch, but then dropped sharply, to about $2.9 billion currently, according to data tracker The announcement of the dinner for memecoin holders modestly boosted the coin's price. Fight Fight Fight LLC and CIC Digital LLC, an affiliate of The Trump Organization, share 80% of the total memecoin supply. With assistance from Helena Cheng and Muyao Shen. This article was generated from an automated news agency feed without modifications to text.
Fast Company
22-05-2025
- Business
- Fast Company
Trump's 4,000 meme-coins-per-plate crypto dinner is an American embarrassment
On Thursday, President Donald Trump will sit down for an intimate evening at his Northern Virginia golf club with 220 of his favorite people in the world: a group of cryptocurrency speculators who have spent an estimated $148 million on Trump's eponymous memecoin, making the president and his associates millions of dollars in the process. Even by Trump's standards, this dinner will be the culmination of one of the most cartoonish episodes of executive-branch graft in recent memory. Last month, Trump announced that at the end of a predetermined period, he would host an 'unforgettable Gala DINNER' for the top 220 holders of $TRUMP, allowing winners to discuss the future of the industry with the 'Crypto President' himself. The top 25 token holders would also get to attend an 'Exclusive Reception' with Trump, along with a 'Special VIP White House Tour.' (Hours after the contest went live, its website was quietly edited to promise the top 25 finishers only a 'Special VIP Tour,' with no location specified. It remains unclear whether that event will indeed take place at the White House, or at a golf resort facility of the president's choice.) The contest's organizer, a Trump-affiliated LLC called Fight Fight Fight, maintained an online leaderboard of those jockeying for position during the sweepstakes, which ended on May 12. The website also includes helpful information about the dress code (black tie optional) and the plus-one policy (none, because 'if you earned a seat at the table, it's because you earned it'). For Trump, the logistical details were far less important than the chance to juice the market for $TRUMP, which had cratered after launching in January but then spiked by more than 50% when he announced the contest. In the two days that followed, the Trump Organization and its affiliates, which together control roughly 80% of the token's supply, took in nearly $1 million in trading fees; by the end of the sweepstakes, that number had jumped to $3 million, according to a Washington Post analysis. In all, the Post estimates that since the coin's debut four months ago, Trump and company have made $312 million from crypto sales and $43 million in fees. As it turns out, one of the perks of being the person in charge of U.S. cryptocurrency policy is the freedom to profit off of cryptocurrency without fear of meaningful consequences. The details of the frenzy to secure a spot on the leaderboard make clear just how for sale the federal government is right now. Making the top 220, according to Wired, required holding or buying more than 4,000 $TRUMP tokens worth about $55,000 altogether; those who made the VIP list held an average of 325,000 tokens worth a collective $4.3 million. Many of the people who made the cut made their purchases on exchanges that suggest they are non-U.S. residents who jumped at the chance to bend the U.S. president's ear in a semiprivate setting. Sure enough, although the leaderboard identifies winners only by username and alphanumeric crypto wallet address, among the confirmed attendees are Justin Sun, a Chinese crypto speculator who is, in a wild coincidence, trying to settle civil fraud charges with the U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission; an Australian crypto entrepreneur who hopes to pitch Trump on adopting an even more industry-friendly regulatory stance; and a to-be-determined representative of MemeCore, a Singapore-based crypto collective that told New York magazine that whomever it sends hopes to ask Trump, 'Are you a meme, or the result of one?' Fight Fight Fight calculated the value of contestants' holdings based on both the amount of $TRUMP in a wallet and the length of time they'd held it, thus rewarding early investors for their commitment to padding the president's bottom line. That said, earlier this month, the journalist Molly White found that of the wallets on the leaderboard at the time, 62% started buying $TRUMP only after he dangled the dinner invitation. Once acquiring a floundering memecoin came with a shot at a sit-down with the literal President of the United States, people who were previously uninterested apparently decided to reevaluate their investment priorities. Since the event is closed to the press, there will be no independent coverage of what Trump says to attendees, or what the attendees say to Trump, or even who the attendees are. The entire spectacle amounts to an off-the-record jam session between a bunch of people who have already gotten rich off crypto, brainstorming ways to keep getting rich off crypto. For Trump, the event is only the latest celebration of his whirlwind romance with crypto, which he spent years disparaging before realizing that embracing it could help fast-track his return to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. He positioned himself as the pro-crypto candidate on the campaign trail last year, promising to create a national crypto stockpile and appoint industry luminaries to prominent administration roles. In another wild coincidence, around the same time, his adult sons helped launch World Liberty Financial, a crypto project structured to funnel 75% of revenue to the Trump family. WLF was basically a hedge against the results of the 2024 election: Even if Trump lost, he would at least have a new source of income to pay his legal bills. The fact that Trump won that election, of course, has made this alliance even more successful for everyone involved. In the hours before his inauguration, the price of Bitcoin spiked to nearly $110,000, then an all-time high. Demand for World Liberty Financial's coins exploded, too, especially from foreign investors whom federal law bars from giving directly to presidential campaigns or inaugural funds. (Sun, who will attend Thursday's dinner, has spent nearly $75 million on WLF tokens, making him its single largest known investor.) More recently, Abu Dhabi announced that it would use a WLF-issued stablecoin, USDI1, for its state-backed investment firm's $2 billion deal with the crypto exchange Binance—a choice that just so happens to put tens of millions of dollars in the Trump family's pockets. In an interview with the New York Times earlier this year, Eric Trump spoke of the family's pivot to crypto in glowing terms, describing World Liberty Financial as 'one of the more successful things we've ever done.' The numbers bear this out: In March, Fortune estimated that Trump's crypto holdings were worth $2.9 billion—not bad for an asset he was dismissing as 'not money,' 'highly volatile,' and 'based on thin air' a few years earlier. Pundits often describe Trump's involvement in crypto as 'unprecedented,' and in a sense, this is right: Given Washington's enduring obsessions with political scandals and conflicts of interest, traditionally, sitting presidents have not developed active side hustles in industries they have the power to regulate. But Trump has never cared about adhering to norms like this one, because he has always viewed the power of the office he holds primarily in terms of its potential to make him wealthier. He agreed to shake hands with a couple hundred crypto enthusiasts this week for the only reason he has ever done anything: He saw a chance to make money, and no one stopped him from taking it.
