The man who pledged to become America’s first “crypto president” is watching the value of his own cryptocurrency collapse at a pace that rivals his falling approval numbers. Days before his inauguration, President Donald Trump announced the launch of a meme coin—a form of cryptocurrency driven by online hype and branding.
His token, traded as $TRUMP and named after his “Fight! Fight! Fight!” chant following his assassination attempt, has lost 88 percent of its value. The coin, once nearly $75 in January, now trades for about $8.
The token’s rise and fall were dramatic. It surged after its debut, fell to $40 on the day Trump was sworn in, and has continued to decline since. First Lady Melania Trump also entered the industry, but her $MELANIA coin has performed even worse.
Once near a peak in January, it has lost more than 98 percent of its value and now trades for just 20 cents. Despite the collapse, the family has profited. A Reuters investigation in February reported that creators of the $TRUMP coin earned nearly $100 million in trading fees during its early frenzy.
One of those creators, CIC Digital, is owned by Trump and controls about 800 million tokens as of February. By May, a blockchain intelligence firm estimated that the Trump Organization had collected $320 million in fees. Weeks later, Trump hosted a private dinner at Trump National Golf Club in Sterling, Virginia, for the 220 largest holders of $TRUMP.
The event, promoted as “the most exclusive invitation in the world,” lasted just 23 minutes before Trump departed in a helicopter. “The food sucked,” one attendee told CNBC. While a handful of early investors profited greatly—at least 50 crypto wallets made over $10 million each—most small investors were left with losses.
More than 200,000 wallets reportedly saw their holdings shrink as the coin plummeted. The timing has fueled criticism. Since Trump took office for his second term, Bitcoin has gained almost 10 percent in value, while his administration has eased regulations on digital finance and pushed an executive order declaring the start of “the Golden Age of Crypto.”
Senate Democrats have since requested that the Office of Government Ethics review Trump’s digital holdings, arguing that his stake in the coins could violate the Constitution’s Emoluments Clause.