During his presidency, Mr. Trump referred to cryptocurrencies as a scam, but his position has since radically changed.
| Photo Credit: AFP

Former U.S. President Donald Trump along with his sons and entrepreneurs late on Monday (September 16, 2024) launched a cryptocurrency platform but provided few details.

Little was revealed about the Trump family crypto project during a two-hour online presentation other than an offer to let people buy digital “tokens” giving them a vote in platform decisions.

World Liberty Financial intended to offer services based on so-called decentralised finance. This mechanism eliminates the need for an intermediary such as a bank to carry out transactions with a third party, the politics-laced discussion indicated. Decentralised finance, or DeFi, is based on so-called blockchain technology, which keeps a theoretically open but tamper-proof record of transactions.

World Liberty Financial will enable users to lend or borrow cryptocurrencies to or from one another, a service already offered by many platforms. The former President’s son Donald Trump Jr. touted this as “the start of a financial revolution,” during a session streamed on X.

During his presidency Mr. Trump referred to cryptocurrencies as a scam, but has since radically changed his position, presenting himself as a “pro-bitcoin President” if elected in November.

In so doing, he is standing in opposition to the Biden administration, which is seen as a proponent of regulating the sector.

Donald Trump, who previously called Bitcoin a scam, has launched a new cryptocurrency venture called World Liberty Financial. “Crypto is one of those things we have to do,” he said in an interview on X. “Whether we like it or not, I have to do it.” The news comes just a day after a likely assassination attempt against Trump at his Florida golf course.

Trump is entering the venture with his sons Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, along with two crypto entrepreneurs: Chase Herro (who once called stablecoins “borderline a Ponzi scheme”) and Zachary Folkman, who founded a company called Date Hotter Girls. Trump’s 18-year-old son Barron Trump, who has no known crypto expertise, is also listed as “chief DeFi [decentralized finance] visionary.”

The tokens themself are supposedly based on US dollar stablecoins. Some involved in the venture have touted it internally as a borrowing and lending platform, according to The New York Times.

Cryptocurrency is generally supposed to be decentralized, but a large chunk of the governance tokens for World Liberty Financial could be held by insiders, according to a draft white paper for the project seen by CoinDesk. The remaining 30 percent would be distributed “via public sale” with some of the money raised from that also going to project insiders.

When asked questions about the venture in an X Spaces interview (above), Trump appeared to know next to nothing about it. “It’s so important. It’s crypto. It’s AI. It’s so many other things. AI needs tremendous electricity capabilities beyond anything I ever heard,” he said. He deferred to Barron’s expertise, saying he has “four wallets” and equated it to learning a language like Chinese.

Some comments in the Spaces interview weren’t kind. “Let’s be honest Trump doesn’t even know what crypto is or why he’s being asked to shill it,” said one. Others noted that launching such a venture just ahead of an election was inappropriate.

“I think it genuinely damages trump’s electoral prospects, especially if it gets hacked (it’ll be the juiciest DeFi target ever and it’s forked from a protocol that itself was hacked),” said crypto industry notable and self-proclaimed Trump supporter Nic Carter in a post on X.

Cryptocurrency enthusiasts tuned in to hear former President Donald Trump speak in an X Spaces event about digital currency and his own soon-to-launch crypto venture—but the president gave no details and spent about half the interview talking about the recent assassination attempt that took place in West Palm Beach, Florida.

The interviewer, the president of a cryptocurrency media startup called “Rug Radio,” spent the first portion of the broadcast asking Trump about Sunday’s incident, which Trump recounted in detail.

Over 16 minutes later, Trump finally addressed the topic of the broadcast.

“Crypto is one of those things we have to do,” Trump said. “Whether we like it or not, we have to do it.”

“You’re going to be happy, and you’re going to love your crypto,” he added. “And as long as you have your crypto, you’re happy.”

Trump gave almost no details about his new crypto venture, World Liberty Financial. But more than two hours into the broadcast, some of the company’s co-founders described it as a sort of crypto banking platform, CNBC reported. They said that customers will eventually be able to buy, sell, borrow and lend cryptocurrencies through the platform.

One of the founders, Zak Folkman, also announced the company would launch with its own cryptocurrency token—WLFI.

At least 20% of the initial tokens will be claimed by the company’s founders, 63% will be offered to customers and the remaining 17% will be saved and allocated as customer rewards, according to CNBC.

Trump talked at length about the influence of his sons, Don Jr., Eric, and Barron on the company, and said they had gotten him interested despite some healthy initial apathy toward the industry.

“I think my children opened my eyes more than anything else,” he said.

“Barron’s a young guy, but he knows it. He talks about his wallet, he’s got four wallets or something… But he knows this stuff inside and out,” Trump said. “Eric and Don know it so well, it’s almost like younger people know it a lot better than older people. But I have a lot of respect for them, they’ve shown great judgment—all of them,” he added.

Steve Witkoff, the real estate developer who was golfing with Trump during the incident on Sunday, is reportedly also a key figure in the new venture—along with his son, Zach Witkoff.

A source told the New York Times that the elder Witkoff is taking a hands-on role in the company. He even sat next to Trump during Monday’s interview and answered his own series of questions after Trump signed off.

“I said, ‘Who would understand this better than the Trump family?’” Witkoff said. “We had a meeting initially with Eric, Don Jr., and the president and his counsel. And we said, ‘Let’s go pursue it.’ We’ve been on it for close to nine months.”