According to a new report, President Trump’s adventures on crypto products have increased his family’s wealth by billions over the past six months as his administration continues to relax federal regulatory approaches to the entire digital currency industry.
The group's democratic defenders' actions are estimated in a new report, encryption The current holdings account for nearly 40% of its net assets, about $2.9 billion. This increase is partly due to His release $trump and $melania Meme Coinin addition to large shares World Free Financea crypto exchange related to the Trump family launched in October 2024. The actions of state democracy defenders identify themselves as nonpartisan, but often monitor President Trump’s critics, whose agenda focuses on “authoritarian threats to our country.”
The president's net worth is expected to bump again, and World Free Finance announced this week that Abu Dhabi-backed companies will invest billions of dollars in the crypto foundation affiliated with the Trump family. The UAE company MGX will buy $2 billion in stable products, the company said in a statement to CBS. This currency, called "USD1", will then be used to invest in Binance, one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges in the world.
World freedom is linked to the President and his son. The fine print on the company's website says entities affiliated with Mr. Trump and his family own 60% of the company.
According to the company's public report, the Trump family entity also holds $22.5 billion in the $wlf token and earns 75% of its net income from future token purchases.
Details of the MGX deal have not been released yet, so it is unclear how much the Trump family benefits from the deal.
World Liberty said in a statement to CBS News that the deal represents "the largest investment ever made by crypto companies" and sets "historical precedent." It did not answer questions about how much money the Trump family made from investments.
The White House responded to a request for comment by telling CBS News to “report what people really care about.” A spokesperson provided links to some White House technical plans.
CBS News Analysis found that as the president invests in cryptocurrencies, the Securities and Exchange Commission has stopped investing in more than a dozen companies since its inauguration.
"The most important thing is that it seems like he's profiting from public office," said Virginia Canter, chief advisor for ethics and anti-corruption at the state Democratic Defender, who co-wrote the New Report, who served as a senior ethics adviser to the Treasury Department under the Republican and Democratic administration.
“As far as modern presidents are concerned, they all divested their assets or dumped them into what we call the Blind Trust,” Kanter said. “President Trump did not do that during his first term, and it seems that he doubled in his second term, and he was all in the cryptocurrency industry.”
The report relies heavily on past media reports, including a Fortune magazine article that reviews the financial disclosures of the Trump family and provides an original estimate of the president's net worth.
Crypto companies are not legally required to disclose who trades to the public on their platforms, so little is known about who invests in crypto products affiliated with Trump’s family.
This makes it more difficult to identify potential conflicts of interest, Kanter said.
"In his first administration, we could see who was in and out of the Trump Hotel," she said.
Trump hopes we will become the "crypto-capital of the world"
The president, who has described cryptocurrency as a "scam" by 2021, has since accepted digital currencies, and he said he wants to make the United States "the crypto capital of the world."
Since its inception, Mr. Trump has taken several actions to relax many industry insiders say weakening the regulatory environment for cryptocurrency business.
He issued several executive orders to promote cryptocurrencies, including one that attempts to promote digital currency growth, and another currency that directs the Treasury to create strategic cryptocurrency reserves.
Reuters reported that Trump also used his office to pardon three founders of cryptocurrency exchange Bitmex, who pleaded guilty in 2022 and could not prevent money laundering on the platform.
The value of Mr. Trump's crypto assets sometimes fluctuates with his policy decisions and social media posts.
Trump's value grew 18.1% in early March after the president issued an executive order to promote strategic crypto reserves. A few weeks later on March 23, the president released the “I love $trump – so cool!! The greatest!!!” about truth socialization, which caused the price of meme coins to rise from $10.93 to $12.24.
Whether or not the $trump coin adds value, the president's business charges a transaction fee when people buy and sell coins. A Reuters analysis found that the business entity behind Trump's coin could charge nearly $100 million in less than two weeks of transactions.
World Free Finance: Encrypted Communications of the Trump Family
Aside from meme coins, the Trump family’s recent dabbling in cryptocurrencies could be the most profitable.
In October, then Trump helped launch World Free Finance, a decentralized or “Defi” cryptocurrency exchange. Its website features largely the president’s image, which provides users with the opportunity to buy an exchange with $WLFI token.
Mr. Trump posted on X before the presidential election.
The website said that world freedom was “inspired by Donald J. Trump,” who was listed as the chief crypto defense lawyer. His son Eric, Jr. and Barron are both listed as Web3 ambassadors.
Donald Trump Jr. promoted world free finance at the DC Blockchain Conference in March, with insiders in the crypto industry rubbing shoulders with members of Congress and government members.
Trump Jr. founders Chase Herro, Zak Folkman and Zach Witkoff appeared on the stage to promote stable products that are free in the world.
“We hope that Republicans, Democrats, whether black, blue, brown, white, can use our stable coins,” said Zach Witkoff, son of Steven Witkoff, the White House special envoy. “We think it democratizes finances.”
World Liberty said it has raised more than $550 million from investors who purchased the $WLF governance token. Most of these investors remain anonymous to the public. Currently, these $wlfi tokens are non-convertible, meaning that once purchased, users cannot exchange them.
World Freedom denies multiple interview requests from CBS.
Justin Sun is one of the few public investors at World Liberty, known for buying and eating a $6.2 million banana pipeline.
Sun, who was investigated for securities fraud in the Biden Administration, said he invested $30 million shortly after Trump was elected, when he claimed he was the "big investor" on X's post about world freedom.
A few days before Trump's inauguration, the Sun said he invested another $45 million, which he also disclosed in an article on X. A few weeks later, the Securities and Exchange Commission reversed its objection and asked the judge to award the Sun case "in the public interest." The suspension of the SEC is part of a larger effort to approve cases against cryptocurrency companies.
A spokesperson for Sun and SEC declined to comment.
Last month, Democrats from the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee sent a letter to the Federal Reserve and the Office of the Currency Auditor General about the potential of conflicts of interest as the Trump administration considered corporate regulations like World Free Finance.
"President Trump has been involved in this cause when he deprived of the independence of financial regulators ... raised an extraordinary conflict of interest that could pose unprecedented risks to our financial system," the letter said.
World Liberty Financial said 85,000 investors have followed your client process to determine “eligibility for participation,” and the company said it is organizing third-party accounting firms to review its new businesses for inclusion in U.S. stablecoins.
As president, Mr. Trump does not comply with the laws on conflict of crime. But he must disclose his assets and income under the Ethics Act in the Government Act, including his crypto assets. The president's next financial disclosure report deadline is May 15.