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Donald Trump has promised to make America the “crypto capital of the planet” if he returns to the White House. Keeping that promise will definitely pay off for him.
In the midst of his presidency, Trump has launched a new venture to trade cryptocurrencies promoted on the same social media account he used for his campaign. The eldest of the two sons, Donald Jr. and Eric, also posting about a new platform, called World Liberty Financial, as well as his daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, who is married to Eric and is also the chairman of the Republican National Committee.
Trump has long combined his political and business interests, promoting a White House hotel and golf course while selling sneakers, Bibles and shares in social media companies during his current campaign. Now, Trump has launched a new money-making venture that could explode in value if he is elected and gains the power to push for legislative and regulatory changes that crypto supporters have long sought.
“Taking a pro-crypto stance doesn’t have to be troubling; the troubling aspect comes when you start a way to benefit from your privacy,” said Jordan Libowitz, a spokesman for the government watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.
“This success can be very much tied to American economic policy,” Libowitz said.
Cryptocurrencies are forms of digital money that can be traded over the internet without relying on the global banking system. They are usually sold on exchanges, which are markets where you can buy, sell and trade cryptocurrencies. Exchanges often charge fees for Bitcoin and other currency withdrawals.
World Liberty Financial is expected to be a lending and borrowing service similar to the recently hacked Dough Finance, an app built by four people listed as World Liberty Financial team members, according to crypto news site CoinDesk.
Many details about World Liberty Financial, including what shares Trump and members of his family own, are not yet known. After Lara Trump posted Tuesday on the X account about “our goal in World Liberty,” her husband, Eric Trump, posted online that Lara and her sister, Tiffany, had been hacked.
During his time in the White House, Trump said he was “not a fan” of cryptocurrency and tweeted in 2019, “Unregulated Crypto assets can facilitate illegal behavior, including drug trafficking and other illegal activities.”
But Trump has reversed himself and taken a favorable view of cryptocurrencies – from announcing in May that his campaign will start accepting donations in cryptocurrency as part of an effort to build a so-called “crypto army” leading up to Election Day; to attend a bitcoin conference in Nashville this year, vowing to make the US the “crypto capital of the planet” and create a “strategic reserve” of bitcoins using the currency currently held by the government.
If re-elected, Trump has talked about taking more control over monetary policy – suggesting he would pressure the Federal Reserve to set interest rates lower. He is also promoting decentralized finance, or “DeFi,” which is the general term for using the public blockchain space to disrupt the traditional world of finance.
Trump has also talked about subsidizing the use of Bitcoin mining to increase energy production and has vowed to block the creation of the Federal Reserve’s Central Bank Digital Currency – a digital form of central bank money that would be publicly available. While still in exploration, many crypto proponents oppose centrally managed digital currencies.
The Trump and Harris campaigns did not respond to requests from The Associated Press for comment.
Embracing cryptocurrency could be another way for the Trump campaign to reach younger people, including engaging with conservative influencers. Crypto has also appealed to Trump allies who are concerned about the government’s influence on global markets and are generally worried about the reach of the so-called “deep state.”
Dustin Stockton, a pro-Trump activist turned crypto influencer, said he supports the former president’s efforts in the crypto space and the upcoming launch of World Liberty Financial.
“The involvement and involvement of the Trump family, and learning what crypto is really about, I’m really positive about it,” he said. Stockton pointed to the Biden administration as anti-crypto, saying SEC chief Gary Gensler is targeting companies like Coinbase and Binance.
While the White House issued an executive order on digital assets in 2022, no substantive legislation has been passed by Congress or written into regulations by the White House. Stockton said the lack of clarity in the rules written by the Biden administration, as well as the SEC’s heavy-handed enforcement of crypto companies through several lawsuits, show “a lack of clarity and selective and arbitrary enforcement of regulations.”
“Honestly, I would like to see all members of the government understand more about this,” he said.
And JW Verret, a professor at the George Mason University law school, said that Trump will not break the law when launching new projects and promoting policies that will benefit him.
“I don’t see a problem with people, anyone in government who owns assets or who starts a business – in fact, I think it’s difficult to manage certain types of businesses unless they work in the business,” he said.
