--- title: "Sad! Trump’s Meme Coin Has Turned Into a Total Disaster" description: "The Donald Trump meme coin, $TRUMP, plummeted to a historic low on Tuesday — a staggering 96 percent plummet from its all-time high. " date: "2026-03-12" modified: "2026-03-12" authors: - name: "Frank Landymore" job_title: "Contributing Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/flandymore" url: "https://futurism.com/future-society/trump-meme-coin-disaster" categories: - "Blockchain" - "Cryptocurrency" - "Future Society" --- # Sad! Trump’s Meme Coin Has Turned Into a Total Disaster ![A close-up of a coin featuring a profile of Donald J. Trump with the text "PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES," "LIBERTY," and "IN GOD WE TRUST" against a background resembling the American flag. Behind it, there are partially visible Bitcoin coins with the Bitcoin symbol prominently displayed. The image has a colorful, blurred light effect on the left side.]() *Jonathan Raa / NurPhoto via Getty Images / Futurism* No one expects a meme coin to have a particularly long shelf life. But the fall of Donald Trump's token, $TRUMP, has been spectacular even by his [own vaunted standards](). The Solana-based token launched ahead of Trump's second inauguration in January last year, and almost immediately surged to a high of over $75 — a spectacular jump in paper wealth that [boosted Trump up the echelons]() of the world's wealthiest people. Unfortunately for both the president himself and his acolytes who bought into the coin, though, it's been on a downward trajectory that mirrors their dear leader's [approval ratings]() ever since. On Tuesday night, $TRUMP fell to a measly $2.87 — its lowest point yet, [*Decrypt* reported]() — and a staggering 96 percent plummet from its all-time high. By press time, it was down even further to $2.73. $TRUMP's ill fortunes come amid a downturn for cryptocurrencies at large, including Bitcoin, which has plummeted by over 38 percent in the past six months. Unlike the presidential meme coin, though, Bitcoin has shown recent signs of potentially recovering some value. That a sitting president has a meme coin in his name at all is a clear conflict of interest that should be a major scandal in its own right. Adding to the sleaziness of the venture is that it very likely was used to sucker many of Trump's followers out of their money. An early group of investors who bought the token at dirt cheap prices immediately after it was officially announced cashed out just days later, pocketing nearly $700 million. One who made an account just hours before Trump launched the coin [walked away with $109 million](). The sudden sell-offs by the early big money investors led to the coin's price collapsing, reeking of a common crypto scam called a "rug pull," in which a schemer hypes up their new coin, convinces people to buy into it to boost its value, and then suddenly sells their stake in it. The schemer makes out with bags of money, while the followers are left with nearly worthless assets. Whether the Trump family was directly involved in a rug pull, it made gangbusters business, [raking in over $100 million in trading fees in just two weeks post-launch](). As of January, the *Financial Times* [reported]() that the $TRUMP coin, and it the First Lady's $MELANIA that followed, have generated about $427mn in sales and trading fees. **More on crypto:** [*AI Agent Goes Rogue, Starts Mining Crypto to Amass Funds*]() ## Author At Futurism, my work has often centered on bringing a sense of clarity and insight to complex topics ranging from the regulation of emerging technologies to the esoteric ideologies of Silicon Valley executives, while striving not to lose the poetic sense of awe inspired by often-obscure fields like astrophysics and quantum computing. I broke the story of CNET using AI to produce articles that turned out to be riddled with factual errors and plagiarism — a dam-breaking inflection point, as I've reported, that's inspired copycats and endless discourse while beguiling stakeholders ranging from tech giants to purveyors of spam around the web. My work at Futurism has been cited by publications including CBS News, the Los Angeles Times, Vice, Gizmodo, Engadget, the Verge, and Vanity Fair. I grew up in locales ranging from India to China, and now live in the exotic suburbs of Virginia. In my free time, I'm an avid reader of weird sci-fi literature, an aficionado of East Asian cinema, and, regrettably, a relapsed gamer. Allegedly, I’m working on a debut novel, currently untitled. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()