--- title: "Trump Supporters Lost a Staggering Amount of Money as They Bought His Meme Coin" description: "Crypto offers an extremely lucrative way of making money. It's also an easy way to get duped.  Case in point: the supporters of President Donald Trump, who bought his meme coin, $Trump, amid a wave of enthusiasm preceding his inauguration.  As The New York Times reports, while a few cashed out in time to steal away with huge profits, the vast majority — over 810,000 wallets — were left holding the bag: collectively, the unlucky suckers lost more than $2 billion after the price of the coin crashed. A classic pump-and-dump. That said, just under 700,000 managed to cash out […]" date: "2025-02-11" modified: "2025-02-11" authors: - name: "Frank Landymore" job_title: "Contributing Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/flandymore" url: "https://futurism.com/trump-supporters-lost-money-meme-coin" categories: - "Blockchain" - "Cryptocurrency" - "Future Society" tags: - "crypto" - "cryptocurrencies" - "donald trump" - "trump" --- # Trump Supporters Lost a Staggering Amount of Money as They Bought His Meme Coin ![Hundreds of thousands of Trump supporters lost money on his meme coin after its price crashed shortly after launching.]() *\Image: Getty / Futurism\* Crypto offers an extremely lucrative way of making money. It's also an easy way to get duped. Case in point: supporters of President Donald Trump who bought [his meme coin](), $Trump, amid a wave of enthusiasm preceding his inauguration. As [*The New York Times* reports](), while a few cashed out in time to steal away with huge profits, the vast majority — over 810,000 wallets — were left holding the bag. Collectively, the unlucky suckers lost more than $2 billion after the price of the coin crashed. That said, just under 700,000 managed to cash out with a profit, fat or slim, totaling $6.6 billion. But a sizable chunk of that, about $699 million, was clinched by just 31 early investors. It appears that the house, as always, has won. According to Chainalysis data cited by the *NYT*, the Trump family and its partners made out with nearly $100 million in trading fees alone. Currently, the $Trump coin is at around $15, which isn't even a quarter of its $[75 peak](). Trump has been involved with crypto ventures in the past, like his [foundering stablecoin project](), World Liberty Financial. But as the *NYT* notes, this enterprise is the first time that the president and his family directly marketed a new crypto token to investors, with Trump [advertising it on his personal X account](). That the US President is so nakedly pushing dodgy tokens should be cause for alarm, especially because Trump has signaled his intent to deregulate the blockchain currency industry, [vowing]() to make the US the "crypto capital of the planet." Trump has reportedly directed the Securities and Exchange Commission to [ease back on crypto enforcement](), while his right-hand man Elon Musk, himself involved in [dodgy crypto maneuvering]() in the past, has mused about [putting the US Treasury on the blockchain](). If it wasn't clear already that Trump's ripping off his own supporters, an investigation into the $Trump coin transactions conducted by Nansen and Chainalysis at the *NYT's* request, makes the shady nature of the whole affair pretty clear. The $Trump token was created on the morning of January 17, just days before his inauguration, according to blockchain records, and would not be announced by Trump for another 12 hours. The biggest winner bought around $1.1 million worth of coins when it was priced at just 18 cents. After two days, they cashed out with a profit as high as $109 million. What a stroke of luck, right? Well, it turns out that the account behind that incredible investment was made a mere three hours before Trump launched his coin, which reeks of insider trading. "The president is participating in shady crypto schemes that harm investors while at the same time appointing financial regulators who will roll back protections for victims and who may insulate him and his family from enforcement," Corey Frayer, who recently stepped down as crypto adviser to the SEC, told the *NYT*. **More on Trump:** *[The Vast Majority of Trump's Net Worth Is Now in His Meme Coin]()* ## 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]()