Jessy (@susanliu33), Golden Finance
Half a month has passed since Trump officially took office as the President of the United States on January 20. During this period, the crypto market has also been on a roller coaster ride. Especially after Trump announced the increase in tariffs, the currency circle was shaken and the crypto circle fell into wailing, shouting "the bear market has come."
After Trump came to power, although he fulfilled his campaign promises about the crypto industry, this did not bring much confidence to the industry. His tariff increase even caused a market crash, which also spread confusion in the cryptocurrency circle about whether Trump's coming to power is a blessing or a curse for cryptocurrencies.
On the one hand, as the President of the United States, Trump is actively promoting the introduction of friendly laws and regulations related to the crypto industry, but these benefits seem to be "less than expected". On the other hand, companies related to the Trump family are actively deploying the crypto industry, especially issuing Meme coins, and the WLFI project's behavior of making money out of nothing is clearly using crypto to "make money".
At present, the market fluctuates with Trump's every move. Trump himself may not have expected that in such an industry that regards decentralization as a norm, he is regarded as an emperor and possesses supreme power.
As president, Trump is actively fulfilling his campaign promises on crypto
In the half month since he took office, Trump has indeed been gradually promoting the implementation of crypto-related policies and regulations, and has indeed fulfilled the promises he made during the campaign, such as banning central bank digital currencies, firing Gary Gensler, then chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, and establishing a Bitcoin and Cryptocurrency Advisory Committee. A series of policies that are beneficial to the development of the crypto industry in the United States are being implemented step by step.
Specifically, on January 23, 2025, Trump signed an executive order to establish a working group under the National Economic Council, chaired by David Sacks, the "AI and Cryptocurrency Tsar" of the White House, and members include the Secretary of the Treasury, the Chairman of the SEC, etc. The task of this working group is to develop a federal regulatory framework, manage digital assets (including stablecoins), and evaluate the possibility of creating a national digital asset reserve.
At the first press conference on digital assets held by David Sacks and several U.S. congressional lawmakers on Capitol Hill on February 4, David Sacks first examined the feasibility of Bitcoin reserves, but he pointed out that the initiative is still in its early stages.
At the meeting, U.S. Senator Bill Hagerty also proposed a bill aimed at creating a regulatory framework for stablecoins. The bill would bring tokens such as Tether and USDC under the Federal Reserve's regulatory rules. The bill also stipulates reserve requirements for stablecoin issuers - issuers of stablecoins exceeding US$10 billion would adopt the regulatory framework of the Federal Reserve and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, establish supervision, inspection and enforcement mechanisms, etc.
In terms of legislation, the plan is to promote a new round of legislation based on the market structure legislation "FIT21" bill passed by the House Financial Services Committee last year, committed to bringing "clarity" to the regulatory framework. It is reported that cryptocurrency legislation is expected to be introduced within six months.
In addition to setting up a working group, the crypto-related executive order signed on January 23 explicitly prohibits the establishment, issuance or promotion of central bank digital currencies in the United States. It also clarifies the right of American citizens to freely use the public chain - allowing citizens to develop and deploy software, participate in mining, transactions and self-custody of digital assets.
The Trump administration's crypto-friendliness is not only reflected in administrative legislation. On February 4, the SEC was revealed to have reduced its department dedicated to crypto enforcement, transferring or demoting more than 50 lawyers and staff. This is also one of the first concrete measures taken by Trump to relax crypto regulation.
However, the introduction of the above measures did not bring much excitement to the market. What the market is most looking forward to is the real implementation of the national Bitcoin strategic reserve. However, David Sacks also pointed out that the national Bitcoin strategic reserve is still in the very early stage of preparation. However, the US states have already set off a competition for Bitcoin strategic reserves. For example, eleven states have proposed relevant bills, and two of them have entered the committee approval stage. For example, Pennsylvania proposed a bill to allow the state treasury to use 10% of its funds to purchase Bitcoin; Texas piloted green energy mining subsidies. The federal level proposed the "Bitcoin Strategic Reserve Act", which plans to purchase a total of 1 million Bitcoins within five years, and promote the "Bitcoin Energy and Technology Innovation Act" to support green mining.
On February 3, Trump also announced the establishment of the US sovereign wealth fund. Industry insiders analyzed that the US sovereign wealth fund is likely to invest in cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin.
Overall, Trump is indeed actively fulfilling his promise to the crypto community during the campaign, but when it comes to the national strategic reserve of Bitcoin, legislation needs to go through a fixed process. However, the crypto industry seems to be impatient and has fallen before the major positive news of the national strategic reserve of Bitcoin appears.
Trump is not only a president, but also a businessman
As president, Trump, a former businessman, cannot personally participate in business operations. However, he can hand over his business empire to his family for management, which is in line with US law.
After Trump was officially inaugurated as the President of the United States, the main operation of his family's crypto business was the WLFI project. According to the WLFI token issuance agreement, the Trump family will receive 75% of the net income left after deducting operating expenses and the initial reserve of $30 million, and these incomes will belong to DT Marks DEFI LLC, a company under the Trump family. Secondly, the Trump family will receive 22.5 billion WLFI tokens, which are worth $337.5 million based on the issuance price of 1.5 cents.
At present, people who hold the pre-sale tokens of the project are unable to transfer and trade the tokens - they are forced to lock them for one year.
The vision of this project is to do DeFi, so it has accumulated a lot of DeFi tokens such as ETH, CBTC, AAVE, Ondo, ENA, etc. in the early stage. Previously, the industry regarded these tokens as President's strict selection and followed the trend to buy them. It is precisely because of the President's ability to bring goods that these tokens have become popular among investors for a period of time.
Perhaps it is precisely because of the huge wealth effect brought by the "strict presidential election" that Blockworks reported that people familiar with the matter said that the Trump family's crypto project WLFI has been in contact with the blockchain team for a "token swap" transaction. In simple terms, this transaction means that the project party pays money to WLFI to purchase WLFI tokens, and the WLFI team will also purchase the tokens specified by the project party, and the tokens that appear in the WLFI wallet will also gain exposure and publicity.
The TRX appeared in the WLFI wallet, which is the effect of "token swap". In mid-to-late January, Justin Sun invested a total of 75 million US dollars in WLFI in two times, and in early February, TRX appeared in the WLFI wallet. It is highly likely that the purchase of TRX by the WLFI project this time is a "token swap".
From the over-sale of WLFI to the "token exchange", WLFI's intentions are already known to everyone. The WLFI token itself is a project that makes money out of nothing. Investors use their own value coins to exchange for WLFI tokens that can only be traded after a year. The value coins obtained by the WLFI project are used to purchase the above-mentioned ETH, Ondo, AAVE, LINK, ENA, etc., which can be said to be free of cost. Therefore, the decline of these tokens is just a retracement of the original profits for the WLFI project.
For the WLFI project, the decline is just a retracement of profits, but for retail investors, it is a loss. Another unexpected move by WLFI was that on the second day after Trump's second son Eric Trump called for an order for Ethereum, the WLFI wallet showed that it had transferred more than 70,000 Ethereum to Coinbase Prime. At the same time, a large number of WBTC, AAVE, LINK, ENA, Move, ONDO, and USDC were also transferred to Coinbase Prime. The relevant virtual currencies that are admitted to Coinbase Prime can no longer be tracked on the chain. Although the WLFI project party stated that it did not sell the cryptocurrencies it held, but was only reallocating assets, it cannot be confirmed without evidence on the chain.
After taking office, in addition to making a fortune in the crypto field, the Trump family has also been involved in the traditional financial industry. On February 6, Trump's social media company Truth announced that it has registered six trademarks for its customized ETF products and separately managed account products, and specific financial products will be launched within the year. Judging from the names of several trademarks that have been launched, Trump Media Technology Group is likely to launch theme products in the three directions of US manufacturing, energy industry and Bitcoin. These products will all belong to the group's newly established financial services brand Truth.Fi.
Previously, Trump was the company's largest shareholder, but before being sworn in last month, Trump transferred all of his shares to a trust controlled by his eldest son, Donald Trump Jr.
However, these ETFs themselves have not yet entered the application process, they have only applied for trademarks. Moreover, even if these ETFs are finally approved, it is still questionable how much funds will flow into them.
However, all of the above actions also show that the Trump family is actively involved in the fields of traditional finance and crypto finance. However, it is still difficult to predict how much influence its products will have.
However, from issuing Meme coins before taking office to various actions of his family after taking office, it has been made clear that Trump is fundamentally a businessman and profit-seeking is the nature of businessmen, and there is nothing to condemn.
Summarize
Businessman is Trump's background. As a businessman, Trump will definitely make money with cryptocurrencies, and he will also make money with his influence as president.
On the other hand, as president, Trump did fulfill the promises he made to the crypto industry during his campaign, which also demonstrated his commitment to keeping his promises.
The recent market crash cannot be simply attributed to Trump's various extreme behaviors: such as issuing currency, imposing tariffs, etc. The funds in the market will make choices based on various information. Trump cannot be held responsible for the decline or rise. A mature investor should be responsible for his own investment behavior.
At present, cryptocurrencies are increasingly integrated into the global financial market. The rise of cryptocurrencies depends not only on crypto-related policies, but also on the macroeconomic environment. At present, there are not many favorable policies for the macro economy, and the crypto industry itself is difficult to remain immune and can only maintain a state of anxiety.
From another perspective, for an industry that advocates decentralization, keeping an eye on Trump's every move and counting on the US government's policies, isn't this also a betrayal of the industry's ideals?
