The Trump family loses $1 billion in wealth amid the crypto winter.

Original authors: Tom Maloney, Annie Massa

Original translation by Luffy, Foresight News

During Donald Trump's second term, crypto assets transformed his family's wealth landscape. Today, the Trump family and its followers are experiencing firsthand the inherent volatility of cryptocurrencies.

Since August, the value of Trump-named memecoin TRUMP has fallen by about a quarter; Eric Trump's (President Trump's second son) stake in a Bitcoin mining company has shrunk by nearly half from its peak; and Trump Media Technology Group, which began accumulating Bitcoin this year, has seen its stock price fall to near all-time lows.

On September 16, Eric Trump spoke at the Nasdaq bell-ringing ceremony for the American Bitcoin company.

The recent sell-off is part of a broader crash in the cryptocurrency market, wiping out over $1 trillion in market capitalization. According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, the Trump family's wealth shrank from $7.7 billion in early September to approximately $6.7 billion, a decline primarily attributed to the family's expanding cryptocurrency-related portfolio.

These investments involve complex transactions that go far beyond simple bets on cryptocurrencies. Ordinary investors now have more avenues to participate in Trump-related crypto projects, and therefore may face greater losses. For example, any speculator who bought Trump at its peak after the announcement of memecoin over Trump's inauguration weekend has almost entirely lost their investment by this month.

Eric Trump stated that he remains confident. He has repeatedly urged investors to double down, maintaining this view even during the cryptocurrency market downturn.

"This is an excellent buying opportunity," he said in a statement to Bloomberg News. "Those who buy on dips and embrace volatility will ultimately be winners. I have never been so optimistic about the future of Bitcoin and the modernization of the financial system."

Admittedly, since its inception in 2009, Bitcoin has experienced several significant crashes, but has ultimately rebounded over time. However, the Trump family's cryptocurrency holdings have a buffer. Despite substantial declines in their token holdings and crypto-related company stocks, they can still profit through other avenues within the cryptocurrency industry.

Take World Liberty Financial, a crypto project they co-founded, as an example: Although the book value of the related tokens held by the Trump family has shrunk, they still have the right to a proportional share of the token sales proceeds regardless of price fluctuations.

“ Retail investors can only speculate, ” said Jim Angel, a finance professor at Georgetown University. “ But the Trump family can not only speculate, they can also issue tokens, sell tokens, and profit from those transactions. ”

The following is an overview of the performance of the Trump family's crypto-related assets during this crash.

Trump Media Technology Group: Losses of $800 million

Shares of Trump Media Technology Group, the parent company of the Truth Social platform, hit a record low on Wednesday. Part of the reason for the decline may be the timing of its cryptocurrency investments.

Since September, the value of Trump's stake in the company has shrunk by approximately $800 million. He is the company's largest shareholder, holding his shares through a trust managed by his eldest son, Donald Trump Jr.

Trump Media Technology Group's stock price has plummeted 66% over the past year.

The still unprofitable Trump Media Technology Group has been venturing into several new businesses, including the cryptocurrency sector. According to a July statement, the company has spent approximately $2 billion purchasing Bitcoin and options. Its holding of approximately 11,500 Bitcoins was purchased at around $115,000 per coin, and this position has currently accumulated a loss of about 25%.

In addition, the company began accumulating CRO, a niche token issued by the Singapore-based cryptocurrency exchange Crypto.com. As of the end of September, Trump Media held approximately $147 million worth of CRO tokens; since then, the token's value has shrunk by nearly half.

Trump Media has also partnered with Crypto.com on other ventures, with plans to launch a prediction market platform called Truth Predict, allowing users to bet on sports events and political incidents.

World Liberty Financial: Book loss of nearly $3 billion

World Liberty Financial, the core crypto project of the Trump family, has issued its own token, WLFI. The token's price has fallen from 26 cents in early September to about 15 cents.

The Trump family's holdings of WLFI tokens, which were worth nearly $6 billion at their peak, have now shrunk to approximately $3.15 billion . (These tokens are not included in the Bloomberg Billionaires Index's valuation of the family's wealth because they are currently locked and cannot be traded.)

World Liberty Financial Official Website

In August of this year, the company sold some of its tokens to Alt5 Sigma Corp., a small publicly traded company. The timing of the sale was perfect: World Liberty Financial received $750 million in cash and a stake in the deal.

But Alt5 investors may not be so lucky. Since the deal was announced, Alt5's stock price has fallen by about 75%.

The Trump family's stake in Alt5 held through World Liberty Financial has shrunk in value by approximately $220 million, but they still profited from the deal. According to Bloomberg calculations, the Trump family received about 75% of the proceeds from the World Liberty Financial token sale, netting $500 million through the Alt5 transaction alone, and previously earning approximately $400 million through the WLFI token sale.

"Cryptocurrencies will exist for a long time," a spokesperson for World Liberty Financial said in a statement. "We have long-term confidence in the rapidly maturing technologies that underpin crypto assets and believe these technologies will revolutionize the financial services sector."

American Bitcoin: Losses of at least $330 million

About two months after Trump took office, his family ventured into another new crypto project. Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr. engaged in a series of complex transactions with crypto company Hut 8 Corp.: Hut 8 exchanged its Bitcoin mining rigs for a majority stake in the newly formed company, American Bitcoin Corp.

Eric Trump owns approximately 7.5% of American Bitcoin, a company listed on Nasdaq (ticker symbol ABTC), while Donald Trump Jr. owns a small, undisclosed stake.

ABTC's stock price peaked at $9.31 in early September, at which time Eric's stake was worth approximately $630 million. Since then, the stock price has fallen by more than half, resulting in a loss of over $300 million in family wealth. However, this deal remains one of the clearest examples of the Trump family acquiring hundreds of millions of dollars in new wealth through recent crypto-related businesses.

If investors bought shares when ABTC went public, they would now be down 45%. An ABTC spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.

Trump's memecoin: Nearly $120 million in losses, $220 million worth of tokens unlocked.

This memecoin has been plummeting since its launch was announced over the weekend of the presidential inauguration, and has shrunk by about 25% since the end of August.

The Trump family's holdings in this token are not transparent. Risk modeling firm Gauntlet found that several months after the token's launch, nearly 17 million tokens were held in crypto wallets associated with the issuance, and another 17 million were transferred to crypto exchanges. In July of this year, another 90 million tokens were unlocked for circulation. The Bloomberg Billionaires Index includes 40% of the total supply of this memecoin in the Trump family's wealth, based on their stake in World Liberty Financial.

At current prices, these tokens are worth approximately $310 million, a decrease of about $117 million since the end of August.

However, according to the index, the Trump family's token holdings have increased significantly. Some tokens held by insiders and issuers were previously locked and will be gradually unlocked over three years.

According to data from crypto research firm Messari, nearly 90 million Trump memecoins were unlocked by insiders after the July unlocking event, with the Bloomberg Wealth Index accounting for approximately 40% of them going to the Trump family.

These newly unlocked tokens are worth approximately $220 million, meaning the total value of the family's holdings has increased. It is unclear whether the Trump family has sold any of these tokens since July.