According to the organization "Public Citizen", cryptocurrency projects linked to U.S. President Donald Trump's family caused losses estimated at at least $4.7 billion to investors, while the President made about $1.4 billion from these projects during 2025.
## Key points
- "Public Citizen" estimated that holders of the TRUMP meme coin collectively lost about $3.2 billion.
- WLFI token holders and Trump Media investors incurred additional losses of at least $1.45 billion.
- Trump recorded about $1.4 billion in income tied to digital currencies for 2025.
- The regulator urged Congress to add rules requiring the president to divest his digital-currency holdings under the “CLARITY” law.
## Losses estimated at $4.7 billion
Public Citizen estimated investors’ losses across five products related to Trump, including the meme token “Official Trump,” the WLFI governance token of World Liberty Financial, the stablecoin USD1, Trump Digital Trading Cards, and the digital-asset fund of Trump Media.
Most of the total losses came from TRUMP, which the nonprofit estimated caused a $3.2 billion loss to its buyers. As for WLFI, its losses were at least $1 billion, while the digital-asset fund of Trump Media resulted in a loss of about $450 million to shareholders.
Trump’s NFT cards added at least $9.3 million to the overall account. The watchdog did not list any major loss for the USD1 stablecoin because it is designed to maintain a fixed value equivalent to one U.S. dollar and did not show ongoing deviation from that peg.
The regulator said its estimate of $4.7 billion includes realized and unrealized losses, meaning the final figure could change if prices recover or if they continue to decline.
Public Citizen also noted that trading in the TRUMP token shifted wealth mainly from late buyers to a small group that entered the market early, rather than the amount disappearing entirely. Based on analysis by blockchain intelligence firm “Nansen,” the report said that about one million retail wallets (65% of the studied wallets) were losing money in total by $3.2 billion.
Only about $400 million of TRUMP’s total losses were actually realized through sales. The top 1% of winning wallets took in about $2.7 billion—roughly 80% of total profits—while the wallets that entered during the first two days after the token’s launch collected about 90% of the profits.
The TRUMP token was launched on January 17, 2025—three days before the president returned to the White House. Its price rose from under one dollar to an all-time high of $73.43, before later losing most of that value.
## Trump made hundreds of millions from TRUMP and WLFI tokens
In contrast, Public Citizen calculated that Trump received $635 million in licensing fees tied to the TRUMP token during 2025. In that case, Trump-owned CIC Digital LLC licensed his name and trademark to the coin project, rather than buying the coins as a typical investor.
Two project-affiliated companies kept 80% of the total supply of TRUMP currency, totaling one billion units, and would have these holdings gradually offered for trading over a period of three years. According to the watchdog organization, these two companies also receive revenues from trading activity, enabling them to realize profits even if the currency’s price falls in the market.
World Liberty Financial also became another major source of income. Trump received $527 million from WLFI token sales during 2025, after generating about $30 million from sales in the project’s first three months in 2024, bringing his total earnings from this governance token to $557 million.
The share deal added $65.6 million, according to the organization. Trump owns 70% of an entity that holds an ownership stake of 38.25% in World Liberty, and he receives 75% of WLFI token sales proceeds after certain deductions, according to company documents, court records, and his financial disclosures.
By contrast, WLFI buyers in the public market faced a different outcome. The token hit its all-time high of $0.3313 on September 1, 2025, but Public Citizen valued it at $0.05744 when it prepared its report—meaning those who bought at the peak lost about 83% of their investments.
AI Financial Corporation (formerly known as ALT5 Sigma) accounted for the largest portion of the estimated WLFI losses. The Nasdaq-listed company acquired 7.28 billion units of WLFI for about $1.46 billion in August 2025, but the value of this position fell to $421 million by the end of June 2026, leaving it with an approximate paper loss of $1.04 billion.
Among the 31,000 retail wallets that bought the WLFI token through decentralized exchanges on the Ethereum network, “Nansen” found that 25,000 wallets (82%) were losing money as of August 3, with losses of $54 million compared with $24 million in profits for winning wallets.
## Financial disclosure shows $1.4 billion in digital-currency income
Trump’s annual financial disclosure filed in June 2026 showed that his digital-currency-related income for 2025 surpassed $1 billion, with estimates approaching $1.4 billion. These earnings came primarily from licensing the meme coin, distributions of the World Liberty token, the sale of an ownership stake, and proceeds tied to USD1.
Financial disclosures revealed that Trump holds a Bitcoin cold-wallet position worth more than $50 million, in addition to a smaller holding in Ethereum and staking rewards totaling about $1.8 million. The disclosure also recorded that he continued to be exposed to the WLFI and USD1 tokens.
For her part, White House spokesperson Anna Kelly denied that the president’s business interests posed any ethical issue, stressing that the president and his family did not participate in any conflicts of interest and that the president is not involved in running his companies.
## Renewed ethical demands regarding the CLARITY law
After publishing its loss estimates, Public Citizen urged that the CLARITY law require the sitting president and his immediate family members to divest their digital-currency projects, stressing that federal digital-asset policy cannot be separated from the president’s personal financial interests.
The bill provides for the creation of federal classifications for digital assets, splitting oversight between the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). It also includes provisions related to registration, custody, disclosure, and protection of clients’ assets.
Ethical constraints remain one of the contentious points in Senate negotiations, alongside rules for decentralized financing and rewards paid on stablecoin balances. Democratic lawmakers pushed to impose limits on holdings by elected officials in digital currencies, while the White House rejected claims that Trump’s projects affect his political decisions.
Senators Elizabeth Warren and Richard Blumenthal separately asked the Securities and Exchange Commission in August to investigate whether the TRUMP token facilitated fraud or improper enrichment, after its price fell by about 98% from its peak.
On August 19, Trump met with executives in the digital-currency industry and federal regulators at the White House, where he asked lawmakers to approve a “fair version” of the legislation. An procedural vote is scheduled in the Senate on September 15.