Trump Meme Coin Generates Over $86 Million in Trading Fees

The $TRUMP meme coin reportedly generated between $86 million and $100 million in trading fees by Thursday (Jan. 30).

At the same time, the overall value of the crypto coin launched by President Donald Trump slumped by two-thirds after reaching a peak of $14.5 billion Jan. 19, the day before his inauguration, Reuters reported Monday (Feb. 3).

At least 50 investors made profits of over $10 million each on the $TRUMP coin, while some 200,000 crypto wallets lost money on it on the crypto exchange on which the coins were first sold, according to the report.

It is not known if any of these fees accrued to Trump personally, the report said. Trump pledged to put his assets in a trust managed by his children when he entered the White House.

His son, Eric Trump, told Reuters that he is proud of what The Trump Organization has accomplished in crypto.

“We are just getting started,” he said, per the report

Trump also has investments in two decentralized finance (DeFi) projects and a series of non-fungible tokens (NFTs), per the report.

Like other meme coins, the $TRUMP coin has little practical use but was intended to serve as an expression of support for Trump, according to the report.

It was reported Jan. 19 that when promoting the meme coin , Trump told supporters to “Have fun!” and that the website selling the tokens said they are designed to be expressions of support, not an investment opportunity.

After the market value surged ahead of Trump’s inauguration, it fell by as much as 60% after he failed to mention digital assets during his inaugural address, as crypto markets had expected him to do.

It was reported Jan. 29 that websites selling products with Trump’s brand had begun accepting the $TRUMP meme coin as payment.

The effort to get people to pay for Trump-branded watches, sneakers and fragrances with the Trump token are part of an ongoing attempt to encourage crypto users to see the digital coins as an online payment tool.

While some people have used dollar-pegged stablecoins for transactions, cryptocurrencies that have a fluctuating value have yet to catch on as a method of payment.