Key Takeaways
- Trump’s 2025 filing lists at least $1.4 billion in crypto income, led by $635 million in TRUMP memecoin royalties.
- World Liberty’s WLFI token trades near 5.7 cents, down 72%, as ethics watchdogs flag conflict-of-interest concerns.
- An OCC decision on World Liberty’s national bank charter, filed January 2026, is the next major data point to watch.
A Record Crypto Payday in Trump’s First Year Back in Office
The figures cover 2025, the first year of Trump’s second term, and were submitted to the U.S. Office of Government Ethics in a 927-page filing. The disclosure lists the crypto income across several ventures, a sum that dwarfs his earnings from real estate, licensing, and resort operations combined.
The single largest line item was $635 million in royalties tied to CIC Digital LLC, the entity behind the TRUMP memecoin launched on the Solana blockchain days before his January inauguration. The payments were described in the filing as royalties from “Celebration Coins.”
World Liberty Financial, the decentralized finance ( DeFi) platform co-founded by members of the Trump family, accounted for another large share. Trump disclosed about $515 million from sales of the platform’s WLFI governance token and a further $65 million from the sale of equity in its holding company. Separately, the filing logged more than $290 million in income routed through crypto wallets associated with the venture.
Bitcoin Holdings and a Token Under Pressure
The president also disclosed holding more than $100 million worth of bitcoin in a cold wallet, alongside other notable positions across a range of tokens, marking the first time a sitting U.S. president has reported direct ownership of the asset in a federal ethics filing.
The earnings landed as World Liberty’s WLFI token struggled, given that by early June, the token had slid to about 5.7 cents, a 72% decline from earlier highs. The slip came after the project’s treasury drew criticism for using its own governance tokens as collateral to borrow stablecoins on an affiliated lending platform.
Some observers compared the structure to the circular lending that preceded the 2022 collapse of FTX. The Trump family’s direct gains from an August 2025 transaction with Alt5 Sigma were estimated at roughly $500 million after fees.
Ethics Questions and a Pending Bank Charter
World Liberty is close to securing a national trust bank charter from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), with a decision expected on an application filed in January 2026. The prospect of a president’s family firm holding a federal bank charter has intensified scrutiny from ethics watchdogs and congressional Democrats, who argue the crypto income creates unprecedented conflicts of interest.
The counterargument being presented is that the President’s holdings were disclosed in full and that the administration has delivered the digital-asset industry’s long-sought regulatory clarity. The filing also arrives as crypto firms pour record sums into U.S. politics ahead of the 2026 midterm elections, cementing the sector’s growing influence in Washington.
