By Lambert Strether of Corrente.
On the Friday before inauguration day at 9:00pm, President-elect Donald Trump released a memecoin, $TRUMP, that by Sunday was valued at $58 billion, making him one of the world’s 25 richest people. Felix Salmon summarizes:
The $TRUMP memecoin — a financial asset that didn’t exist on Friday afternoon — now accounts for about 89% of Donald Trump’s net worth.
The coin (technically a token that’s issued on the Solana blockchain) has massively enriched Trump personally, enabled a mechanism for the crypto industry to funnel cash to him, and created a volatile financial asset that allows anyone in the world to financially speculate on Trump’s political fortunes….
Some 200 million of the 1 billion total coins have already been released and are being actively traded. The rest, which are owned by Trump-controlled entities, will be able to be sold at various points over the next three years, starting in April.
Not to be outdone, Melania Trump launched her own coin MELANIA Sunday night, almost immediately achieving a market capitalization north of $5 billion.
Here is a handy chart:
These sudden, lightning strike-like events strike me as remarkable, extraordinary, potentially signaling a change to the Constitutional order. And yet they aren’t front page news at the New York Times or the Washington Post[1] (being exclipsed by the inaugural itself, TikTok, the coming winter storm, etc.). What can they mean? In this post I’ll try a sketch a preliminary answer to that question.
Let me concede immediately that I loathe Bitcoin and its “community” (and loathe them despite any raised hands saying “I personally profit from it!”). See Bloomberg, “Joseph Stiglitz: Bitcoin ought to be outlawed“:
Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz said “bitcoin is successful only because of its potential for circumvention, lack of oversight.” “So it seems to me it ought to be outlawed,” Stiglitz said Wednesday in a Bloomberg Television interview with Francine Lacqua and Tom Keene. “It doesn’t serve any socially useful function.”
However, this is not the post to give my loathing analytical form (here is a partial list of NC posts on bitcoin; the headlines will give you an idea of the general tenor of our coverage[2]). What I will do first is define some terms for those who came in late: Blockchain, for example. After that I will consider the Constitutional, even existential, questions raised by Trump’s memecoin.
Definitions: Blockchain, Bitcoin, Shitcoin, Memecoin
The world of so-called[3] “decentralized finance” has an extensive vocabulary all its own, seeminly spawned in imitation of — and I can’t believe I’m saying this — genuine finance. Our purpose, however, is to understand Trump’s memecoin, and for that we need four terms: Blockchain, Bitcoin, Shitcoin, and Memecoin.
Bitcoin (and Crypto (and Blockchain). From the Monthly Review (2022):
Bitcoin was launched a few months after the collapse of Lehman Brothers as a prototype for a secure, permissionless digital currency that would be created, without the guarantee of a financial intermediary as the basis for its credibility, by ‘mining’—the energy-intensive process of deploying a large amount of computing power to solve a cryptographic puzzle (also called proof of work) validating a transaction[4]. While currencies are conventionally underpinned by trust in a powerful central authority, Bitcoin relies on this cryptographic proof, drawing on open-source software and a network of servers sharing data to verify and record transactions so that a multitude of users can anonymously validate the cryptocurrency. Time-stamped, cryptographically proven transactions, immutably recorded in ledgers, are shared and replicated across servers, forming the blockchain—the technological bedrock of the decentralized logic of the cryptoverse. A limit on the maximum number of bitcoins that can be mined (21 million) is built into the trustless mechanisms on the grounds that this technologically imposed scarcity acts as a bulwark against inflation and the profligate impulses of the state. But perversely, this artificial scarcity ensured the allure of Bitcoin as a speculative asset.
Bitcoin has now been joined by a vast number of other cryptocurrencies. Crypto coins are subject to stomach-churning price swings, a painfully slow settlement process, and a huge environmental footprint, undermining their utility as a stable, liquid, and efficient means of settlement.
Shitcoin. From Investopedia: “The term shitcoin refers to a cryptocurrency with little to no value or no immediate, discernible purpose. The word is a pejorative term often used to describe altcoins or cryptocurrencies developed after Bitcoin became popular.” (Of course, Stiglitz would argue, and I would assert, that all bitcoins are shitcoins.) And a subtype of the shitcoin is–
Memecoin. From The Motley Fool:
Meme coins are cryptocurrencies that originate from internet memes or have a humorous or viral aspect. Unlike Bitcoin (BTC -0.4%) or Ethereum (ETH 1.29%), which are backed by robust blockchain technologies and have clear utility in [fraud] digital transactions and decentralized applications (dApps), meme coins often lack a specific purpose beyond the community and cultural value they hold.
Dogecoin (from which Musk’s DOGE derives, Musk being a DOGE holder, naturally) is a meme coin derives from the DOGE meme (see Know Your Meme). Another example from the Daily Mail:
Meme coins are generally considered to be incredibly risky investments, since they are prone to insider-trading and extreme volatility.
There are thousands of them available for purchase through many different platforms, but the most recent meme coin that has gotten negative media attention was Haliey Welch’s.
Welch, better known as the ‘Hawk Tuah Girl,’ launched $HAWK with the help of a shady foundation on December 4.
The token cratered by over 90 percent just hours after it reached a $490 million market cap, prompting accusations of fraud from the crypto community and a lawsuit against the creators of the coin.
Trump signals that his coin is a memecoin in his URL (“gettrumpmemes.com”) and in the verbiage on the page:
Trump Memes are intended to function as an expression of support for, and engagement with, the ideals and beliefs embodied by the symbol “$TRUMP” and the associated artwork, and are not intended to be, or to be the subject of, an investment opportunity, investment contract, or security of any type. GetTrumpMemes.com is not political and has nothing to do with any political campaign or any political office or governmental agency.
We’ll see about that “not political” in the next section.
Issues Raised by Trump’s Memecoin
There are at least four.
First, executive unity. I struggled to think of a good reason for Trump’s spectacular autogolpe as a top-tier, world-class oligarch immediately before he took the oath of office, a reason not involving lust for power or open corruption, and this is what I came up with. In Federalist #70, famous for the discussion of “energy in the executive,” Madison writes (I have marked the two key portions [A] and [B]):
Those politicians and statesmen who have been the most celebrated for the soundness of their principles and for the justice of their views, have declared in favor of a single Executive and a numerous legislature. They have with great propriety, considered energy as the most necessary qualification of the former, and have regarded this as most applicable to power in a single hand, while they have, with equal propriety, considered the latter as best adapted to deliberation and wisdom, and best calculated to conciliate the confidence of the people and to secure their privileges and interests.
That unity is conducive to energy will not be disputed. Decision, activity, secrecy, and despatch will generally characterize the proceedings of one man in a much more eminent degree than the proceedings of any greater number; and in proportion as the number is increased, these qualities will be diminished.
This unity may be destroyed in two ways: either by vesting the power in [A]two or more magistrates of equal dignity and authority; or by vesting it ostensibly in one man, subject, in whole or in part, to the control and co-operation of others… The experience of other nations… [a]s far, however, as it teaches any thing, it teaches us not to be enamoured of [B]plurality in the Executive.
[A] “two or more magistrates.” I think I was one of the first to joke about “President Musk,” but the jokes had a basis in reality, as Musk really did seem to be an independent actor. By increasing his personal wealth overnight to $35 billion dollars, Trump shows fellow billionaire Musk, in the crudest way possible, who the big dog on the block really is.
[B] “plurality in the Executive.” Trump’s experience in his first administration must surely have given him the sense of “plurality in the executive,” given for example that he ordered withdrawal from Syria, and it didn’t happen, which can only mean there are people in his administration just as powerful as he is. Now, I don’t think Trump becomes “the big dog” in our enormous Federal government as easily as he does in a one-on-one with Musk, but the sense of Trump’s dominance can only increased (importantly, within Trump himself).
Second, the emoluments clauses. Article I, Section 9, Clause 8 (foreign emoluments):
No Title of Nobility shall be granted by the United States: And no Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them, shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State.
Article II, Section 1, Clause 7 (domestic):
The President shall, at stated Times, receive for his Services, a Compensation, which shall neither be encreased nor diminished during the Period for which he shall have been elected, and he shall not receive within that Period any other Emolument from the United States, or any of them.
And the Legal Information Institute’s commentary:
For most of its history, courts have rarely substantively analyzed or interpreted the Foreign Emoluments Clause. During the administration of President Donald Trump, however, a number of private parties, state attorneys general, and Members of Congress sued the President based on alleged violations of both the Foreign Emoluments Clause and the Domestic Emoluments Clause (collectively, the Emoluments Clauses). Three major federal lawsuits concerning the Emoluments Clauses were filed against President Trump. Over nearly four years, these cases progressed through the lower federal courts, resulting in the first significant judicial decisions on the Emoluments Clauses.
In late 2020, the Supreme Court denied review in one of these cases, and—after the end of President Trump’s term in January 2021—instructed two federal appellate courts to vacate their judgments and dismiss the other two cases as moot.
So Trump’s memecoin puts us in uncharted territory. More:
The final litigated issue was the meaning and scope of the term “emolument” as used in the Emoluments Clauses—particularly, whether it includes private, arm’s-length market transactions. In the litigation, President Trump argued that ’emoluments’ included only benefits received by an officeholder in return for official action or through his office or employment. Plaintiffs urged that ’emoluments’ be defined more broadly to apply to any ‘profit, gain, or advantage’ received by the President from a foreign or domestic government. The two district courts that reached the issue adopted the plaintiffs’ broader definition of ’emolument,’ although the appellate courts subsequently vacated those decisions.
Trump’s memecoin, then, would seem to be barred by the district courts broader definition, but not barred by the appellate courts. To put the matter in very simple terms:
Most dangerous thing for country about Trump coin is what comes next. Now anyone in world can essentially deposit money into bank account of President of USA with a couple clicks. Every favor – geopolitical, corporate or personal – is now on sale, right out in the open.
— Anthony Scaramucci (@Scaramucci) January 19, 2025
(This article argues that Trump’s memecoin is carefully crafted to win a Supreme Court case legalizing the practice, but the technical basis on which it does so is beyond me. Perhaps some kind reader can explicate.)
Third, a cult of personality. Once again, from Trump’s site:
“Celebrate Our Win & Have Fun!”
Note the word “our” (and how the heck is owning a memecoin fun? I genuinely don’t get it. More:
Join the Trump Community. This is History in the Making!
I genuinely don’t get the “community” aspect either, though it’s often used by coin touts. And once more:
Trump Memes are intended to function as an expression of support for, and engagement with, the ideals and beliefs embodied by the symbol “$TRUMP” and the associated artwork , and are not intended to be, or to be the subject of, an investment opportunity, investment contract, or security of any type. GetTrumpMemes.com is not political and has nothing to do with any political campaign or any political office or governmental agency. See Terms & Conditions Here, See Card Allocation Here.
On one level, “is not political” is just silly. “Celebrating the win” is obviously political, given that an election was won; “community” is political as well, by definition (even more so when forming the community is “history in the making”). Presumably that’s all boilerplate that Bud From Legal insisted be in there. However, the part that concerns me is this:
… an expression of support for, and engagement with, the ideals and beliefs embodied by the symbol “$TRUMP” and the associated artwork…
I hate to invoke Godwin’s law, and heaven knows I don’t think MAGA are Nazis. But the idea that one pays to express “support” seems like a phase shift to me; it reminds me uncomfortably of the fact that Nazi brownshirts had to buy their own uniforms; a level of commitment, especially in bad times, far greater than going to rallies or voting. “If this goes on,” if the level of commitment is escalated, drawing more and more relentlessly in, then I am even more uncomfortably reminded of what I have always regarded as the dividing line between fascist adjacency and outright fascism, the line we have never crossed: “a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants.”
Fourth, financialization of the body politic. Felix Salmon writes:
Trump’s fans believed it made sense to stand by him through the scandals and the victories, because they thought his leadership would provide them with opportunities down the road.
But now holders of TRUMP have a direct financial incentive to amplify his message and defend his presidency, because the token is sure to rise in value whenever sentiment moves in his favor.
I suppose if money is speech….
Conclusion
I’ve never been one to worship, with Democrats, at the altar of the Norms Fairy. But it does seem to me that a President using the imminence of his inauguration to transform himself into an instant multi-billionaire is a norms violation on a colossal, a gargantuan scale, a mountain so huge that we cannot see its peak from where we stand. Felix Salmon writes:
Trump has just delivered a masterclass in the ability of a president to turn power into wealth.
(Or social capital into economic capital). Can anybody really believe that a sitting President should have the power to teach that lesson? Can anyone believe that the Constitution’s framers intended it? Does this mean every future President can do the same thing? Why not every politician? Will Bitcoin prices replace polling? Why not? Heck, why not voting? Meanwhile, even the tech bros are aghast. From Web3 Is Going Great:
[S]ome in the crypto world are reacting with horror at Trump’s decisionmaking. While they hoped that Trump’s administration would be crypto-friendly, they did not seem to anticipate that the Trump family would openly embrace some of the ecosystem’s worst parts to enrich themselves at everyone else’s expense.
(Again, I think the “worst parts” of crypto “ecosystem” are the “ecosystem” itself, but it’s telling that even true believers have problems with the grossness of Trump’s act.) And what on earth can Susie Wiles think? Or did she find out about it from Trump’s post?
NOTES
[1] RealClearPolitics, which I had thought was a reliable, albeit conservative aggregator, hasn’t mentioned the story at all:
[2] Naked Capitalism on Bitcoin:
What Happens If Bitcoin Succeeds? (2021)
Crypto Crackdown: Only the Beginning? (2021)
Nassim Nicholas Taleb Shellacks Bitcoin and Cryptocurrencies (2021)
The Only Crypto Story You Need? A Response to Matt Levine’s The Crypto Story (2022)
Jim Chanos: “The Crypto Ecosystem Is Well-Suited for the Dark Side of Finance.” (2023)
Feds Bust $3.4 Billion Crypto Theft, Demonstrating Ability to Penetrate Supposed Secrecy (2023)
What Does Mustard Gas Have in Common with Crypto and Blockchain? (2023)
[3] As it turns out, decentralized finance has turned out to be extremely concentrated. The creation of bitcoins (“mining”) is very concentrated, because it’s capital intensive; it takes a lot of electrical and processing power. So is bitcoin ownership (see list of whales here). Interestingly, the mythical Bitcoin founder, Satoshi Nakamoto “could be a single person or a group of people. Either way, the identity remains a successfully guarded secret.” Nakamoto is said to own 1.1 million Bitcoins, making him one of the 30 richest people in the world. (Speaking of “groups of people,” it’s interesting to consider whether there are any institutions that would find the anonymity enabled by bitcoin of practical use.)
[4] Some blockchain vendors have replaced “proof of work” with “proof of stake.” See here.
NOTES
[1] RealClearPolitics, which I had thought was a reliable, albeit conservative aggregator, hasn’t mentioned the story at all:
[2] Naked Capitalism on Bitcoin:
What Happens If Bitcoin Succeeds? (2021)
Crypto Crackdown: Only the Beginning? (2021)
Nassim Nicholas Taleb Shellacks Bitcoin and Cryptocurrencies (2021)
The Only Crypto Story You Need? A Response to Matt Levine’s The Crypto Story (2022)
Jim Chanos: “The Crypto Ecosystem Is Well-Suited for the Dark Side of Finance.” (2023)
Feds Bust $3.4 Billion Crypto Theft, Demonstrating Ability to Penetrate Supposed Secrecy (2023)
What Does Mustard Gas Have in Common with Crypto and Blockchain? (2023)
[3] As it turns out, decentralized finance has turned out to be extremely concentrated. The creation of bitcoins (“mining”) is very concentrated, because it’s capital intensive; it takes a lot of electrical and processing power. So is bitcoin ownership (see list of whales here). Interestingly, the mythical Bitcoin founder, Satoshi Nakamoto “could be a single person or a group of people. Either way, the identity remains a successfully guarded secret.” Nakamoto is said to own 1.1 million Bitcoins, making him one of the 30 richest people in the world. (Speaking of “groups of people,” it’s interesting to consider whether there are any institutions that would find the anonymity enabled by bitcoin of practical use.)
[4] Some blockchain vendors have replaced “proof of work” with “proof of stake.” See here.
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Looks like a missing close bold tag here somewhere?
Thanks, Lambert.
Is Scaramucci correct? This is not like a bank account. This is speculation on a token, whose value will almost certainly fluctuate wildly (and likely tank hard, like the TikTok coin). Ditto for the graphic from Bloomberg. DJT cannot extract $56 B from this right now, and do we know his actual stake in DJT stock?
That said, DJT doubtless has many shares and so this can work like a kind of slush fund. There will be ppl doing analysis of the chain, to try and track the money flow.
Meanwhile, even “the community” seems pretty annoyed at Ryan Fournier, e.g.:
https://www.reddit.com/r/CryptoCurrency/comments/1i5p13z/tragicomedy_in_6_screenshots/
“bro you rugged the shit”
I mean, the people who use fortunes to keep score have never insisted it all be liquid or even real. After all, they won’t and don’t spend it. If they need to touch it, they’ll just use it as collateral.
Or, hilariously, as part of the strategic crypto reserve, he’ll just have the gov buy token off of him. After all, why not?
Look at what happened to the Hawk Tua bitcoin– a conventionally attractive 20 year old blonde woman asked about sex on the street joked about the Oral kind, then got blown up into an “Influencer” by clowns like dirty old man Bill Maher on cable and online. She marketed a Bitcoin that rapidly inflated, then fell apart, bankrupting many “investors”.
As little as I trust the now NeoLib/NeoLib Rolling Stone, they at least covered the basics (all but the headline behind a paywall, sadly). Others have as well.
https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/hawk-tuah-crypto-meme-coin-crash-1235194089/
Are people so stupid they have forgotten Caveat Emptor entirely? Apparently so.
I’m sure those Hawk Tua memecoin buyers paid for those memecoins with good old tradmoney ( traditional money). And I feel confident that Ms. H. Awk Tua was happy to take their tradmoney.
I hope that all of Trump’s worshippers buy all the $Trumpcoins they can afford. And that they buy and hold. And buy more on every dip and every dive. And ride it all the way down to ultimate zero.
But then, I hope the same for every bitcoin owner as well.
Meanwhile, I keep my money invested in tradmoney. And tradcans of tradfood. Tradclothes. Tradbooks. And I pay tradmoney each month to stay in my tradhousing in the tradco-op that I am a tradmember of.
Those around me have been calling this the smash and grab era since about 2022-ish, and it looks like the accelerator is now mashed to the floor. Thanks for writing about this; I agree that this second-order consideration of the story just not breaking through. I wonder if it’s because most writing about shitcoins are enthralled with the ecosystem or access. Thanks, Lambert.
> I wonder if it’s because most writing about shitcoins are enthralled with the ecosystem or access.
The language used in the “ecosystem” is pernicious in that it legitmates what is not legitimate. For example, the dollar symbol that begins a bitcoins technical name, like $TRUMP, suggests a stock ticker price, as if bitcoin were an asset like a stock. But in fact bitcoin is worthless.
For me, $TRUMP just turns into strump – or a short form of strumpet. It gave me a bit of amusement in a time of sore need – I hope by sharing it, you also get some fun in these interesting times.
Thank you for this post. My head just exploded. I cannot believe this can possibly be legal. But that’s just me.
No, it’s not just you.
I think that a reason for my problems with my relatives is that they still believe that what was, still is. It is not like the corruption, incompetence, and insanity happened all at once, but instead happened over several decades and if you are at all primed for groupthink or are enmeshed in semi isolated communities like the PMC, then the Mindscrew has its chance to work its magic on you.
I’m reminded of the Screwtape Letters by C. S. Lewis. Yes, it is a Christian apologetic, but it does show how to mess with people. I should read it again.
Or one can just think of an addict’s excuses, evasions, selfishness, and lying (to themselves as much as they do to others). Sometimes they get to where they believe in their own bullpucky. What’s the truth and what’s sh—? Nobody knows! Which is what politics is to too many people.
What was abnormal behavior becomes the new normal and nobody sees. Yes, we are living in a world enmeshed in the thinking of cult members, drug addicts, and con artists.
From the preface:
There’s an audio version narrated by John Cleese that can be found on YouTube:
Maybe its because my head exploded decades ago, but as I see it Trump is simply a more blatant example of what typically goes on just a bit more obscurely and rationalized as normative by narratives promulgated by the powers that be. Our system of governance itself is to a considerable extent a morally bankrupt but financially profitable criminal enterprise. Trump is refreshingly honest in declaring the system is rigged and that he knows this because he has made a career in using it to his own advantage.
I agree with you.
” Legal permission? We don’t have any legal permission. We don’t need no stinkin’ legal permission!”
How can anyone honestly argue that President Trump should suffer from the Emoluments Causes when President Biden did not? They both should be of course, but invoking the Norms Fairies because it’s His Orange Evilness while not doing so for the Doddering One would be embarrassing. For now, President Trump’s corruption is merely of degree and not of kind when compared to much of Congress and most of the leadership in the various agencies such as the FDA.
I think that too many people are too deranged to see the mote in their collective eyes, such as the omnipresent corruption, which is scary.
> For now, President Trump’s corruption is merely of degree and not of kind
I don’t think that’s true (as urged below) for two reasons: 1) The enormous scale. How many other grifts do you know that catapulted the grifter into the top 30 of wealthy people you know? Trump makes the Clintons look like an organ grinder and a monkey. 2) The timing. Trump cashed in even before he was sworn in (like a Caudillo, I suppose).
Would the release of the coin before he became president be part of the legal defense? He’s now just holding assets he acquired before his presidency.
I caught news of it right after the announcement. Wish I had bought some and sold it already.
That would be a very good shyster legal defense. That’s how shyster law works. Roy Cohn was a very good shyster lawyer, I believe.
Well, don’t blame me. I voted for Harris. I didn’t make any specific predictions about what Trump would do, beyond his own proud announcements. How could I or anyone predict this in particular? But I expected this sort of Trumpiness in general, which is why I voted for Harris.
To those who voted for Trump or who non-voted to allow Trump because they wanted the hip, cool and groovy accelerationism, I say: Happy Acceleration.
All I can say is… every time I think we’ve hit peak clown world, I’m proven wrong shortly thereafter.
It is clowns all the way down.
Clown world economy demands perpetual growth.
This clown car *pats world* can hold so many clowns, you wouldn’t believe me!
“the token is sure to rise in value whenever sentiment moves in his favor”
This doesn’t seem particularly likely to me. I don’t think sentiment about Trump went down 40% at 2:30 pm yesterday. This is going to fluctuate wildly but trend downward like the DJT stock price did from 2021 to 2024. The only sentiment boost likely to move it up significantly is if Trump really does have the government buy it for a “strategic reserve,” or maybe a bump in 2028 if he can figure out how to run for a third term.
But Trump’s net worth is still likely to double even if he ends up selling his stake for a couple dollars apiece over a period of years.
If the government under his control buys it, sure. It’s more likely the issue that other people buy it as a sign of kissing the ring or just transferring money indirectly.
Either way, in a sane world, this would be struck down or be an immediate cause for impeachment, but…
in my world meme coins and shitcoins are synonymous.
I was following the story from Sat morning. I own some $BTC and stable coins $USDT. I was really surprised. This is a grift. Doing it so out in the open means that the incoming admin at the very top in like any other caudillo and the US truly has become a banana Republic.
We are going to have difficult times.
Btw the $TRUMP is now down to USD. 33. Down from a high of 75 on Saturday. Looks like a busted flush. The Melania meme coin is at $3.50, down from 13. Amusingly there’s a shiittier shit coin Melania Trump at 3.5 cents .
I really ought to laugh at this. We knew he was a grifter but there’s been all this stuff about his near murder changed him etc. Not so. Glad I stayed in my ‘Dont vote, it only encourages them’ lane.
> I own some $BTC and stable coins $USDT. I was really surprised. This is a grift.
I’m pleased that a bitcoin owner commented, without pointing out any technical errors (which I assume means there aren’t any).
Is this any more dishonest than Obama’s $100 million “consulting contract” with Netflix or a Bill Clinton speech for a million dollar honorarium?
Here’s betting that they start financing political campaigns the same way.
What a perfect way to own a politician
Off the top of my head – and it’s floating away, like a cloud on a summer’s day- I’d say yes, it’s much worse. If I can say this, and moderator(s) please be indulgent, I’d suggest that djt has just dropped the biggest turd in america’s political potty..and john roberts et.al will be there to cheerily clean his dirty behind.
John Roberts will rule that it is not a turd, it is a dumpling. And those who agree with the Roberts ruling should buy all the $trump coins they can afford. And I hope they do.
Yes.
Sleazy as Obama and Clinton may be, a) we know who gave them money, and b) they did not take bribes while President.
Trump didn’t even wait to become President before setting up his personal dark money gravy train for 24/7 corruption.
Same with Keir Starmer. The norm used to be that you served your term/s in office and then afterwards would make bank – legally – through book deals, consultancyships, seats on different boards, think tank positions, interviews, etc. Just ask Obama. Not anymore and the trend is to cash in before even taking office.Starmer did that with people buying him with gifts, very expensive clothing for he and his wife, etc. before even taking office. Trump is taking part in this new trend but what is different is the scale of what he has done and it will be interesting to see how this “coin” tracks over the next for years. The Dems will scream blue murder about this, mostly because they did not think of it first, but I suppose that Trump will justify it by saying ‘It’s OK when we do it.’
> The norm used to be that you served your term/s in office and then afterwards would make bank – legally – through book deals, consultancyships, seats on different boards, think tank positions, interviews, etc. Just ask Obama. Not anymore and the trend is to cash in before even taking office.Starmer did that with people buying him with gifts, very expensive clothing for he and his wife, etc. before even taking office. Trump is taking part in this new trend but what is different is the scale of what he has done
The Norms Fairy sheds a tear. And what a penny ante grifter Starmer is, to be sure. No sense of the grand gesture.
Admittedly she didn’t get to be President, but I think Hillary shattered that no bribes during thing while she was Secretary of State and then during the campaign for President. The Clintons’ foundation may be more tangible, more work, and even have to pretend more than the meme coin. But it was absolutely soliciting bribes while in office. And then there is the Biden crime family. I mean it did look to be somewhat shut down while Joe was puppet President, but then again do we really know who was buying Hunter’s paintings?
No excuses for the Trumps, they have absolutely demolished the pretense that there was some norm in the financilization of the presidency. And I gotta give Don credit, he has always been brazen. But the idea that the norms fairy hasn’t been under assault longer than he has been on the scene is ignoring too much. They merely turned the “acceptable” highway into the Autobahn.
I understand your point, and I have been following these characters for years, so I well aware the the Norms Fairy is “honored more in the breach than in the observance.”
Still, at some point, quantitative change “flips” into qualitative change, and I think that the billion-dollar scale + Trump cashing in even before he took office make the difference here.
I would agree with it being a quantitative change. Although I do believe Trump having been the President does gray things up a little. Not in his intent to cash in, or in the fact that having been reelected makes this billion dollar boondoggle possible though. Still he is unique and this was both pre presidency AND post presidency.
I also have to apologize, it was meant to be a response to converger’s statement. I merely was disagreeing with the first part of their contention- the idea that everything before was post presidency. I also disagree with the second part that we knew who was paying in those cases. But that ultimately doesn’t matter, unspecified before or clear after, we are left to guess who our politicians are working for besides themselves when they are in office. We can usually make a good guess based on their actions and priorities, but until we can insist on the NASCAR style jumpsuits with names of the sponsors it is always a guess. And frankly that normalizes the corruption too much for me.
Ah, a reference to the Dialectics of Nature! Appropriate, since the Bearded One and his patron explained it all (or most of it) very well a long time ago.
After sleeping on it, I still think there should be an $NC memecoin with the two snow leopard kittens on the heads side and the cover of ECONNED on the reverse. I’m in for $25.
Aaaw!
How does it differ in scale or character from, on the same day, Biden pardoning 8,000 enables of his grift since 1st Jan 2014? Don’t say timing, the grift was going from 2014!
Even if they are equivalent, Biden’s unjust enrichment has also required the deaths of at least 500,000 Ukrainian men. Trump has just wasted datacentre space and electrons.
I suggest WW3 is fought through memecoins and the military industrial complex can be retired. The Pentagon can shovel its black budget into $F35 and $LCS to go up against RPutin and RT-72….
Are you serious?
This is whataboutism, which is a subset of the fallacious “tu quoue” form of argument.
To put this in more basic terms, which sadly seems necessary: I don’t spend much time around small children. Even so, I can tell you with considerable confidence most parents would not accept your contention, which boils down to “Johnny did it so why can’t I?”
As Uncle Joe the First (aka Djugashvili/Stalin) is reputed to have said, quantity has a quality all its own.
Richard Murphy’s take:
“In their own deeply tacky and startingly offensive way, the so-called coins are indicative of what the far-right’s view of politics is all about. It is about using the power of the state to enhance the wealth, status and power of the far-right politician. That is all there is, ultimately, to their politics. It is an exercise in exploitation.
“They just come with the aim of extracting as much value for themselves as they can regardless of those that they harm – including their own supposed supporters – along the way. It is as if the kick of exploitation is the thrill that they seek.”
https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2025/01/20/trumpcoins-represent-the-essence-of-far-right-politics/
While Murphy is worth reading on British economics, he is beset with TDS, which colours all his posts about Trump. And he has bought the msm version of Ukraine wholesale.
I have to say I find this article either misses or dances around the real issues. The emoluments clause? It’s really a stretch to brand Trump’s issuing (*another*) memecoin with his name as “confering a title of nobility” to himself. (And he’s also been issuing Trump-themed NFTs – non-fungible tokens – which he sold on the Ethereum network etc.)
The real problem here, which I didn’t find the article addressing very directly at all, is that the President of the United States used his own reelection and specifically his inauguration to issue a memecoin (indistinguishable really from sh*tcoins, with names like C*MROCKET, and so on) to prepare a rug pull on his own supporters (mainly, but perhaps with some other dumb money along for the ride) to the tune of 60 billion dollars. (This is where I would go: “Am I allowed to say “c*m” on this channel?”)
It’s “sh*tcoining” combined with brazen profiting from the office of the presidency on the first day. Not even with corrupt wheeling and dealing in the shadows, but out in the open. And profiting from your presidency is also quite different from profiting from your cult of personality as ex-president, as he did during the Biden era.
I also strongly disagree with the idea that holders will be incentivized to support Trump because the value of the coin will be tied to his popularity. Again, it’s both an unnecessarily convoluted argument and also doesn’t reflect how these memecoin scams work. If Trump has any idea of what he’s doing, he is going to offload these (so-called) coins to the “greater fool” (of which there are many, as we’re seeing right now) as quickly as he can, though preferably at least somewhat discreetly. (He very likely still holds the vast majority of these coins. I haven’t seen numbers for $TRUMP or whatever it’s actually called, but the $MELANIA coin apparently is owned to 87% not just a single identifiable owner but even by a single blockchain address).
The value will go to zero and the suckers will be left with the useless tokens. And he will brush this off, change the subject when (and if) it’s brought up, or it will just be forgotten, just like the ridiculous Trump NFTs have been. It’s a simple pump-and-dump scheme, not an ersatz “stock ticker” for the popularity of his person and his presidency. Trump is many things but I don’t think he somehow believes in his own scams.
In any sane country, Trump would be in prison for blatant fraud and corruption on a massive scale. (In China, he would have received the death penalty for corruption, embezzlement, etc. a very long time ago. To be clear, the same goes for most members of the Biden family too.) But successive US administrations have decided that pump-and-dump schemes are perfectly within the law as long as they involve cryptocurrencies, and also the Supreme Court has confirmed that presidents are above the law anyway. So I think he is legally in the clear here, and has (if the scam works out) substantially enriched himself and his descendants for generations, and money was always a problem for them. (In a way, I can’t blame him. “Hate the game, not the player.”)
A good question is to what extent Musk pushed him to do this. Musk himself hasn’t (yet, at least) issued a $MUSK memecoin (and arguably doesn’t need to) but he has used tweets to play with the DOGE coin, which wasn’t created by him but sort of hijacked by him. There is no doubt of course that he of course would buy large quantities of DOGE before he did this, and then sold when the price would skyrocket, and surprise, surprise, there are no inquiries opened into this.
I also believe that mainstream media (including RealClearPolitics) aren’t covering this partly because they’re happy to see MAGApedes lose their money to their cult leader. On some level I can’t completely blame them either. But also, they are really (and obviously) part of the same corrupt class as Trump is. Expect to see (and again, I don’t think I’m surprising anyone here with this) the media and the Democrats to rant about things like hush money over sex with porn stars, but not multi-billion dollar fraud like this.
> The emoluments clause? It’s really a stretch to brand Trump’s issuing (*another*) memecoin with his name as “confering a title of nobility” to himself.
Do consider reading the post. For the avoidance of doubt, I qouted both emoluments clauses. Foreign:
And domestic:
Emolument: “a salary, fee, or profit from employment or office.”
There is no “stretch.” Titles of nobility don’t enter into it.
I agree with Lambert that there is a compelling legal argument that the Emolument Clauses are violated here. And I don’t think the “Constitutional Crypto” article cited by Lambert really argues to the contrary. As I read it, the author is merely contending that the traceability of blockchain transactions will make it easier for courts to reach the merits of the constitutional question, by avoiding some of the procedural (i.e. standing or mootness) hurdles that sidelined earlier emolument litigation during Trump’s first term.
The article then goes off on a tangent about the need for federal financial oversight of cryptocurrency in general, which is probably true but also irrelevant to the constitutional issues raised here.
Federal financial oversight of cryptocurrency would just lend a fake legitimacy to a pure fraud/scam/swindle vehicle. I hope it never happens. Let crypto remain a wild west tarpit to be dived into by those who don’t know any better.
If we get Federal financial oversight of crypto, then pension funds and funds of all kinds will begin buying trillions of “dollars” of crypto with the money of millions of helpless victims. Including with my money. Without my permission, but with my money all the same.
So I expect we will get “Federal financial oversight” of crypto any old time now.
If Trump remains a Cult Leader with a devoted Cult Fanbase of millions, he will not want to unload all the $Trump coins at once.
He will want to sell them slowly and little-by-little to his millions of worshippers who will continue to prove their loyalty to their God-Emperor Trump through the ongoing purchase of these quasi-religious tokens of their love and loyalty. He will place control of the $Trumpcoins into some sort of Trump family controlled Foundation control so it can keep selling them for decades after he himself has died. They are sheep to be sheared over and over, not coal to be mined once and then gone.
There is a difference between shyster-legal and illegal. Shyster-legal is bending the law until it cracks without quite breaking. Outright breaking it is illegal. Maybe every law has a ” Hooke’s Law Constant”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hooke%27s_law to which it can be stretched or bent without quite breaking.
These crypto-meme coins are about pumpendumpen pumpendumpen pumpendumpen over and over and over again. They are “greatest fool magnets” and all the greatest fools will eventually be found.
If the Tech-Shkrellis are aghast, it is because these $Trump coins threaten to give the game away.
Shkreli tweeted he’d short the Trump shitcoin at 100-200. He’s been short FARTCOIN.
He’s also been short the 4 of 5 utter crap quantum computing stocks.
He’s been telling people what a shitty game this is .
All heil DOGE!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-VfYjPzj1Xw
I am impressed how well he has stepped up his game since his first term.
Should be an interesting 4 years, at this rate he might be able to surpass Musk in wealth.
> I am impressed how well he has stepped up his game since his first term.
The 100 executive orders are the world’s greatest Gish Gallop.
The reason crypto bro’s are aghast is because TRUMP coin endangers their own potential profits from Bitcoin, Ethereum, or other “tier 1” crypto.
Currencies derive value from inelastic demand. Currencies arise from the palace, temple, and state because taxation creates inelastic demand for the currency. It’s inelastic because if you don’t pay your taxes, there is, ostensibly, a negative consequence.
Speculative digital tokens, i.e. cryptocurrency, are inherently worthless, and as Stiglitz points out, not socially beneficial. The existing inelastic demand which supports their value is entirely speculative, or is due to illegal activity (human trafficking, smuggling, bribery, gambling, tax evasion).
If you own a lot of Bitcoin, what’s needed is to ground the value of your crypto in state enforced inelastic demand.
Hence why for the last 4 years, the general goal of the crypto “industry” has been to legitimize crypto, but especially Bitcoin, so that institutional adoption could take place. This has occurred, through outright bribery (campaign contributions, CFTC redefinition of commodity to include Bitcoin), but also by donating ill gotten crypto money to prestigious academic institutions like Harvard (Filecoin), and by funding media organizations.
More than anything, however, cryptocurrency perfectly adheres to the neoliberal economic prime directive of redistributing wealth from the many, to the few. Hence why our institutions, both sides of the aisle, and corporations (especially finance), adopted it so readily.
What cryptobros have been hoping for from a Trump presidency is the creation of state backed inelastic demand, say through the ability to pay fines, fees, or taxes at a discount by using Bitcoin, or perhaps by legitimizing crypto as a means of international settlement between nations.
The entire point is to go from a currency which has some pretense of democratic control, to one which is fully controlled by oligarchs.
What the Trump Coin signals is that he couldn’t care less about early adopters of Bitcoin or Ethereum, because he isn’t one of them. Instead, he can create inelastic demand for a coin HE controls, and possibly through the state backed coercion they hoped would apply to Bitcoin.
As Lambert noted, bribery through the coin could provide a form of inelastic demand, where policy, pardons, and profits could be purchased on crypto exchanges. The smarter play for Trump would be to attempt to make his coin equivalent to the US dollar, either by forcing foreign governments to accept payments in $TRUMP, or by allowing taxes to be paid in it.
Cryptocurrency is dangerous.
> What cryptobros have been hoping for from a Trump presidency is the creation of state backed inelastic demand
Ah, that’s what the Strategic Coin Reserve is all about.
Thanks for this comment (though I think even Trump wouldn’t allow taxes to be paid in $TRUMP.
It occurred to me that we could think of both fiat and crypto as bets on legimacy or hegemony; of the State, on the one hand, and of crypto itself, on the other. Long crypto holders (and apparently the whales are) are short the State.
Would he demand or at least allow royalties paid by oil/gas companies for leases drilled on and pumped from . . . to be paid in $Trumps? Why not?
Thank you for this framing.
A simple usage case: concentric rings of access at Mar-a-Lago, the entry fee at each consecutive door being an order of magnitude higher, payable only in $TRUMP. Thus determining who you get access to.
It seems to me that it is equivalent to a digital “commemorative medal”, or other silver plated rubbish you could buy in the back of TV-guides, to commemorate the election of someone, the Queen’s golden Jubilee, or whatever. I expect its value to tank if Trump et al sell theirs, because I expect its market to be tiny and once proper price discovery can occur, no one will want one. I guess we’ll see.
> once proper price discovery
I don’t even know what proper price discovery look like with bitcoin, which is intrinsically worthless. (Also shows the confusion between bitcoin as a currency and bitcoin as an asset; one doesn’t do price discovery on the dollar, for example.
Bitcoin is also thinly traded and nothing prevents wash trading between several accounts belonging to the same person. So one can also ask how price discovery works when price manipulation is easy and profitable.
Another take:
https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2025/01/donald-trump-crypto-billionaire/681388/
The President Is a Crypto Billionaire
Donald Trump’s new token is making the crypto industry uneasy.
“…Although much of the crypto world has been eagerly awaiting Trump’s return to the White House, a new sense of unease has settled over some of the industry’s biggest defenders, who recognize that memecoins don’t exactly reflect well on crypto. Memecoins are “zero-sum,” the investor Balaji Srinivasan, typically aligned with Trump, reminded his followers on X over the weekend. “There is no wealth creation … And after an initial spike, the price eventually crashes and the last buyers lose everything.” Nic Carter, a prominent crypto investor and Trump supporter, reasons that the unease is indicative of a broader panic, a slow-growing sense that Trump can’t be controlled in the way the industry might want. $TRUMP “exposed the worst parts of the crypto industry to the public eye in a way that really didn’t need to happen, right when we were on the cusp of legitimacy,” he told me today…”
> $TRUMP “exposed the worst parts of the crypto industry to the public eye in a way that really didn’t need to happen, right when we were on the cusp of legitimacy
That’s a damn shame.
This is a superb, completely necessary post, however distressing because it shows how fragile a state America has become.
One can almost see Mr Trump’s Greater America taking shape. Where do I register?
Get in touch with a recruiter in your area today.
https://www.spaceforce.com/find-local-recruiter
Call me old fashioned, but one could easily get a one ounce silver coin with Trump on it from several bullion dealers the past few years / right now. I prefer the Headless Horseman silver coin as a symbol of the country for the last sixty years. But if Krugman wants to fork lift over that $trillion platinum coin he talks about to my garage, then I’ll take that, too.
> one ounce silver coin with Trump
Doesn’t scale the way $STRUMP (I keep reading “strumpet”) does.
> Krugman wants to fork lift over that $trillion platinum coin
You’re saying fiat is the same as bitcoin? Interesting.
What’s a ‘bitcoin’?
Full disclosure: I was born during the Eisenhower Administration.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bjkp48XohbE
I do miss Zappa.
Lamberth did it again!
I don‘t know what to make out of it except that the USA is a country rotten to the core.
1) getting rich is the only thing that counts on a cultural level
2) congressmen and presidents have for a long time used their positions for self-enrichment https://www.businessinsider.com/congress-insider-trading-earmarks-real-estate-nancy-pelosi-rich-tax-payer-money-2011-11?op=1
3) the political machinery has ceased to function as a mechanism to protect the common man from the perverted anf bloodlusting elites (Epstein, neocons etc.) and to improve the common man‘s life.
4) all that is solid melts into air. In parallell I see the Harry & Meghan shitshow as a neoliberal dissolution of the royal house. They simply sell themselves to the highest bidder using the royal background of Harry. This Trum-coin enrichment is just a more open and trumpian way to refine and perfect the usage of the mechanism for seöf-entichment while dissolving the government as a societal point of reference.
5) also Dmitry Orlov and his description of the dissolution of the Soviet Union is os use here.
The engines of the gravy train of consultancy gigs, book deals, board seats, whirlwind tours of the speaking circuit etc used to be fired up after a president vacates office. Trump is tearing up that playbook by cashing in on the frontend. Who’s the biggest maker of popcorn in the US? I want to load up on the stock, the next four years will be a hell of a show…
And don’t forget ‘campaign contributions’ as they get to keep the pot when they retire. I really don’t see much difference just because of the timing. I don’t see the mechanism that the president can be bribed as any different from the million dollar donations for the inaugural celebrations before he was sworn in. They all enrich themselves, and some their entire extended families. We were all shocked that Jimmy Carter did not. And that was a long time ago. I can’t get all that worked up about this issue.
Orville Redenbacher may not be the biggest, but he may be the bestest. ( Or rather , may have been the bestest before he died.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orville_Redenbacher
Seems like the digital version of the Dutch tulip craze of the 17th century. On a personal level, it reminds me a great deal of the pyramid clubs that ripped off suckers in the 1970s.
But since tax dollars aren’t involved I’m having trouble caring about this one. Trump is ripping off his supporters directly which to me is an improvement over a system where your campaign takes in hundreds of thousands of dollars over the course of your career in exchange for votes to authorize spending a trillion dollars on ill-conceived weapons programs that exist so that a few people can “earn” billions of dollars.
Thanks for this coverage, it’s bizarre that the news cycle seems to have borderline competent ignored this, it reminds me of the civil war in Albania circa 1997, which was caused by a collapsed pyramid scheme (though it’s not yet at the scale(?))
“At their peak, the nominal value of the pyramid schemes’ liabilities amounted to almost half of the country’s GDP. When the schemes collapsed, there was uncontained rioting, the government fell, and the country descended into anarchy and a near civil war in which some 2,000 people were killed.”
https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/wp/1999/wp9998.pdf
> … an expression of support for, and engagement with, the ideals and beliefs embodied by the symbol “$TRUMP” and the associated artwork…
This reminds me a little of my (perhaps idiosyncratic) psychological dynamics during the 2016 and 2020 D primaries. On days when the news flow made me feel especially cross with the D establishment, I would “vent” by making a contribution to the Sanders campaign, both an act of political support and, subjectively, a raised middle finger to the D establishment.
Perhaps part of the “have fun” (from the perspective of the seller and buyers) aspect of purchasing $TRUMP coins is that enriching DJT in violation of norms really annoys his detractors. If that’s going on, I suppose that it’s better than an actual shooting civil war.
Meanwhile in Serbia, swimming season opens.
https://www.dw.com/en/in-serbia-swimmers-brave-icy-waters-for-orthodox-epiphany/video-71352382
Ooops, this should have been posted in Links. Sorry for posting while blind.
But can I use it to gamble on Valve games and sports betting apps?
I’ve had at least a dozen guffaws at Donny’s expense this morning, but his $TRUMP coin is really a metaphor for the new ‘normal’. With that in mind Lambert, I recommend that NC add a new category to TOPICS with this post leading the way…call it what you will
Pitfalls of the intentional fallacy notwithstanding, it is my impression that DJT has learned, over the course of a long and storied career as a high-rolling grifter, that he is all but untouchable. He can mess with legal, to say nothing of normative, boundaries, in the manner of Sharpies on hurricane maps, pretty much with impunity. Legal processes are slow, cumbersome, and expensive, and with tenacity they can be reliably gamed, beaten, or quashed. A lesson learned at the knee of Uncle Roy.
Some no doubt disagree, but as I see it, the effort to overturn the 2020 election was nothing so much as an extension of that same persistence in gaming the legal system. The small matter of which candidate won the popular or Electoral College vote was a triviality, an irrelevant formality taken seriously only by little children and grownup fools, merely an initial stage in the real struggle for victory and power. We can argue over whether DJT knew the 2020 counts were valid and that he’d lost the votes or whether he convinced himself, against evidence backed by lost appeals, that he’d won, but either way he’d have behaved the same. He saw a perfectly (or close enough) legal (until proven otherwise; see above) path to moot the vote, so he took it.
Vis-à-vis Lambert’s fine and timely analysis of $TRUMP, the foregoing suggests that DJT is from the George W. Bush school of constitutional studies, i.e., the Constitution, like all law, is just a scrap of paper, to be ignored until forced into obedience. Who, pray tell, what institutions, will enforce, after the customary casuistry (and luxury benefices), the applicable constitutional limits? So here we are, among the crickets. To end on a cheerful note, Trump’s enthusiasm for scams may be welcome inasmuch as it leaves less time and appetite for the usual executive pastimes of ruling the world, the world, I say, haha! Greenland may suffice. With a few billion in $TRUMP, Donald can tell Miriam to go pound Gazan rubble. Besides, you can’t flaunt godlike wealth and power as a cinder. Accentuate the positive. (/s)
Has anyone tried to determine whether bitcoins or memecoins are inflationary? Isn’t this private money creation ex nihilo, which adds to the money supply without adding any real value or resources to the economy? Is this covered anywhere in Modern Monetary Theory (MMT)?
Depends on the implementation of the crypto currency. Bitcoin is designed to be deflationary, with production (“mining”) of it meant to slow down over time. I’d consider crypto currency and memecoins to be speculative asset classes.
I’m pretty sure the currency model is to be virtual gold, but I can’t be bothered to look up sources. What I do know is that the currency designers wanted to remove power/control over it from people like government officials or politicians (democratically elected or otherwise).
Thanks for your reply. Further thought: Let’s take as a given that bitcoins as a single currency have an artificial scarcity built in and can be considered as virtual gold. There are still no limits on creating other new bitcoin-like currencies: so the total is still unregulated.
And gold, itself, can be inflationary if large quantities suddenly go into circulation. An historical example: Mansa Musa, the 14th century king of Mali, caused inflation when he gave away large amounts of gold on his pilgrimage to Mecca.
I believe that is correct. There is a hard limit on Bitcoin at 21 million. Other coins have different characteristics.
However, if you look at the market dominance chart for BTC (e.g., CRYPTOCAP), you’ll see that it is around 60% and has been steadily moving up. The closest contender was Ethereum, whose star has faded somewhat.
Upshot: BTC will not suffer inflation, though it may collapse for other reasons.
Bitcoin is performing akin to Bizarro World hyperinflation.
Can create unlimited number of other crypto currencies. Then the question becomes who issues it? Who accepts it?
MMT describes a system where a national government issues a currency, and collects revenue in it – i.e. the source and sink of money.
Maybe the way to think about it is gold and silver. Gold would be Bitcoin, and silver would be some other crypto currency. Then, there is a huge new silver mine discovered. The equivalent of something in gold will change a lot less the equivalent in silver.
There already exists a Dogecoin, which issues 5 billion a year. It’s volatile but still worth something, even though it was created explicitly to show how stupid it all is.
Anyway, the question of inflation feels like a category error, because it’s not a currency.
The cryptobros thought they were paying Trump to turn crypto into a currency. He may have proven them wrong by embarrassing them in public by revealing the nature of crypto as a racket.
If Trump’s action leads to an eventual mass revulsion against crypto, to the point where Bitcoin itself goes to zero and stays there, then the joke will have been on the cryptobros.
One way to help that happen is to prevent any branch of any government, state, Federal or any other, from regulating crypto the least little bit. Let crypto be a Wild West and let it stay that way till it crashes and burns.
Can Trump use his $TRUMP to pay his fines?
Bwwaaaaaaaaaaahahahahahahahaaa!
#OMGWTFLOL
Also #TIL …
Wooooow … I mean … it’s amazing … the sheer magnitude of suckers ante-ing up …
… then again, maybe they’ve got wind of some scheme to have these sh**-coins backstopped by the Fed. Not likely methinks, but who am I to speculate … surely someone who can elicit billions from the billionaire-sucker class knows waaaaaaay more than I do.
Ha, thx, Lambert, I needed a good laugh. Not laughing at your reporting, but at the bizarro world that we now inhabit, which you report accurately and with clear recognition of the insanity around us. Didn’t somebody famous say something about History repeating as Farce?
I’m delighted to hear that the Techbros are freaked out about Trump taking one of their favorite scams (crypto-currency) and running it so far over the top that people will finally realize that the whole concept is moondust and green cheeze.
Of course, lotsa simple people (possibly including my MAGAt sister, bless her heart) will lose some money on this, which is sad, but as the kids say, I’m all outta fx to give for people so willfully ignorant.
And of course, it’s a big neon sign over our (once-great?) country advertising our Going Out Of Business Sale, but again, I’m outta fx to give about that, too.
I am curious about the statistics of who has wasted how much on these new Dunning-Krugerrands (though admittedly not curious enough to attempt the research). What’s the breakdown, in terms of how many people are in for how much?
Have 60 Million MAGAts each wasted $1K to show their love for Trump? or have 60 Zillionaires each “invested” $1B to influence Trump? Presumably, the small “investors” are far more numerous, but I’d bet that the dollar volume is skewed bigly toward the whales.
. . . ” [S]ome in the crypto world are reacting with horror at Trump’s decisionmaking. While they hoped that Trump’s administration would be crypto-friendly, they did not seem to anticipate that the Trump family would openly embrace some of the ecosystem’s worst parts to enrich themselves at everyone else’s expense.
(Again, I think the “worst parts” of crypto “ecosystem” are the “ecosystem” itself, but it’s telling that even true believers have problems with the grossness of Trump’s act.) And what on earth can Susie Wiles think? Or did she find out about it from Trump’s post? ” . . .
The crypto bros are only upset for the one single reason that Trump has exposed the true and only deepest nature of crypto and its supporters for all the world to see. The crypto bros are afraid that their sweet little racket stands exposed for what it is and that they might not get to make all the tradmoney they thought they would make by selling their crypto to all the greater fools. ( The crime-money launderers and movers will only get upset if indeed crypto disappears as a way to move crime-money and launder it).
I wish I had the time/energy/patience to research when I first made a referrence to President Musk my own self. I will claim that I was the first to use the referrence to President Musk as a non-joke deadly serious crowbar for driving President Musk and Trump apart from eachother in hopes of getting Trump to fire DOGE. But it didn’t work and it won’t work. Both Trump and President Musk have their eyes on the long-game prize. Trillions of dollars are at stake and for that kind of money Trump can swallow his pride for a while.
America itself has become a meme so it makes sense for the President to drop a memecoin. When $TRUMP replaces the USD as the national currency & Trump hits the red Presidential Rug Pull button >>>>>