Trump’s World Liberty Financial crypto project ‘100%’ not political, says Donald Trump Jr
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Mr Donald Trump Jr speaking at a panel session at the annual Token2049 crypto event held at Marina Bay Sands on Oct 1.
ST PHOTO: KUA CHEE SIONG
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SINGAPORE - The crypto venture backed by US President Donald Trump’s family is “100 per cent” not political, said his son Donald Trump Jr.
World Liberty Financial is not a political organisation, but a means to uphold US dollar hegemony in countries that oppose it, he said on Oct 1.
He was speaking at a panel session with World Liberty Financial chief executive Zach Witkoff at the annual Token2049 crypto event held at Marina Bay Sands.
“We’re going to do that and that’s going to maintain the dollar hegemony that’s allowed America to lead and have the power over the world that has kept so many places safe, sound and strong,” Mr Trump Jr said.
“I think it’s going to greatly benefit the world as people have started seeing the threat that America perhaps poses to them. These are not exactly great places – these are not exactly countries that have the rest of the world’s interests at heart.”
World Liberty Financial is a decentralised finance project launched in September 2024 by President Trump, his three sons and real estate tycoon Steve Witkoff, who is also the US leader’s envoy to the Middle East and father of Mr Zach Witkoff.
It has launched two tokens
“I think preserving that power of the dollar is a huge part of what stablecoins are going to be doing,” said Mr Trump Jr, who is the eldest son of the US President.
He also told the audience that the traditional finance system “was so broken” and “so undemocratised”.
“For so many years, we were just on top of a ponzi scheme... There’s nothing egalitarian about any of these systems. So what we did was utilise our platform and capital and partnered with our long-term friends who really knew the space – we said there’s a better way to do this, not just for us, but for everyone,” he said.
“So we truly believe that (crypto) is the future of finance.”
WLFI was trading at about US$0.20 on exchanges such as Binance, Bybit and Coinbase on Oct 1.
According to the BBC, President Trump holds about 15.75 billion WLFI tokens worth more than US$3 billion, making crypto the most significant source of his fortune.
The Trumps also collectively control just under a quarter of the roughly 100 billion WLFI coins created in 2024, giving them claim to holdings worth about US$20 billion at Oct 1 prices.
At the panel session, Mr Witkoff said World Liberty Financial has plans to launch a debit card.
“We are definitely rolling out a debit card that’ll bridge... crypto assets with everyday spending,” he said.
“We’ll be rolling out a pilot programme here in the next quarter and that debit card will either be live the fourth quarter (in 2025) or the first quarter of 2026.
Mr Witkoff also said that World Liberty Financial is “actively thinking” about tokenising assets like real estate and oil and gas.
“Commodities are a really interesting area for us, whether it be oil, gas, even things like cotton, timber – all of those things frankly should be traded on-chain,” he said.
