Melania Trump, wife of United States President-elect Donald Trump and future son of the First Lady, launched her own $MELANIA coin early on January 20 (late Sunday, US time). The move caused her husband’s coin, $TRUMP, to briefly fall by 50%, attracting traffic from fans and crypto enthusiasts of the next president.
Melania Trump posted these announcements on social media as Trump was set to kick off a rally in Washington to celebrate his inauguration, declaring: “The official Melania Meme is live! You can buy $MELANIA now.
Melania tanks Donald Trump’s cryptocurrency by 50%
Notably, $MELANIA diverted investments from Melania Trump’s husband’s crypto offering, $TRUMP, whose value plunged 50%, according to reports.
Donald Trump’s token fell to $41 each, before rising again. At the time of writing, $TRUMP was trading at $47 with a market cap of $9.82 billion, an 83% jump from the previous day, according to data from Coinmarketcap.
$MELANIA was trading at $0.1702 apiece – a meteoric rise of 3,035.16 percent with a market capitalization of $7.31 million, as of 7 am on January 20 (IST).
Donald Trump pushes crypto at rally
Speaking at his rally, Trump called the moves “all investments,” adding that “Bitcoin has broken one record after another.” Thanks to the couple’s cryptocurrency coins, Trump could already be the richest man in the world.
According to CoinGecko, on paper, Trump tokens on the market had a total market value of nearly $13 billion before the launch of $MELANIA and were the 19th most valuable form of crypto in the world up until that time.
As for who owns the coins, Trump affiliates appear to control 800 million tokens in addition to the 200 million already released, which can unlock a potential of up to $51 billion, the CoinGecko report adds.
Reactions to $TRUMP and $MELANIA split
While crypto fans and enthusiasts have praised Donald Trump and his family’s “business acumen” with crypto decisions, critics have questioned the ethics and even conflicts of interest arising from the assets.
Trump has promised to usher in pro-crypto regulations and has nominated a host of pro-crypto names to serve in his administration.
(With contributions from agencies)
