A new digital assets venture promoted by Donald Trump is being shunned by much of the crypto industry, as executives fear the project will undermine efforts to rebuild trust with consumers after years of high- profile collapses and frauds.
The former US president and his three sons have been promoting World Liberty Financial, a crypto venture set up by his longtime business partners and others. The company began selling its token to qualified investors on Tuesday, aiming to raise $300mn. By Wednesday it had raised $12mn, selling 4 per cent of the 20bn available tokens.
However, the Trump family’s embrace of crypto has drawn widespread criticism from leading industry executives and analysts, who are worried about World Liberty’s ties to a candidate running for the US presidency, its unclear investor protections and the records of two of the executives running it. One of them previously ran classes teaching men how to pick up women and the other faced allegations of fraud and illegal drug sales.