Ahead of Donald Trump’s inauguration, the launch of Official Trump ($TRUMP) on Friday evening created a market stir.
Backed by the President himself, TRUMP quickly gained value, reaching an overwhelming $15 billion market capitalization, briefly challenging established meme coins like PEPE and SHIB, and ranking 22 in the top cryptocurrencies by market cap.
TRUMP’s price peaked at $75 before dropping to $38 after announcing a second family token: the Melania meme coin, which surged to $13. The first later recovered slightly to trade under $60.
TRUMP’s crash alone accounted for $140 million of the liquidations, surpassing assets like SOL and DOGE but it sent shockwaves across the crypto market, with Bitcoin dropping from $106,000 to under $100,000 and altcoins like SOL, DOGE, ADA, and others losing 6-8%. Meme coins and smaller tokens saw even steeper declines.
The market turmoil triggered $1.2 billion in liquidations, with over 400,000 traders affected.
These token launches have drawn skepticism and harsh criticism from the crypto community, with many questioning the logic of releasing two competing tokens with misleading information. Bubblemaps, a blockchain analysis tool, revealed that 88% of MELANIA’s token supply is concentrated in a single wallet without multi-signature security.
JUST IN:
The bubble map of $MELANIA does NOT match the distribution on their website pic.twitter.com/Q734sd4ykJ — Bubblemaps (@bubblemaps) January 19, 2025
In addition to its questionable tokenomics, MELANIA’s execution appears rushed. Conor Grogan, Coinbase’s head of product business operations, noted suspicious activities tied to the wallet behind MELANIA, including trades on the memecoin launchpad Pump.fun. He commented:
My guess is that this token was handled by a different team than TRUMP’s. That one looks like professional market makers, this one honestly looks like a college kids
The family’s foray into cryptocurrency is not new, but this new approach has sparked debate about the ethics (or lack thereof) and outlook of promoting meme coins in such a rushed manner.
Some users don’t care, naturally, and see the tokens as just another way to capitalize on the family’s brand. But others view them as poorly planned and executed projects that prioritize insider gains over long-term value and may damage the industry’s perception in the long term.
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