Investors at least $4.7 billion underwater across Trump crypto ventures, Public Citizen says

Investors in cryptocurrency projects tied to President Donald Trump face at least $4.7 billion in losses, while Trump earned at least $1.4 billion from his crypto ventures in 2025, according to a report by advocacy group Public Citizen.

Public Citizen said the figure is largely made up of unrealized losses, meaning the assets have declined in value but have not necessarily been sold. The report also includes realized losses where trading data allowed them to be measured.

The largest estimate comes from TRUMP, a memecoin the President launched in January 2025, three days before his inauguration. The report estimated that about 1 million of roughly 1.6 million retail wallets that bought the token on decentralized exchanges were underwater by a combined $3.2 billion.

Only about $400 million of those losses had been realized through sales, Public Citizen said.

According to The Block's TRUMP price page, the memecoin reached an all-time high of $73.43 in January 2025 before falling to about $2.73 as of Friday. Public Citizen said the earliest buyers captured most of the gains, with wallets that purchased during the token’s first two days accounting for nearly 90% of gains among retail buyers. Meanwhile, Trump could have gained the most.

"Trump’s tokens were allocated to his company rather than purchased, and his other income from the meme coin came via licensing fees," the report said. "Neither required any capital investment from him, meaning his proceeds should be nearly all profit."

WLFI and Trump Media

Of the total estimated losses, World Liberty Financial accounts for at least another $1 billion. Public Citizen said the figure includes a roughly $1.04 billion paper loss at Nasdaq-listed AI Financial Corp., which acquired 7.28 billion WLFI tokens for about $1.46 billion in August 2025. The company's shares have fallen 91% since it partnered with World Liberty Financial, from $7.04 to $0.642.

Trump Media's bitcoin treasury accounts for another $450 million in paper losses. The company held 9,477 bitcoin as of June 30 that cost about $1.006 billion but were worth roughly $557 million, the report said.

Public Citizen also estimated at least $9.3 million in losses for buyers of three Trump Digital Trading Card collections. USD1 holders were assigned no investor losses because it has maintained its dollar peg.

Separately, Trump reported at least $1.4 billion in cryptocurrency-related income for 2025 in his latest financial disclosure.