Crypto-bros’ appetite for a seat at President Donald Trump’s “VIP reception” for investors in his bizarre memecoin appears to have cooled dramatically since last year.
Trump is set to host the Mar-a-Lago gala for holders of his controversial $TRUMP digital asset on Saturday, featuring speeches from the president himself, boxer Mike Tyson, and a senior executive from the top crypto firm Tether.
Almost 300 participants secured tickets through a competition, which required them to have bought a sufficient amount of the memecoin.
The 29 winners of top-tier access at the event held a median investment of just $539,000—an almost 84 percent drop on the $3.28 million investment they held ahead of the same event last year, according to analysis by the Financial Times.
“Many winners appear to have liquidated their $TRUMP holdings since the contest ended,” the newspaper writes, showing just how far interest in the digital asset has plummeted since its controversial launch last year.
The coin is thought to have lost 96 percent of its value from the peak it reached just one day after Trump’s inauguration, dragging it into a wider crash across holdings in memecoins, which have no real-world use and are designed purely for speculation and trading.
“Memecoins have gotten wrecked,” Austin Campbell, an adviser at crypto analysis firm Zero Knowledge consulting, told the FT. “The Trump brand is not enough of a carrot to elevate them.”
Accounts with the greatest amount of $TRUMP holdings between March 12 and April 14, apparently also qualified for “Trump Sneaker, Watch or Fragrances purchases,” with ticket winners also set to receive “a Trump fragrance, a ‘Fight Fight Fight Red Beauty Watch’, a commemorative trading card and a poster,” according to the newspaper.
Small print on the contest website notes Trump “may not be able to attend” and that organizers could cancel the event “for any reason.”
A group of Senate Democrats has apparently written to the event’s organizers requesting information on how the president and his family may stand to profit from the gala.
They’re not alone in those concerns. Ethics experts and former White House insiders have raised concerns over Trump’s foray into memecoins, citing potential conflict-of-interest between his office as president and business as a private citizen.
Anthony Scaramucci, who briefly served as director of comms during Trump’s first term, called $TRUMP “Idi Amin-level corruption.” Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren called last year’s memecoin event an “orgy of corruption.”
Trump and his family are widely believed to have doubled their wealth since he assumed office for the second time, with much of that boom driven by investments in the crypto sector, where Trump has consistently rolled back regulations since last January.
The Daily Beast has contacted the White House for comment on this story.
