Trump family venture accused of freezing out investors as value plummets
One of the largest stakeholders in the Trump family's crypto venture accused the company of bilking investors.
Crypto billionaire Justin Sun alleged that World Liberty Financial grants company officials with unilateral authority over user accounts – including the power to freeze them – and an independent analysis found the value of his personal stake in the company has shriveled while he's been locked out of his account, reported NBC News.
“I have always been an ardent supporter of President Trump and his crypto friendly policy,” Sun posted Monday on X. "[However,] this is the opposite of decentralization. This is a trap door marketed as an open door. I denounce the ongoing token scandals by the bad actors at WLFI.”
Sun claims his own account has been frozen since September, preventing him from selling his holdings, and the blockchain tracking group Bubblemaps found the value of that stake has declined by more than $80 million, to about $43 million, while he's been unable to access his account.
"I am the first and single largest victim, as a result of their wrongful blacklisting of my WLFI token wallet back in 2025, that violates basic investor rights and blockchain principles of fairness," Sun wrote on X.
"Every action taken by the WLFI team to extract fees from users, to secretly implant backdoor controls over user assets, to freeze investor funds without disclosure or due process, and to treat the crypto community as a personal ATM — all of these actions are illegitimate and were never authorized by any fair, transparent, or good-faith community governance process," the investor added.
World Liberty responded to Sun's claims with an apparent threat of a lawsuit and accused the crypto mogul of engaging in misconduct himself, alluding to a civil fraud lawsuit filed against him by the Securities and Exchange Commission in 2023 that he settled last month by agreeing to pay a $10 million fine.
"Does anyone still believe @justinsuntron?" WLFI posted on X. "Justin’s favorite move is playing the victim while making baseless allegations to cover up his own misconduct. Same playbook, different target. WLFI isn't the first. We have the contracts. We have the evidence. We have the truth. See you in court pal."
World Liberty was founded in 2024 – in the midst of Trump's third presidential campaign – by the president's three sons and lists him as co-founder emeritus, and the company lured investors with a promise to become a world leader in the crypto and decentralized finance space.
The value of the company's primary token, known as WLFI, has lost 74 percent, and was trading Monday at around 8 cents each, although its stablecoin, USD1, is among the 10 most heavily used stablecoins, which are crypto tokens set up to be traded on par with the U.S. dollar.
World Liberty borrowed $75 million from another crypto group, Dolomite, in February, using 5 percent of the entire supply of WLFI as collateral, and some investors expressed concern at the time about whether the company could repay the loan if the token continued to decline in value.
Company officials insisted last week that World Liberty was “nowhere near liquidation,” saying it would simply supply more collateral if the value continued to decline.
"We are one of the largest suppliers and borrowers on WLFI Markets. Yes, we supplied WLFI as collateral and borrowed stablecoins," WLFI posted on X. "No, we are nowhere near liquidation — and frankly, even if markets moved dramatically against us, we'd simply supply more collateral. That's not a risk. That's how this works."
However, crypto consultant Austin Campbell said concerns about the loan arrangement appear to be legitimate.
“If you took this conduct and translated it to traditional markets, you would have some problems,” said Campbell, an instructor at New York University.