Donald Trump's World Liberty Financial Plans Mulls Stablecoin Launch

Donald Trump's crypto project, World Liberty Financial, is planning to launch its own stablecoin.

The project has reportedly raised $14 million to develop and launch the US dollar-pegged token. World Liberty Financial is currently working on how to make the product safe for the market.

Earlier this month, World Liberty Financial announced that Paxos co-founder Rich Teo would lead the project’s stablecoin. Paxos powers the stablecoins Pax Dollar (USDP) and PayPal USD (PYUSD), which launched just a few weeks ago.

World Liberty Financial describes itself as "a movement to help secure the future of the US dollar in a digital world, without succumbing to the centralized control of CBDCs."

The project drew in $220 million in sales of its WLFI token within the first hour of its launch. At the time of writing, 956.23 million tokens have been sold with 19.044 billion remaining.

According to recent reports, there has been a recent record surge in the number of stablecoin transactions. Stablecoin liquidity surged to an all-time high of $169 billion at the end of last month, reflecting a 31% growth since the beginning of the year.

However, launching a new stablecoin requires partnerships with exchanges like Coinbase and Binance. Trump’s re-election could position him advantageously, as both exchanges are facing SEC lawsuits - although Trump did pledge to remove Gary Gensler from his position if he were to be elected.

Tether, the market leader in stablecoins, partnered with Cantor Fitzgerald, which serves as a custodian. Cantor's CEO, Howard Lutnick, co-chairs Trump’s transition team.

Tether's USDT has maintained its leading position, with its market cap expanding by $28 billion to nearly $120 billion since the start of the year, representing 71% of the market.

As the world’s most traded cryptocurrency, Tether sees about $190 billion traded daily. For the first half of 2024 alone, Tether revealed record-breaking profits, with a staggering $5.2 billion in earnings.

That said, according to the Wall Street Journal, the US federal government is investigating Tether for allegedly violating sanctions and anti-money laundering laws.

Specifically, prosecutors in Manhattan are probing whether Tether has been used to support illegal activities like drug trafficking, terrorism, or hacking.