"Brazenly self-enriching": How Trump's wealth has almost tripled

 

US President Donald Trump has almost tripled his wealth since taking office a little over a year ago, largely due to investments in his family's Bitcoin businesses.

Economist Steve Rattner discussed how Trump's net worth has skyrocketed from $US2.34 billion ($A3.25 billion) in 2024 to a projected $US6.5 billion ($A9.02 billion) in 2026 during an appearance on the new US cable TV station MS NOW (previously MSNBC) late last week.

Where did the funds originate? He and his family made $4 billion in earnings, according to Rattner.

US$3 billion of it came from cryptocurrency, and I will tell you, there are so many transactions and structures here that trying to understand them made my head hurt.

Apart from the cryptocurrency endeavors, Rattner cited Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner's ability to raise funds from Middle Eastern investors through his investment firm Affinity Partners, as well as the money he received from lawsuits against various media companies and increased revenue from raising admission fees to his Mar-a-Lago resort.

The Trump meme coin's finances were then detailed by Rattner, who compared the transaction to investing in a pet rock, but you do not even get a rock.

He sold them for US$7 at first, and it increased to US$45. It crashed, which was not unusual, according to Rattner.

Rattner, however, claimed that early cryptocurrency investors, whom he referred to as "whale wallets," made significant profits from the endeavor by purchasing a huge quantity of Trump coins and subsequently reselling them to individual investors. Soon after the coin's debut, its value plummeted, leaving those investors in the dark.

He emphasized, It is not like [the ordinary investors] got anything.

In essence, all they received was a brief email or message that said, Congratulations, you own 10 Trump meme coins. However, there is little they can do about it. They were purchasing air rather than something.

Additionally, Rattner pointed out that Trump received $600 million in trading fees from investors who used the coin to conduct trades.

Rattner shared a picture of a graph he created to show the increase in Trump's fortune over the previous two years on social media following his MS NOW visit.

Rattner declared, [Trump's] government is the most blatantly self-enriching in American history.