Summary President Donald Trump has launched a crypto-coin, providing reassurance for US-based digital asset companies about crypto-friendly regulatory policies under his administration. OFFICIAL TRUMP has quickly achieved a top ten fully diluted market capitalization in less than three days of trading. While the coin's valuation is high, the Tokenomics of TRUMP are dubious, with no observable utility and a high level of dilution over just 3 years. The big winner here is Solana, which is the blockchain chosen by the President (and/or his team) for his official memecoin launch. President Donald Trump is back. If there have been any doubts about '47' overseeing crypto industry-friendly regulatory policy, US-based digital asset companies may have just been given the biggest reassurance an incoming President can possibly give before being inaugurated; the Trump team has officially launched a crypto coin. In less than three full days of trading, OFFICIAL TRUMP ($TRUMP) briefly achieved a top ten fully diluted market capitalization: $TRUMP (CoinMarketCap) At one point on January 19th, $TRUMP had a $72 billion fully diluted market cap. This made $TRUMP briefly the most valuable memecoin in the market and give the coin the 7th largest valuation of any coin. We're going to get into all of the reasons why you probably shouldn't buy this coin in a moment. But before we get to that, please remember that the barrier to entry for meme-coin creation is virtually nothing. Because of this, there are literally dozens of "TRUMP" coins that could be purchased rather than the 'official' coin if prospective buyers aren't careful: Other 'TRUMP' Coins (CoinMarketCap) One certainly wouldn't want to accidentally purchase 'trumpwifhat' - a derivative of dogwifhat ( WIF-USD ) - instead of OFFICIAL TRUMP; each of which uses TRUMP as the symbol. So if you're actually interested in plowing into a meme coin at a $72 billion fully diluted valuation, make sure you know the correct contract address before you incinerate your capital. TRUMP is Not An Investment Anyone looking at TRUMP as an investment opportunity should consider that President Trump's own disclosure overtly says that the coin should not be viewed as such: Trump Memes are intended to function as an expression of support for, and engagement with, the ideals and beliefs embodied by the symbol "$TRUMP" and the associated artwork, and are not intended to be, or to be the subject of, an investment opportunity, investment contract, or security of any type. So, now that we know TRUMP should not be viewed as an investment, we can dive into the supply dynamics and holder data. Tokenomics and Distribution As far as I can tell, there is no utility for TRUMP whatsoever. In the past, NFTs released by Trump have offered token holders potential perks or privileges when purchased at a certain scale; for instance, meet and greet opportunities. However, no such perks appear to exist for TRUMP holders. Thus, the inflation of TRUMP supply and its distribution will likely play a large role in how this coin performs over time: TRUMP Token Distribution (GetTrumpMemes.com) There are a total of 1 billion TRUMP coins, 800 million of which are owned by "creators and CIC Digital." President Trump has an ownership stake in CIC Digital, though it is unclear how much TRUMP he owns through that entity. Regardless, at an 80% token allocation to the creators and CIC Digital, TRUMP has one of the more dilutive coin distributions that I can recall seeing in this market. TRUMP Emission Schedule (GetTrumpMemes.com) To be sure, there have been other coins that have launched with 80% of supply in lockup, but I don't know if I can remember seeing one where the total supply is unlocked within 3 years. Furthermore, the lockup periods begin in just 3 months and the emission schedule appears to show circulating supply doubling within 12 months. Meaning, TRUMP dilution is going to be quite quick compared to some of the other coins that I've covered for Seeking Alpha in the past. Early Trading Data Through less than three full days of trading, interest in TRUMP has been robust. There has been over $52 billion in total transfer value of the TRUMP coin and $32.2 billion in DEX trading value. The coin has quickly scaled to over three quarters of a million total token holders. However, most of those holders have very small allocations based on the Top 20 holder data: TRUMP Holders (SolScan) Again, 80% of supply is locked for creators and CIC Digital. Another 4% or so is held cumulatively by various centralized exchanges like OKX and Kraken. We can see an absolutely enormous percentage of TRUMP is held by the top 20 addresses. 88.5% of the total coin supply is held by just 20 wallets. If it hasn't been deduced by the reader at this point already, I'll be overt; I wouldn't buy this coin with free money. Like TRUMP? Buy Solana The biggest winner here is perhaps Solana USD ( SOL-USD ). While there is certainly an argument to be made that $TRUMP is simply cannibalizing liquidity from all of the other memecoins on the Solana Blockchain, there is no question the coin launch is bringing fresh liquidity to Solana through the President's non-crypto native supports. The price of SOL has been a large out-performer on the launch of TRUMP. Rallying over 40% from the January 16th close in just 3 days, SOL has made a new all-time high at $295 as of January 19th. L1 P/F Ratios (Token Terminal) And at just 82x circulating fees, SOL is the second cheapest L1 blockchain gas token when viewed through the price to annualized fee ratio. So if all of this activity isn't totally off-putting, I think the right way to play President Trump's memecoin on Solana is simply buying Solana. Closing Thoughts I don't think that I've made it any real secret on Seeking Alpha or on my Substack newsletter that I'm generally not a fan of memecoins. In my opinion, there is an element of financial nihilism that is pervasive through most of the memecoin segment that I don't think has been helpful to broader sentiment about digital assets or public blockchains as a legitimately useful innovation. But I do think the broader implications of TRUMP are compelling. On one hand, we could look back at this moment 5 to 10 years from now and see a memecoin launch from a US President - and subsequently his wife as well - as a clear sign of a market top. On the other hand, we could look back at this moment 5 to 10 years from now and see it as the certification of progress in financial technology. Readers can place their own chips on that one. For me, TRUMP is untouchable and SOL is worth some long term speculative capital.
