Talk of a huge Friday night shock. Republican Donald Trump’s social media accounts shared what appears to be an official Solana-based meme coin called TRUMP, just three days before he takes the oath of office to become the 47th president of the United States. The price of TRUMP jumped from a couple of cents to nearly $29 in less than 24 hours despite widespread skepticism on whether the token was actually Trump-backed or was just an elaborate hack to promote a pump-and-dump scam. Did Trump Really Just Launch A Solana Meme Coin? The first announcement on Friday appeared on Trump’s Truth Social platform, directing users to GetTrumpMemes, the project’s official website, to buy the TRUMP meme coin. A similar message was later posted on Trump’s X (formerly Twitter) account, touting $TRUMP as an “official” meme coin linked to President-elect Trump. “My NEW Official Trump Meme is HERE! It’s time to celebrate everything we stand for: WINNING! Join my very special Trump Community. GET YOUR TRUMP NOW,” the post read. My NEW Official Trump Meme is HERE! It’s time to celebrate everything we stand for: WINNING! Join my very special Trump Community. GET YOUR $TRUMP NOW. Go to https://t.co/GX3ZxT5xyq — Have Fun! pic.twitter.com/flIKYyfBrC — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 18, 2025 While some crypto commentators initially suspected an elaborate hack, the meme coin’s official website appears to have been “deployed almost identically to his previous NFT website,” pseudonymous blockchain sleuth cygaar observed . Additionally, the project seems to be associated with the same official Trump licensee behind his NFT collections, CIC Digital LLC. “Either this is the greatest cyber heist of all time, or this is legitimate,” he added. Trump’s posts regarding the TRUMP meme coin remained online as of press time. “I don’t like to tweet about coins, and in no way shape, or form is this a promotion,’ Slorg, a member of Jupiter’s Core Working Group posted on X. “But to keep people safe, this is the real Trump coin. We have approved it to the Jupiter strictlist.” Traders Bag Huge Profits In Hours TRUMP hit a market cap of almost $9 billion within hours of going live, stealing the spotlight from other popular meme coins like PEPE, SHIB, and Bonk. The token currently boasts a market cap of $4.47 billion. Notably, meme coin traders who bought $TRUMP early have raked in millions of dollars in paper gains. On-chain data from Lookonchain shows that a crypto user, “LeBron,” turned a $1 million USDC investment into more than $2 million by purchasing 4.52 million $TRUMP tokens just two minutes after Trump’s post. Another trader turned a $1.1 million investment into a staggering $70 million in the span of just four hours. The anonymous trader sold 1.35 million TRUMP for 3.7 million USDC, remaining with 4.62 million tokens worth $67.5 million.
