May 23, 2025 2:04:46 pm

More than 200 wealthy crypto bros descended on Donald Trump’s Washington D.C. golf course on Thursday evening for a private dinner with the president. The White House kept the guest list a secret but many of the invited posted about the event on social media, showing off photos of Marine One landing and the massive ballroom filled with guests in black-tie. 

Video of his remarks were posted on social media by attendees. The dinner was hosted by the president’s cryptocurrency venture for the biggest holders of the $TRUMP meme coin. Trump pitched the value of the venture when he addressed the room.

‘A lot of sense in crypto, a lot of common sense,’ the president said.

Many of the investors in the cryptocurrency are foreign and it’s unclear what kind of background check they went through in order to be near the ballroom. Some had to navigate a sea of protesters outside of the club, walking through the shouting throngs on their way into the event. Inside, guests were greeted by a poster featuring Trump in a tux, his fist upheld in his classic fight stance, with the words ‘Fight Fight Fight’ written in gold.

The event was to thank investors for their $400 million investment in Trump’s memecoin. The official website for the dinner describes it as ‘the most exclusive invitation in the world.’ The average investor spent $1,788,994.42 to attend the dinner, according to an analysis by the blockchain analytics company Nansen given to NBC News. 

But the price of admission ranged from $55,000 to $37.7 million. The top seven winners each spent more than $10 million. The invitation also promised the 25 biggest investors special access to the president via a private reception and special White House tour.

‘FOR THE TOP 25 COIN HOLDERS, YOU are Invited to an Exclusive Reception before Dinner with YOUR FAVORITE PRESIDENT!,’ the website reads. ‘PLUS, We have separately by us arranged for a Special VIP Tour for you – so make sure you stay in town.’

Many of the guests were anonymous as they bought the currency through pseudonyms, registering with user names to make their purchases.

When it came to the evening’s attendees, an analysis by Bloomberg News showed that all but six of the top 25 holders who registered for the dinner used foreign exchanges that say they exclude customers living in the US. And at least 56% of the top holders used similar offshore exchanges. BY EMILY GOODIN for DM.

UPDATE 27/5 – APEX CORRUPTION: President Donald Trump’s family plans to drop a $3 billion investment into cryptocurrencies, including bitcoin, as it bets big on digital assets. The president has said he hopes to make the United States the ‘crypto capital of the world.’ 

Now his Trump Media & Technology Group plans to raise $2 billion in fresh equity by selling off its stock and another $1 billion via a convertible bond to invest heavily in the digital coin business, the Financial Times reported. 

The initial cash will come from about 50 institutional investors by selling roughly 58 million shares of the company. Then, those funds will be used to create one of the largest corporate reserves to invest in Bitcoin, giving the Trumps’ a a ‘bitcoin Treasury.’

Trump Media & Technology Group is behind the Truth Social app and President Trump is its largest shareholder. As president, his assets are in a blind trust managed by his family. The formal announcement of the new investment strategy came ahead of this week’s big meeting of crypto investors taking place in Las Vegas. Vice President JD Vance and Trump’s sons Don Jr and Eric are scheduled to speak. Trump’s crypto tsar David Sacks is also expected to attend.

The company said it is looking to diversify its revenue streams with a push into the financial sector. ‘We view Bitcoin as an apex instrument of financial freedom, and now Trump Media will hold cryptocurrency as a crucial part of our assets,’ Devin Nunes, the company’s chief executive officer, said in a statement. President Trump owns a little over 50 percent of Trump Media’s stock, making the approximately $2.7 billion stake one of his most valuable investments. 

The company went public a little over a year ago but has lost money ever since. Truth Social has generated just a few million dollars in advertising revenue – despite it being President Trump’s preferred social media platform. Last quarter, Trump Media recorded a $32 million loss on just $820,000 in revenue from advertising and other sources. 

The Trump family famously made its money in real estate, putting its mark on the New York City skyline and at Trump properties throughout the world.

But the family is diversifying and opened multiple beachheads in crypto, quickly gaining hundreds of millions of dollars. Those other crypto forays include Trump NFTs, a meme coin, a stake in a newly formed bitcoin producer called American Bitcoin and the cryptocurrency exchange World Liberty Financial. BY EMILY GOODIN for DM.

UPDATE 28/5 – FRAUD AND LOATHING IN LAS VEGAS: Vice President JD Vance leaned into the politics of Bitcoin during remarks at a conference in Las Vegas, casting the Trump administration as a “champion” and “ally” of the cryptocurrency industry.

“I’m here today to say loud and clear with President Trump, crypto finally has a champion and an ally in the White House,” the vice president said.

Vance also used his remarks to implore cryptocurrency supporters to show up for the 2026 midterm elections, making an ask to the crowd to “carry” their momentum “forward.”

“The first piece of advice, the first thing that I’d ask you, is to take the momentum of your political involvement in 2024 and carry it forward to 2026 and beyond,” he said.

The vice president railed against the Biden administration’s regulations of Bitcoin, saying the Trump White House would end the “weaponization of federal regulations.”

The crypto industry, created as a rejection of traditional finance, has long complained about being unfairly “debanked” as part of a coordinated federal effort. Banking regulators have disputed that narrative. Banks are required to ensure their clients comply with a maze of rules, and those lenders have to assess risk on a case-by-case basis. Crypto, in particular, raises red flags for traditional lenders because transactions are anonymous, making it especially useful for illicit transactions.

Vance also championed the firing of a Biden-era chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission, Gary Gensler, who was openly hostile toward crypto. In one of his first speeches as chair, he described crypto as an asset class that is “rife with fraud, scams, and abuse in certain applications.” His stern stance toward digital assets made him a frequent rhetorical punching bag for the crypto industry.

“Maybe the most important thing that we did for this community, we reject regulators and we fired Gary Gensler, and we’re gonna fire everybody like him,” Vance said. From CNN’s Samantha Waldenberg and Allison Morrow