Nearly 1 million investors in Trump’s memecoin lost a collective $3.8 billion as he cashed in

Of the 1.48 million wallets that bought the $TRUMP memecoin since it launched just three days before Trump’s second inauguration last year, about 66%, or 988,905 wallets, had lost money by the end of June. According to data from blockchain analytics firm Nansen, the combined losses were $3.81 billion, reported the New York Times.

The losses are stark given that President Trump has claimed large profits from the token, which sports a picture of him with his fist in the air and the words “Fight, Fight, Fight,” in reference to the Butler, PA attempted assassination attempt in 2024. According to the president’s most recent financial disclosures, he had pocketed $636 million from the $TRUMP memecoin alone.

Trump Organization affiliates CIC Digital and Fight Fight Fight LLC own roughly 80% of the token supply, and Trump earns transaction fees each time the coin is bought or sold, according to CNN, meaning he profits regardless of whether the price rises or falls.

Trump also used his large social media presence to announce the coin in posts on both X and Truth Social when the coin launched last January.

“My NEW Official Trump Meme is HERE! It’s time to celebrate everything we stand for: WINNING! Join my very special Trump Community,” he wrote at the time.

But for his followers who put money into the token, the result has brought on less winning than expected. 

The Trump coin

The $TRUMP crypto is a memecoin, meaning its value isn’t tied to anything intrinsic. Because of this, the coin’s value can vary wildly. And indeed it has: the coin on Tuesday was trading at $1.68, down 97% from its all-time-high of $75.35.

While the coin’s own website says it is not an investment opportunity and is instead “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,” many investors bought the coin with the hope that it might surge in value during Trump’s presidency.

While major losses have hit retail investors, Trump, once a cryptocurrency skeptic, has seen his crypto businesses quickly become a major part of his financial empire. His latest financial disclosure, as required to be filed with the U.S. Office of Government Ethics, showed that his crypto earnings reached $1.4 billion last year, making up the majority of what Trump has earned since returning to office. 

Apart from his earnings from the $TRUMP coin, his companies also received $799 million from World Liberty Financial, the crypto venture he co-founded with his sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump. That sum included about $250 million from selling his interests in World Liberty Financial as well as more than $520 million from sales of another token, World Liberty Financial’s WLFI token, which has also plummeted more than 80% from its peak.

With the Trump memecoin, only fewer than 500,000 people actually made money, totaling $4 billion in gains, according to the Nansen report. Still, these gains represented mostly early buyers who got in during the first hours of trading, before the token surged and then crashed. The Nansen report said that the group who won on Trump’s memecoin “reflects a small number of early buyers capturing enormous gains while the broad retail majority absorbed the losses.”

This is a common dynamic with meme coins. While early buyers and insiders often profit when a coin takes off, retail investors who arrive later are often left with the steepest losses.

As for the White House, a spokesperson told the Associated Press that Trump is not involved in business decisions, and that “neither the President nor his family has ever engaged—or will ever engage—in conflicts of interest.”

The White House did not immediately respond to Fortune’s request for comment.