Melania’s crypto launch sends Trump coin spiraling

Donald Trump’s meme coin took a nosedive after his wife, Melania, decided to hop on the crypto bandwagon with her own token. On Sunday (Jan. 19), the price of the $Trump coin more than halved before slowly bouncing back.

Melania announced her new crypto coin on X, writing: “The Official Melania Meme is live! You can buy $MELANIA now.”

The Official Melania Meme is live!

You can buy $MELANIA now.  https://t.co/8FXvlMBhVf

FUAfBo2jgks6gB4Z4LfZkqSZgzNucisEHqnNebaRxM1P pic.twitter.com/t2vYiahRn6

— MELANIA TRUMP (@MELANIATRUMP) January 19, 2025

The coin’s official website reveals that $MELANIA is a crypto asset powered by the Solana blockchain. However, just like its counterpart $Trump, disclaimers on both sites reiterate that the tokens are not designed to be investment opportunities or classified as securities. According to the site, the team are setting aside 35% of the supply for themselves, but it’ll all unlock in 13 months.

Currently, according to CoinMarketCap, $Trump has a market valuation of around $12 billion (£9.8 billion), while $Melania’s coin is valued at a still-impressive $1.7 billion.

Following the temporary crash of Trump’s own coin, The Kobeissi Letter analysts posted an image of the dramatic drop, writing: “Less than 48 hours ago, Donald Trump launched $trump which just erased $7.5bn in market cap in 10 minutes. In the minutes around the launch of Melania Trump’s token, we saw massive sell orders in $trump.

“This is insane.”

BREAKING: Donald Trump’s memecoin, $TRUMP, crashes over -40% as Melania Trump launches her own memecoin.

This is beyond insane. pic.twitter.com/6Oj2GGqjqF

— The Kobeissi Letter (@KobeissiLetter) January 19, 2025

The coin reportedly erased over $5 billion in market cap in a matter of seconds.

While crypto supporters have been enthusiastic about the $Trump coin, some users have criticized the release of another family member’s coin.

Trump just lost a huge chunk of my support. This is NOT a good look. It's not serious at all. What's next? $Junior, $Eric, $Kai and what not?

— Nicholas Jointson (@NickJointson) January 19, 2025

Dude we just wanted sensible crypto regulation.

Instead we got this

— FrugalBC (@BC_Kowalski) January 19, 2025

One user wrote on X: “Trump just lost a huge chunk of my support. This is NOT a good look. It’s not serious at all. What’s next? $Junior, $Eric, $Kai and what not?”

Another person added: “Dude we just wanted sensible crypto regulation. Instead we got this.”

On the campaign trail, Trump promised to shake up the crypto world by creating a strategic Bitcoin stockpile and appointing financial regulators with a more crypto-friendly outlook.

That fueled hopes he’d roll back some of the stricter regulations on the industry.

After his election victory, Bitcoin skyrocketed to an all-time high and is now trading at around $107,000, according to Coinbase.

Featured image: Grok

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