Investor funds set ablaze as Trump-backed venture collapses spectacularly: report

A Donald Trump family crypto venture is collapsing into a fire sale —and taking investor money down with it, according to an exclusive new report from the Wall Street Journal. A year after the Trump's World Liberty Financial bought control of a small payments company, AI Financial is now in talks to sell its "core business" for a pittance: reportedly $15 million, the Journal reported Wednesday. "The deal has been a money loser for almost everyone except the Trumps," wrote reporter Angus Berwick. The deal represents a catastrophic failure for everyone involved except the Trumps , who have already extracted over half a billion dollars from the scheme, according to the report. "The potential sale would mark an abrupt reversal for a company that the Trump venture World Liberty Financial had promoted as key to its plans to turn into a serious industry contender, wrote Berwick, "harnessing dollar-based stablecoins to grow an international-payment business." Investors who poured money into AI Financial have seen their shares plummet over 90 percent, reducing the company's market value to just $80 million, the Journal reported. Meanwhile, President Trump disclosed last week that he personally earned over $1.4 billion during 2025 from his various crypto ventures "leading to an avalanche of complaints from Democrats that he was profiting from the presidency," Berwick wrote. World Liberty acquired a majority stake in the Nasdaq-listed company (formerly Alt5 Sigma) by paying with its own cryptocurrency, WLFI. AI Financial then raised an additional $750 million from outside investors specifically to buy more of World Liberty's digital tokens, the Journal noted. Problems arose when the Trump cryptocurrency lost 70 percent of its value since the deal, leaving AI Financial saddled with a worthless digital asset that's partly locked up and can't be sold, according to the report. According to the Journal, " AI Financial’s woes were set against the Trumps’ gain. The Trump family are entitled to 75 percent of the proceeds from World Liberty’s sale of WLFI tokens, meaning AI Financial’s purchase handed them about $540 million in cash. President Trump’s disclosure identified income of $527 million from WLFI token sales, though the form didn’t specify which sales these proceeds corresponded to."