Meme Coins have officially entered the halls of power.
Just a day before President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration as the 47th President of the United States, he and his wife, First Lady Melania Trump, launched their meme coins, Official Trump ($TRUMP) and Melanie Meme ($MELANIA), sparking a frenzy of reactions on Crypto Twitter.
$TRUMP soared to a fully diluted valuation (FDV) of $72 billion while $MELANIA surged over 12,000% within hours of launch, according to DexScreener data.
However, the meme coin got its start by siphoning liquidity from the broader crypto market, leaving Bitcoin (BTC) stable and altcoins are struggling to recover.
Popular coins such as Dogecoin (DOGE) and Shiba Inu (SHIB) have each slipped about 7% and 6%, respectively, over the past 24 hours, while Pepe’s piece (PEPE) experienced an even steeper decline, falling 12.6% according to CoinGecko data.
Amid the chaos, opinions varied wildly, from excitement over mass adoption to harsh criticism of ethics and execution.
Arthur Hayes, co-founder of BitMEX, rallied traders to push $TRUMP to a market cap of $100 billion. “Degens, let’s celebrate the emperor by sending his 100 Billy coin by Monday,” he said. wrote on X (formerly Twitter).
Bad move for crypto?
Others condemned the move as exploitative and unethical. Coffeezilla, a YouTuber known for exposing crypto scams, didn’t hold back:
“80% of tokens are given to insiders DURING the presidency… “should be” a crime, but crime is legal now, I guess?” he said, blasting the play itself makes its debut.
Alpha Prime Capital founder William Scythe accused Trump of prioritizing personal gain over public service:
“It’s a very sad day for America when the president realizes that he himself can scam people, going from the most anti-crypto to the crypto-maniac… by scamming his MAGA sect with the coin $TRUMP”, Scythian wrote.
Melania’s $MELANIA token faced even harsher backlash. Conor Grogan, Head of Product Trading Operations at Coinbase, noted:
“This token was managed by a less professional team…the creator’s wallet was funded via a Solana memecoin launchpad.”
For some, like Caitlin Long, CEO of Custodia Bank, the incident portends future regulatory changes:
“Well, one of the side effects of creating memes is that Trump now actually has an incentive to change the taxation of #crypto in the United States,” Long said. tweeted.
One step forward, two steps back
For others, this moment represented a step backwards:
“It’s not about integration. This is not education. This is not how we build a better future. We need to do better,” Gafoor Khan, co-founder of lending platform ZeroLend. wrote on X.
Many traders reflected on past warnings from SEC Chairman Gary Gensler. Pseudonymous crypto trader Ash Crypto tweeted: “I think we all have to say this: we’re sorry Gary Gensler, you were right, our space is a joke.”
Yet, amidst the chaos, Daan Crypto sounded a hopeful note about medium-term possibilities:
“I think the market could benefit more than you think in the coming weeks,” the crypto trader wrote. “Especially when something happens where they bring the Trump coin to multiple chains (including ETH), which would drive the entire market crazy.”
Edited by Sébastien Sinclair
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