News linked to both this project and an event.
According to The Block, bipartisan Senators Thom Tillis (Republican) and Ruben Gallego (Democrat) submitted a new ethics compromise proposal to the White House on Thursday morning local time, attempting to break the deadlock in advancing the Clarity Act cryptocurrency legislation. Currently, there is less than a week left until the Senate recesses on August 7, but the bill still has not obtained the 60 votes required for passage. Democrats insist on adding stricter ethics provisions to constrain the Trump family's crypto interests, including the Meme coins they issued and the World Liberty Financial project in which the family participates, while some Republican senators have objections to the stablecoin interest provisions, worrying that it will divert deposits from traditional banks to the crypto sector. Although the draft leaked last week prohibited public officials and their spouses from issuing digital assets, it did not cover other family members, and included a "sunset clause" expiring in January 2029, which critics believe essentially nullifies the entire ethics provision. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent subsequently blamed the Democrats on X, stating that they "chose political gaming on the verge of a major victory". The Crypto Innovation Committee (CCI) warned that if the bill fails to pass, the US will hand over its global leadership position in the field of crypto regulation.
Odaily President Trump will meet on Thursday with Republican Senators Bernie Moreno and Cynthia Lummis, along with White House crypto policy advisor Patrick Witt and White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, to focus on the ethics provisions in the CLARITY Act. These provisions are considered one of the main obstacles to advancing the crypto market structure bill.Kristin Smith, President of the Solana Policy Institute, stated, "The purpose of the meeting is to present some proposals on the ethics issue to Trump and hope to gain his support. I believe this is a very positive signal." She described the meeting as crucial for pushing the CLARITY Act through.Earlier, it was disclosed that Trump family-backed World Liberty Financial had received hundreds of millions of dollars in crypto-related revenue, raising concerns among Democrats about potential conflicts of interest. (The Block)
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent stated in an interview with CBS News that the recently disclosed revenue of approximately $1.4 billion earned by President Donald Trump through crypto projects poses no problem for the president. The financial disclosure shows that since the start of his second term, Trump has earned around $1.4 billion from crypto ventures, including the TRUMP meme coin and World Liberty Financial.Congressional Democrats have criticized this, arguing that there is a conflict of interest given that the current administration is seeking to ease cryptocurrency regulations. White House spokesperson Anna Kelly responded by stating that the disclosure reveals no conflict of interest. Additionally, Bessent expressed optimism about the U.S. economic outlook and noted that over 6 million Trump Accounts have been opened, a project aimed at helping minors invest in the stock market to improve financial literacy. (cbsnews)
U.S. President Trump’s newly released 927-page financial disclosure document reveals income including hundreds of millions of dollars in crypto-related earnings. Among these are millions of dollars in revenue linked to World Liberty Financial, the DeFi project launched by the Trump family in 2024. This disclosure has heightened the urgency of congressional negotiations over ethics provisions within the Clarity Act, the crypto market structure bill.Currently, bipartisan lawmakers are negotiating the Clarity Act, which aims to establish the first comprehensive federal crypto regulatory framework in the United States. A key focus of the negotiations is whether to include ethics restrictions preventing the President, Vice President, members of Congress, and other federal officials from profiting from digital assets while in office.Following the document's release, Democratic lawmakers reiterated that the bill must contain strict ethics clauses. Senator Angela Alsobrooks stated that such restrictions should apply to the President, Vice President, and all members of Congress. She noted that ordinary Americans should benefit from digital assets in a fair and honest manner, rather than allowing political figures to profit through corruption and institutional loopholes.Senator Kirsten Gillibrand also indicated that both parties are still advancing stringent ethics reforms, proposing to prohibit the President, Vice President, and lawmakers from using crypto assets for personal gain. Meanwhile, Elizabeth Warren argued that if the Clarity Act fails to prevent the President, members of Congress, and their families from profiting from the crypto industry, the bill would further fuel controversies surrounding Trump-related crypto corruption.Republicans, for their part, stated that ethics clauses remain part of the bipartisan negotiations. With the July window for advancing the Clarity Act approaching, the disclosure of Trump family crypto income could become a key variable influencing the final text of the bill and the level of Democratic support.
five Democratic senators urged a Republican committee chairman on Tuesday to immediately hold hearings to investigate a report that the UAE invested $500 million in the Trump family's crypto venture, World Liberty Financial.According to reports, an aide to the Abu Dhabi royal family signed an agreement four days before Trump's inauguration last year to purchase a 49% stake in World Liberty Financial for $500 million. An advance payment of $218 million has been made to entities linked to Trump and his Middle East diplomat, Steve Witkoff, and their families. The senators confirmed that the backer is UAE National Security Advisor Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan.Since Trump took office in January 2025, his administration has approved several deals favorable to the UAE, including a $1.4 billion weapons sale in May 2025 and authorization in November to sell 35,000 advanced AI chips worth over $1 billion to UAE-based G42. (financefeeds)
美国参议院民主党人敦促就特朗普家族加密公司 World Liberty Financial 与阿联酋达成的 5 亿美元投资协议举行听证会，质疑交易或影响国家安全决策。
Odaily, U.S. Senate Democrats have sent a letter to Republican leadership demanding an immediate hearing regarding the potential relationship between the Trump family's crypto project, World Liberty Financial, and the Abu Dhabi royal family.This follows a report by the Wall Street Journal that an investment entity backed by Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan, a member of the Abu Dhabi royal family, secretly acquired a 49% stake in World Liberty Financial. The project is a DeFi and stablecoin venture, with Donald Trump and his three sons listed as advisors.According to the report, the deal was signed by Eric Trump four days before Trump's presidential inauguration in January 2025. The transaction was valued at $500 million, half of which was paid upfront. Approximately $187 million flowed to entities controlled by the Trump family, while at least $31 million went to entities linked to the family of World Liberty co-founder Steve Witkoff. Witkoff was later appointed as the U.S. Special Envoy for the Middle East, and his son, Zach Witkoff, currently serves as CEO of World Liberty.The Trump side has stated that Trump was unaware of the $500 million investment and was not directly involved in the daily operations of World Liberty Financial. Democrats argue that the matter involves potential conflicts of interest between the president's family business interests, foreign capital, and government diplomatic roles, and have therefore called on the Republican-led Senate to launch an investigation as soon as possible.
World Liberty Financial, a crypto project backed by the Trump family, is expected to receive approval from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) to operate as a national trust bank in the near future. Two former OCC employees who spoke on condition of anonymity revealed that the application is almost certain to be approved.World Liberty Financial established a U.S. trust company in January of this year and submitted an application to the OCC. Obtaining a federal trust bank charter would allow the project to issue and redeem its USD1 stablecoin, manage reserves, provide digital asset custody, and offer conversion and settlement services under a single federal regulatory body, without relying on third-party intermediaries. Currently, the project's intermediary institution is BitGo. (The Block)
According to an official announcement, Gate has launched a limited-time USD1 staking program offering high yields. During the campaign period, users holding USD1 in their asset accounts (minimum holding requirement: 1 USD1) can earn up to 20% annualized yield. The annualized yield rate is adjusted daily based on the remaining monthly reward budget and the platform’s total effective USD1 holdings. The updated annualized yield rate is published daily around 14:00 (UTC+8). The system takes hourly snapshots of users’ USD1 balances to calculate the average holding amount for yield calculation. Yields are distributed to users’ asset accounts the following day. According to the announcement, USD1 is a U.S. dollar-pegged stablecoin issued by World Liberty Financial. It is fully collateralized by U.S. Treasury bills and cash equivalents, designed to maintain a stable 1:1 peg with the U.S. dollar. As a regulated, reserve-backed asset, USD1 delivers the same price stability as traditional cash—on-chain and in digital form.
Today, the U.S. House Financial Services Committee held a hearing with banking regulators, focusing on stablecoin rules and the banking license application of World Liberty Financial, a crypto venture associated with the U.S. President.During the hearing, Acting Comptroller of the Currency Jonathan Gould stated that the only political pressure the agency has felt regarding the decision to grant a banking license to World Liberty Financial came from Democrats, and he rejected allegations that the agency was following the President's directives. Additionally, FDIC Chairman Travis Hill indicated that the agency will soon propose a rule requiring stablecoin issuers to implement customer identification procedures. (coindesk)
World Liberty Financial (WLFI), a crypto project backed by the Trump family, stated that in light of recent updates to sanctions measures, the platform will continue to enforce risk-based sanctions compliance control mechanisms to fulfill legal and regulatory obligations in relevant jurisdictions.WLFI noted that transactions involving sanctioned individuals, entities, or related wallet addresses may be subject to enhanced scrutiny, rejection, restrictions, or other compliance measures. The platform reminds users that when transferring digital assets, they should ensure that the source of funds and original wallet addresses are not associated with sanctioned parties or prohibited activities.WLFI stated that if user transactions or accounts are affected during the compliance review process, its support team will assist users in completing the subsequent processing steps.
Bybit has officially launched its new “Hold USD1 to Earn Tokens” campaign. Users only need to complete Level 1 KYC verification and hold at least 1 USD1 in their Bybit account to share daily WLFI rewards—no subscription or lock-up required; rewards are earned simply by holding. The campaign begins on May 19, 2026, at 10:00 UTC. During the campaign period, users can earn up to a 20% annualized return and compete for a total reward pool of up to 45,000,000 WLFI—climbing the USD1 Holding Leaderboard. USD1 is a regulated stablecoin issued by World Liberty Financial, fully backed 1:1 by short-term U.S. Treasury securities and cash equivalents, and strictly pegged to the U.S. dollar. WLFI is the governance token of the World Liberty Financial ecosystem, enabling holders to participate in protocol governance and influence the ecosystem’s strategic direction. In this campaign, WLFI rewards will be distributed daily to USD1 holders on the Bybit platform. During the campaign, the system will take a snapshot of each user’s eligible USD1 balance once every hour—24 snapshots per day. WLFI rewards are expected to be credited to users’ main account funding wallets by approximately 06:00 UTC the following day.
According to The Block, Lee Reiners—a lecturer in law at Duke University and former examiner at the New York Federal Reserve—published a post on May 8 stating that WLFI, the governance token issued by the DeFi project World Liberty Financial—which is closely associated with the Trump family—may constitute an unregistered security. Reiners cited the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) recently released token classification framework, arguing that WLFI is not a “pure digital commodity” and therefore falls under SEC regulatory scrutiny. He contends that WLFI was publicly presold—approximately 25 billion tokens—prior to the protocol’s launch and was marketed leveraging the Trump family’s brand, leading buyers to reasonably expect profits—a key element of the SEC’s “Howey Test” for determining whether an asset qualifies as a security. Regarding decentralization claims, Reiners referenced litigation filed by Justin Sun, noting that World Liberty unilaterally froze Sun’s tokens and revoked his governance rights—revealing a high degree of centralized control. Additionally, he highlighted clear conflicts of interest: the project borrowed $75 million in stablecoins from the Dolomite protocol, using 5 billion WLFI tokens as collateral; notably, a co-founder of Dolomite also serves as an advisor to World Liberty, and part of the borrowed stablecoins flowed directly to World Liberty itself.
According to The Block, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand stated clearly on Wednesday at the Consensus Miami conference that she would not support the Cryptocurrency Market Structure Act unless it includes an ethics provision. She emphasized that members of Congress, the President, the Vice President, and senior executive branch officials must not profit from the industry by virtue of their insider status, bluntly declaring, “Without this provision, corruption will destroy this industry.” Previously, before the presidential inauguration, both Donald Trump and his wife launched meme coins. Their family-led DeFi and stablecoin project, World Liberty Financial, has also sparked widespread controversy. Bloomberg estimates that Trump has already earned at least $1.4 billion from cryptocurrency-related businesses.
According to The Block, Jaret Seiberg, Managing Director of the Washington Research Group at investment bank TD Cowen, stated that stablecoin yield issues are not the sole obstacle to the passage of the Clarity Act—and cited the following five additional hurdles: 1. A severe shortage of Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) commissioners: only Chairman Michael Selig remains in office, and the process to appoint new commissioners could take several months, while the bill must complete its review by the end of July; 2. Complex regulatory questions surrounding prediction markets—including concerns about insider trading and potential conflicts of interest involving the Trump family—which may prompt Democratic lawmakers to withdraw their support via related amendments; 3. Ongoing controversy surrounding World Liberty Financial, a cryptocurrency project affiliated with the Trump family, increasing political resistance from Democrats toward supporting the bill; 4. Reports indicating Iran is discussing requiring vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz to pay tolls in cryptocurrency—a development that could trigger contentious anti-money laundering (AML) amendments, potentially serving as a “poison pill” for the bill; 5. Risk that the Credit Card Competition Act could be attached to the Clarity Act, jeopardizing the entire bill’s progress. Regarding stablecoin yield issues, Senator Thom Tillis indicated that the Senate Banking Committee will not vote on the bill until as early as May. TD Cowen maintains its assessment that the bill has approximately a one-in-three chance of passing this year, while Galaxy Digital estimates the probability at roughly 50%.
Odaily News Investment bank TD Cowen stated that disagreements surrounding the "CLARITY Act" extend far beyond the issue of stablecoin revenue, with multiple practical obstacles potentially slowing down the legislative process.First, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission is understaffed, currently with only one commissioner in office. Under these circumstances, Congress is unlikely to confidently assign more cryptocurrency regulatory responsibilities to the agency, and filling the personnel vacancies alone would require several months.Second, the issue of prediction markets is heating up. Whether to include them under the bill's regulatory scope, along with potential concerns about insider trading and political conflicts of interest (including controversies related to Trump-affiliated projects), could cause some Democratic lawmakers to oppose the bill.Simultaneously, the ongoing controversy surrounding the Trump family's crypto project, World Liberty Financial, is also increasing the bill's political sensitivity, making bipartisan consensus more difficult to achieve.Geopolitics has also become a variable. Discussions regarding Iran's potential use of cryptocurrency payments are intensifying focus on anti-money laundering provisions and could even lead to the introduction of amendments unfavorable to the industry.Furthermore, some lawmakers are attempting to incorporate the "Credit Card Competition Act" into the bill. If pursued, this could trigger new conflicts of interest, further impeding the overall legislative progress.
In his response, Witkoff clarified the following points one by one: First, WLFI has absolutely no connection with the TRUMP meme coin—these two should not be conflated. Second, WLFI is unrelated to “fight fight fight” or CIC Digital. Third, early WLFI holders purchased the token at prices of $0.015 and $0.05, respectively; its current price stands at $0.08. Fourth, WLFI’s core product is not transaction fees, but rather the stablecoin USD1, which generates yield by holding U.S. Treasury securities. By both trading volume and market capitalization, USD1 is currently the world’s second-largest compliant stablecoin.