“Purchase the dips!!!” Eric Trump, the son of the president, declared on the social media platform X, creatively replacing the letter B with the Bitcoin symbol.
The cryptocurrency sector has experienced a mixed landscape recently. The president and congressional supporters of crypto have committed to ushering in a new era for the industry, promising swift actions to establish supportive regulations. In the last few weeks, officials at the Securities and Exchange Commission have indicated intentions to ease enforcement measures against significant industry players, including Coinbase and Robinhood.
However, a significant breach of a leading cryptocurrency exchange—one of the most substantial thefts ever—and a major controversy involving Argentina’s president and a meme coin have exposed certain weaknesses in this still emerging industry.
Recently, the Dubai-based cryptocurrency exchange Bybit reported that it had fallen victim to a sophisticated cyberattack, resulting in the theft of approximately $1.5 billion in digital currency. Many cybersecurity experts suspect that North Korea, which has been implicated in several other high-profile crypto hacks, is behind this incident.
Argentine President Javier Milei is currently under investigation for his endorsement of a meme coin named LIBRA, which experienced a dramatic price surge before plummeting after Milei tweeted about it on X. He has since distanced himself from the coin and has denied any misconduct.
Meme coins are a particularly speculative category of cryptocurrency, often created as jokes and lacking intrinsic value, yet they can occasionally experience sharp price increases.
A developer involved with the LIBRA coin described meme coins as essentially a rigged system that mainly profits a select few at the cost of retail investors during a recent conversation with an independent reporter.
That developer, Hayden Davis, also disclosed his participation in the launch of First Lady Melania Trump’s meme coin just prior to her husband taking office. The Melania meme coin was trading around 90 cents on Tuesday, a significant drop from over $13 at its initial launch. The president had also helped introduce a meme coin just before he took office, which has experienced a similar price decline.
Solana, a significant cryptocurrency that plays a vital role in the meme coin market, has seen its value reduced by approximately half since Trump’s inauguration.
