In a revelation that has sent shockwaves through the corridors of financial power and caused several civil servants to choke on their Digestives, it emerges that the former and future (depending on which timeline you’re on) President of the United States, Donald J. Trump, has apparently raked in over one billion dollars from the digital casino known as cryptocurrency. Yes, the man who once claimed he knew more about the economy than anyone, except perhaps the waitress at Mar-a-Lago who gives him extra bacon, has now conjured a fortune from the ether. Or rather, from the blockchain. Or possibly from a combination of bravado, insider timing, and a magical ability to convince people that his face on a digital coin is worth actual money. The billion-dollar figure, reported by those tireless number-crunchers at the Financial Times, has sent UK financial regulators into a flurry of finger-wagging and calls for ‘tougher oversight.’ Because nothing says ‘we’ve got this under control’ like a bunch of middle-aged men in ill-fitting suits demanding more rules after the horse has not only bolted but has also bought the stable, turned it into a luxury condominium, and started charging rent.
Let us pause to savour the sheer, unadulterated absurdity. Donald Trump, a man whose business career has been a glorious symphony of bankruptcies, lawsuits, and the occasional steak, has now become a crypto tycoon. It is as if the universe, in a fit of pique, decided to give the keys to the candy store to the toddler with the biggest tantrum. His crypto portfolio, we are told, is worth over a billion. A billion dollars. That is more than the GDP of several small countries, or approximately the cost of building a single Trump-branded golf course that will inevitably bankrupt a local council. And what is his secret? Is it a complex understanding of decentralized finance? A prescient grasp of the volatility of digital assets? Or is it simply that he has the mystical ability to convince people that anything with his name on it is worth more than it actually is? Dear reader, I suspect the latter. The Trump brand is a testament to the power of sheer, unrelenting chutzpah. It is the same force that turned a New York real estate scion into a reality TV star, and then into a political messiah for the populist set. Now it has turned him into the King of Crypto, the Sultan of Satoshis, the Duke of Digital Gold.
Meanwhile, across the pond, our own financial regulators are wringing their hands and pronouncing that something must be done. The Financial Conduct Authority, that bastion of proactive oversight, has issued a statement expressing ‘deep concern’ about the lack of transparency in the crypto market. They have called for ‘tougher oversight’ and ‘greater regulatory alignment.’ This is the same Financial Conduct Authority that has been ‘deeply concerned’ about cryptocurrencies since approximately 2013, which is to say, they have been worried in a very British, passive-aggressive, let’s-write-a-strongly-worded-letter sort of way for over a decade. And what have they done in that time? They have issued warnings, created a regulatory sandbox (because nothing says tough regulation like a sandbox), and generally tutted a lot. Meanwhile, the crypto market has grown from a niche curiosity into a global financial juggernaut, and the biggest beneficiary appears to be a septuagenarian with a peculiar hair helmet. This is not a failure of regulation; it is a satire of regulation. It is as if the regulators are trying to catch a Formula One car with a butterfly net.
But let us not be too harsh on the regulators. After all, they are grappling with a beast that is inherently unregulatable. Cryptocurrency was designed to be a peer-to-peer, decentralized, anonymous system that operates outside the purview of governments and central banks. It is the digital equivalent of a speakeasy, except the bootleggers are now billionaires and the gin is replaced by volatile algorithms. To regulate it effectively would require a global coordinating body with more power than the UN, more tech savvy than a Silicon Valley startup, and more integrity than a Swiss bank account. In other words, it is impossible. So instead, we get calls for ‘tougher oversight’ which, in practice, will mean more paperwork for honest investors and slightly more sophisticated scams for the dishonest. The true genius of Trump’s crypto fortune is that it perfectly encapsulates the current state of finance: opaque, volatile, and utterly absurd. The billion dollars is not a sign of his business acumen; it is a sign that we have all lost our collective minds.
So, raise a glass of whatever you have (preferably gin, neat) to the new American dream. Forget the house with the white picket fence. Forget the 2.5 children and the dog. The new dream is to create a digital currency that is essentially a hype machine, attach your name to it, and wait for the suckers to make you a billionaire. And then have the regulators wring their hands and do precisely nothing. It is a beautiful, terrible, hilarious world we live in. And Donald Trump, the orange-faced oracle of the absurd, is laughing all the way to the blockchain.
