Trump family investing in bitcoin mining venture
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Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr. Photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Two of President Trump's sons are investing in a new bitcoin mining venture.
Why it matters: The deal further expands the first family's business interests in the crypto industry, even as President Trump continues to push favorable digital currency policies.
Driving the news: Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr. have inked a deal with the publicly traded bitcoin mining company Hut 8 to create the new company, American Bitcoin Corp.
- Hut 8 is contributing the computing infrastructure to power the mining operation, and will own 80% of the new venture.
- The rest of the company will be owned by an entity formed in February, which counts Eric and Donald Trump Jr. among its investors. That entity has been merged into and renamed as American Bitcoin.
Eric Trump, who was described as a co-founder of American Bitcoin, will serve as its chief strategy officer.
Zoom out: American Bitcoin is aiming to go public, and may collaborate with World Liberty Financial, a decentralized-finance project created recently by the Trump family, Eric Trump told the Wall Street Journal.
- The company plans not only to mine new bitcoin, but to create what it called a "strategic reserve," which would be separate from the U.S. strategic crypto reserve that President Trump established earlier this month in an executive order.
State of play: This is the third major crypto venture announced by the Trump family since President Trump's 180-degree turn to support the industry before the election.
- The president and his sons launched World Liberty Financial during the campaign; it just announced plans for a stablecoin last week. Regulation around stablecoins is currently being debated in Congress.
- Donald and Melania Trump launched a pair of meme coins just before the inauguration. Donald Trump's coin is set to release more supply in the coming month.
- All of those announcements follow Trump's prior launch of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) back in December 2022.
What we're watching: Bitcoin mining itself has been a highly lucrative venture in recent years, especially for larger-scale operations utilizing the most advanced mining machines.
- The business is also highly sensitive to energy prices and bitcoin price, two areas the president is able to influence through policy.
