TRON becomes WLFI strategic reserve: Strategic investments hidden above traffic

Author: Sissie

The cryptocurrency project World Liberty Financial (WLFI), supported by the Trump family, announced on January 20 that it has increased its holdings of cryptocurrency assets by over $88 million, including $32.81 million in WBTC, $37.47 million in ETH, $4.7 million in TRX (Tron), and various other cryptocurrencies. Among them, Tron became the first Chinese blockchain project included in its investment portfolio. Subsequently, WLFI has repeatedly increased its holdings of TRX.

Once the news was released, TRX rose for three consecutive days, with a cumulative increase of 10.94%. In addition to the traffic and funding effects brought by the "Trump effect," Sun Yuchen may be laying out a larger vision.

Becoming an Advisor to WLFI, Leveraging the "Trump Effect" Traffic Leverage

World Liberty Financial publicly announced that the project is driven by members of the Trump family (sons Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr.) and has received multiple endorsements from Trump himself on his official Twitter account. For instance, before and after the sale of WLFI tokens, Trump's official X account continuously posted promotional content for the token sale, leading the cryptocurrency community to view World Liberty Financial as a DeFi project personally supported by Trump.

On November 26, 2024, Sun Yuchen purchased 30 million WLFI tokens issued by World Liberty Financial through a wallet associated with Huobi. Subsequently, TRON DAO increased its investment in World Liberty Financial by $45 million, bringing its total investment to approximately $75 million. TRON DAO has become the largest investor in World Liberty Financial.

At the same time, Sun Yuchen became an advisor to the Trump family's cryptocurrency project WLFI. WLFI stated in its announcement, "Sun Yuchen's insights and experience will help us continue to innovate and grow." Sun Yuchen stated, "We have reached a cooperation with Trump, WLFI will also issue on the Tron network, and we will announce that TRX will be used as a reserve asset, with Huobi HTX launching it as soon as possible."

Returning to the evening of October 15, 2024, the WLFI token officially began public sale, with a total issuance of 100 billion tokens, planning to publicly sell 20 billion tokens at a price of $0.015 (equivalent to $300 million). However, the sales results after the WLFI token launch fell far short of expectations, with participation funds of less than $15 million. As of November 5, only 982 million WLFI tokens had been sold, raising just $14.73 million. The investments from Sun Yuchen and TRON DAO not only provided WLFI with the much-needed liquidity but also reignited market interest in the project. After the announcement, the WLFI token price surged over 50% in a short time, with trading volume reaching a historical high, estimated at $94 million by January 18. According to the World Liberty Financial white paper, this means the Trump family could receive $48 million.

Moreover, Sun Yuchen has fully grasped the "Trump effect." On January 18, Trump announced the launch of his personal official meme coin TRUMP (OFFICIAL TRUMP) on his social media account. On January 20, Trump's wife Melania also announced the issuance of her personal meme coin $MELANIA. Huobi HTX was one of the first centralized exchanges to seize the opportunity. Subsequently, the platform launched a major event where new users registering had the chance to receive airdrops of TRUMP and WLFI tokens, providing substantial benefits to users while continuously stimulating market participation enthusiasm. The Huobi HTX platform saw over 100,000 new registered users in a single day, gaining significant traffic benefits.

This wave of operations by the crypto president has certainly captured market attention and funds, and the biggest winner behind this momentum, besides the Trump family, is likely Sun Yuchen and TRON.

Business Collaboration, Opening New Incremental Opportunities in DeFi

The decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem of Tron is particularly prominent and has long been the largest circulation network for the popular stablecoin USDT, surpassing Bitcoin to become the most used payment blockchain, ultimately accounting for 31.5% of all transactions. TRON reached a peak of DeFi activity last year, with SunSwap being the most active decentralized exchange on the network. By August, SunSwap's monthly trading volume had climbed to 4 million transactions, 97% of which involved WTRX. From August to December, the total trading volume surged to 8.3 million transactions.

World Liberty Financial undoubtedly injected a strong boost into the DeFi track. The WLFI project was not hastily put together but was developed with sufficient legal compliance preparation to operate within the regulatory framework, especially with early arrangements for compliance. According to the new DeFi tax regulations proposed by the IRS in December 2024, it can be inferred that more systematic DeFi regulatory laws may be introduced in 2025, and the compliance of the DeFi industry could become a trend in cryptocurrency development in 2025.

The ecological cooperation between the two is beneficial for building the TRON payment system, as Sun Yuchen described TRON's vision in an interview with Mario Nawfal as a "decentralized SWIFT," stating, "The goal of Tron is to become the core settlement layer for global financial transactions, providing efficient and low-cost financial services for various institutions and individuals."

Business cooperation between the two has already begun to take shape. In November last year, World Liberty Financial announced it would adopt Chainlink's on-chain data and cross-chain interoperability standards. At the same time, World Liberty Financial will use Chainlink oracles built on Aave v3 instances on the Ethereum mainnet.

Chainlink's Data Feeds are the official oracle solution for TRON, and this collaboration provides a more stable and transparent data source for TRON's decentralized finance (DeFi) applications. Meanwhile, TRON has also participated in the Chainlink Scale program, further ensuring data reliability and operational compliance within the ecosystem.

Stepping onto the Political Stage, An Important Step Towards Globalization and Compliance

TRON, through its established non-profit organization "Digital Sovereignty Alliance" (DSA), became a sponsor of the cryptocurrency industry celebration event for Trump's and Vance's inauguration (Crypto Ball), and TRON representatives attended the presidential inauguration ceremony held on January 20. The close contact between TRON and the core of the U.S. government is also an important step for TRON to achieve globalization and compliance.

In 2023, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) sued Sun Yuchen for fraud related to cryptocurrency trading and for concealing payments made to celebrities to promote his company, with the case still under review. Sun Yuchen's investments undoubtedly have a positive impact on the outcome of this case.

Currently, Trump has fulfilled nine commitments to the cryptocurrency industry in his first week in office, signing multiple executive orders to ease regulations on the cryptocurrency industry. These actions indicate that Trump is fulfilling his campaign promises and is likely to introduce more crypto-friendly policies in the future.

In a more relaxed regulatory environment for cryptocurrencies, Sun Yuchen's strategic layout and innovative potential will be released to a greater extent. While expanding his cryptocurrency empire, as an advisor, he will also provide the Trump family with in-depth insights into the cryptocurrency market, helping to accelerate the development of the industry and promote positive changes in the entire cryptocurrency ecosystem.