Trump-endorsed WLFI falls short of $300m target

World Liberty Financial, a decentralized finance project backed by the Trump family, has sold only 4% of its public token offering after technical glitches stalled its launch.

Within 24 hours of WLFI’s launch, the Trump-supported real-world asset protocol raised around $11 million by selling under 800 million tokens to investors. WLFI had planned to generate $300 million by selling 20 billion tokens, starting Tuesday, Oct. 15, but website issues and scammers impersonating WLFI initially marred the project’s launch.

Still, Etherscan data confirmed that thousands of investors flocked to the Trump-endorsed DeFi initiative. Despite a staggered start, 3,000 unique addresses scooped nearly 350 million WLFI coins in the first hour.

WLFI had around 9,300 token holders by the time of publishing, although the project had previously boasted 100,000 whitelisted investors pre-launch. Many may consider the debut lackluster, with the number of users regarded as unimpressive.

This year alone, multiple meme coins on blockchains like Solana (SOL) have raced to hundreds of millions in market cap within hours of launch.

The reasons for World Liberty Financial’s muted start are unclear, but clues may lie in WLFI’s token dynamics. WLFI coins are non-transferable, leaving little room for price discovery and on-chain speculation.

Instead, the governance token allows holders to lend, provide liquidity, and execute borrows, among other DeFi-related actions. World Liberty Financial joined Trump’s pro-crypto campaign trail after the former U.S. President seemingly embraced the industry he had previously criticized.

Less than a month before the election, the Republican candidate has shared plans to position the U.S. as the global crypto capital, create a national strategic Bitcoin (BTC) reserve, and support blockchain innovation.

While doubts persist, some view Trump’s possible victory as positive for cryptocurrencies. This outlook is reflected on social media and prediction markets like Polymarket.

As crypto.news reported, Trump gained his largest lead over Democratic pick Kamala Harris on Polymarket. The latest data from the Polygon-based betting platform showed that Trump’s odds of winning had extended further, with Trump at 59.5% versus Harris at 40.5%.