A United Arab Emirates-backed investment vehicle has quietly agreed to buy half of World Liberty Financial, a cryptocurrency startup linked to President Donald Trump, just days before he returns to the White House, according to a Wall Street Journal report.
An Abu Dhabi entity backed by Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan signed a deal to buy a 49 percent stake in World Liberty Financial in January 2025 for $500 million, the Journal said, citing documents and people familiar with the matter.
According to the report, half of that amount went to entities controlled by the Trump family, $7,187 million, with additional tens of millions going to entities connected to the co-founders, including relatives of US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff.
The agreement was reportedly signed by Eric Trump. The Journal reported that the deal was not publicly disclosed, despite the revelation that the Trump family’s stake had declined sharply after the global release.
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After Trump’s election, Tahnoon’s ambitions increase
Tahun, brother of the UAE president and the country’s national security adviser, has been at the center of Abu Dhabi’s push to become a world leader in artificial intelligence. Under the Biden administration, its efforts to secure advanced US-made AI chips have been limited amid concerns that sensitive technology could reach China, particularly through companies like the G42.
After Trump’s election, these efforts gained momentum. Tahnoun met several times with Trump and senior US officials, and within months the administration committed to providing the UAE with access to hundreds of thousands of advanced AI chips annually.
The Journal reported that G42 executives helped manage Arum Investment 1 and received board seats at World Liberty as part of the deal, making Arum the startup’s largest outside shareholder. Weeks before the announcement of the US-UAE chip framework, another Tahnoon-led firm, MGX, used Global Liberty’s stablecoin to complete a $2 billion investment in Binance.
World Liberty and the White House have reportedly denied any wrongdoing. The spokesman told the Journal that President Trump was not involved in the deal and provided no influence on US policy.
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Global Liberty faces US investigation
Last year, Democratic senators called on US officials to investigate the global Liberty Financial’s alleged ties to token sales and sanctioned foreign actors. In a November 1 letter to the Departments of Justice and the Treasury, Senators Elizabeth Warren and Jack Reid cited claims that the WLFI governance token was purchased by blockchain addresses tied to North Korea’s Lazar Group, as well as Russian and Iranian-linked entities.
The dispute is exacerbated by WLFI’s ownership structure, which allows Trump family-linked entities to control the majority of the token. Lawmakers argue that this creates a direct conflict of interest, as the president’s family receives most of the proceeds from token sales.
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