The Nation

07/10/2025

On June 26, a Dubai-based company called Aqua 1 Foundation announced a $100 million investment in World Liberty Financial, the crypto company closely affiliated with the families of President Donald Trump and Steve Witkoff, the Trump administration’s Middle East diplomatic envoy. As is typical for these kinds of deals, Aqua 1 was buying $100 million worth of $WLFI, a crypto token created by World Liberty Financial. According to the terms of the agreement between Trump and World Liberty Financial, Trump receives 75 percent of the revenue from token sales, meaning that the president was now possibly $75 million richer. And Aqua 1 Foundation—whose existence was completely unknown before it published its June 26 press release—had become one of the largest benefactors for Trump’s crypto businesses, outspending Tron founder Justin Sun, who put $75 million into $WLFI and about $19 million into $TRUMP, the president’s memecoin. (The Securities and Exchange Commission announced shortly after that purchase that it was pausing its multibillion-dollar fraud case against Sun.)

It’s unclear where the real money powering this deal originated. Cryptocurrency allows for a degree of discretion and pseudonymity, if not total privacy, in financial transactions. Someone can spin up a website and press release and send $80 million worth of crypto to the US president’s associates without leaving the couch. It’s possible that Aqua 1 Foundation is a real Emirati company, but it’s just as possible that it could be a front for any number of foreign financial or political interests seeking favors from Trump.