World Liberty Financial, backed by Trump’s allies, appointed Tron founder Justin Sun as an advisor after HTX invested $30 million.
The Aave offshoot, World Liberty Financial, which is supported by the friends and family of President-elect Donald Trump, announced on Tuesday that it has appointed Justin Sun, the founder of Tron, as an advisor.
The announcement was made one day following the $30 million investment in World Liberty by HTX, the crypto exchange that was previously known as Huobi and is closely associated with Sun, as indicated by onchain data.
“We are thrilled to invest $30 million in World Liberty Financial @worldlibertyfi as its largest investor,” Sun said in a pinned post on X. “The U.S. is becoming the blockchain hub, and Bitcoin owes it to @realDonaldTrump! TRON is committed to making America great again and leading innovation. Let’s go!”
One of Trump’s most significant forays into the cryptosphere to date is World Liberty Financial, a decentralized lending platform that was established in September 2014. In recent months, the incoming U.S. president has aligned himself with crypto interests and signaled his intention to reduce the strict regulation of digital assets in the country, despite his previous skepticism.
The sale of World Liberity’s governance tokens has been a rocky start, despite the high level of anticipation. The project’s initial objective was to sell $300 million in tokens; however, it was reduced to $30 million in late October due to inadequate support.
World Liberty had only sold $21 million in WLFI tokens prior to Sun’s acquisition on Monday, as indicated by the most recent filings. The transaction was restricted to qualified U.S. investors and non-U.S. investors.
Tron is among the most significant blockchains in terms of market capitalization. The ERC-20 token standard was initially employed to establish TRX tokens, which were subsequently deployed on the native Tron network. On Tuesday, the token experienced a decline of approximately 4.6%.
World Liberty noted in its announcement that Sun graduated from the University of Pennsylvania, which is the alma mater of Trump, and recently acquired a conceptual artwork of a banana duct-taped to a wall for $6.2 million at a Sotheby’s auction.
Zak Folkman, the co-founder of World Liberty, observed that there have been “a number of similarly significant purchases” in recent weeks that are consistent with Sun’s investment. The firm’s intention to recruit additional advisors remains uncertain.
Tron representatives have been contacted by The Block in order to obtain a statement.
