Crypto mogul Justin Sun is — unsurprisingly — making another controversial investment decision, and this time, we wish it were just an overpriced fruit duct-taped to a wall.
Last Wednesday, July 9, the notorious buyer of Maurizio Cattelan’s “Comedian” (2019) announced that he is purchasing $100 million worth of President Donald Trump’s cryptocurrency token, $TRUMP. Already the largest holder of the so-called “meme coin” — a novelty coin with no intrinsic value — Sun boasted on X that the purchase underscores his “belief in collaborating across ecosystems to grow the crypto landscape.” Sun is the founder of Tron, a blockchain that recently added the Trump meme coin to its list of supported tokens.
“$TRUMP on #TRON is the currency of #MAGA!” the Hong Kong-based billionaire signed off.
The steep investments in Trump’s yellow-haired token, which earned Sun a seat at a May dinner held at Trump’s private golf club, are just his latest moves to cozy up to the president and his wallet. In November 2024 and January 2025, Sun spent a total of $75 million on $WLFI coins — digital tokens traded on the cryptocurrency firm World Liberty Financial, which is largely owned by a Trump family corporate entity, a New York Times investigation found.
Notably, all of these purchases have been made while Sun appears to still be mired in a civil fraud case brought against him by the Securities and Exchange Commission in 2023. But civil fraud isn’t Sun’s only legal entanglement. Earlier this year, the business executive sued DreamWorks billionaire David Geffen over a $78.4 million Alberto Giacometti sculpture, alleging that it had been sold without his permission. Denying Sun’s claims, Geffen filed a 100-page countersuit in April, calling the original lawsuit a “sham.” The legal battle is still ongoing.
Trump’s launch of the meme coin ahead of his inauguration in January sparked concerns and accusations of corruption from ethics watchdogs. Though a Trump family company manages the coin, the May gala dinner, which required a buy-in, was advertised as an opportunity to hear first-hand from the “Crypto President.” Meanwhile, Republican lawmakers are pushing to advance legislation that House Financial Services Committee ranking member Maxine Waters said would “make Congress complicit in Trump’s unprecedented crypto scam.”
