What Is World Liberty Financial and Its USD1 Stablecoin?

World Liberty Financial is a decentralised finance project co-founded by US President Donald Trump and his sons. It has raised over $590 million in token sales, launched its own dollar-pegged stablecoin called USD1, and attracted billions in institutional investment from Abu Dhabi. It has also become the subject of multiple congressional investigations, a high-profile lawsuit from one of its biggest early backers, and a sustained debate over whether a sitting president's family should operate a crypto business at all.

Trump's connection to the project is financial rather than operational. He is listed as "co-founder emeritus" on the WLF website, a title the firm says reflects that he holds no active management role since taking office in January 2025. However, the Trump family receives 75% of net proceeds from WLFI token sales and a cut of stablecoin revenue. By December 2025 those arrangements had generated approximately $1 billion in proceeds for the family, with a further $3 billion in unsold tokens sitting on their books. Trump has also publicly promoted the project, appeared at WLF events before his inauguration, and declared personal income from it in official government filings. His three sons, Eric, Donald Jr. and Barron, are listed as co-founders and remain active in the venture's public profile. The day-to-day operation of the platform is run by Zach Witkoff and co-founders Chase Herro and Zak Folkman.

Here is everything you need to know.

What Is World Liberty Financial?

World Liberty Financial is an Ethereum-based DeFi project that describes itself as a platform to "keep the dollar digital" and provide loans for institutions and everyday users. It was announced in August 2024 and officially launched its governance token, WLFI, in October 2024. The project is built on multiple blockchains including Ethereum, Arbitrum and Berachain, and currently offers a lending and borrowing platform, a stablecoin, a cross-border payments product and a token bridge.

DeFi, short for decentralised finance, refers to financial services that operate on public blockchains without traditional intermediaries like banks. Users can lend, borrow and trade through smart contracts rather than going through a regulated institution. World Liberty Financial positions itself at the intersection of DeFi and traditional finance, using political branding and institutional distribution to target a different audience from most DeFi projects.

Who Runs It?

The project was co-founded by DeFi builders Chase Herro and Zak Folkman, who serve as day-to-day operators. Zach Witkoff, son of US special envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff, serves as CEO. President Trump's three sons, Eric, Donald Jr. and Barron, are listed as co-founders on the project's website.

President Trump himself is listed as "co-founder emeritus," a title the firm says reflects that he holds no role as director, officer or employee since taking office in January 2025. Steve Witkoff is also listed as co-founder emeritus. Despite those designations, the Trump family receives 75% of net proceeds from WLFI token sales and a share of stablecoin revenue. By December 2025, the family had received approximately $1 billion in proceeds from token sales while holding a further $3 billion in unsold tokens.

The WLFI Token

WLFI is World Liberty Financial's governance token, giving holders the right to participate in votes on the direction of the project. It does not entitle holders to a share of revenue or profits. World Liberty Financial raised $590 million from WLFI token sales, placing it among the ten largest crypto token raises in history. The token began trading publicly in September 2025, briefly pushing the Trump family's net worth up by around $6 billion in the hours after trading went live.

WLFI has since fallen sharply from its peak. As of late April 2026, it trades around $0.06, roughly 75% below its high, and has a market cap of approximately $3 billion. It is available on major exchanges including Binance, Coinbase and OKX. Justin Sun, the founder of the Tron blockchain, was one of the project's biggest early backers, investing at least $75 million in WLFI tokens before a public dispute with WLF management led to a lawsuit alleging fraud and the illegal freezing of his holdings.

USD1: The WLF Stablecoin

USD1 is World Liberty Financial's dollar-pegged stablecoin, launched in March 2025 and backed by US cash, government money market funds and other cash equivalents. It runs on Ethereum, BNB Chain, Solana, Tron and Plume Network. As of late April 2026, USD1 has a circulating supply of over $4.6 billion, making it the fifth-largest stablecoin by market cap globally, behind Tether's USDT, Circle's USDC, FDUSD and Ethena's USDe.

The token's rise has been rapid and politically charged. A $2 billion investment by Abu Dhabi-based firm MGX into Binance, announced in May 2025, was settled using USD1 as the official stablecoin, making it the largest stablecoin-settled transaction in crypto history at that time. The deal gave Binance a direct financial interest in maintaining USD1's peg, and gave World Liberty Financial an estimated $60-80 million in annual yield from the reserves backing those tokens.

World Liberty Markets: The Lending and Borrowing Platform

World Liberty Markets launched in January 2026 as the project's first live DeFi application, powered by yield protocol Dolomite. Users can supply assets including ETH, cbBTC, USDC, USDT and WLFI as collateral and borrow against them, with USD1 as the primary borrowing asset.

The platform attracted significant controversy in April 2026 when CoinDesk reported that World Liberty Financial had deposited 5 billion of its own WLFI tokens into Dolomite as collateral and borrowed approximately $75 million in stablecoins against them. The manoeuvre drained Dolomite's USD1 lending pool to a utilisation rate of around 93%, effectively locking retail depositors out of their funds while WLFI sat as the dominant borrower. The situation was compounded by the fact that Dolomite's co-founder is an adviser to World Liberty Financial, raising concerns about self-dealing. WLF said it had repaid $25 million of the position but the episode damaged confidence in the platform's governance.

The $500M UAE Deal and What It Revealed

In January 2026, the Wall Street Journal reported that Aryam Investment 1, a UAE firm controlled by Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan, had purchased a 49% stake in World Liberty Financial for $500 million in the days before Trump's inauguration. World Liberty Financial had not disclosed the deal publicly. The report also revealed that two affiliates of Tahnoon's company G42 had been quietly placed on WLF's board.

According to reporting cited in congressional letters, approximately $187 million of the deal's proceeds flowed to Trump family entities and $31 million to entities affiliated with the Witkoff family. Months after the deal closed, the Trump administration approved export licences for advanced AI chips to the UAE, licences the Biden administration had previously blocked over concerns about diversion to China. Critics including Senator Elizabeth Warren and Senator Chris Murphy described the chain of events as potential corruption, with Murphy warning of "potentially criminal conduct." Trump has said he has not followed the details of his crypto ventures' profits.

Controversies and Congressional Investigations

World Liberty Financial has attracted more congressional scrutiny than any other crypto venture in recent memory. Representative Ro Khanna formally launched an investigation into the UAE deal in February 2026, demanding records on ownership, payment flows, due diligence, conflict-of-interest policies and any communications relating to export controls or the later pardon of Binance founder Changpeng Zhao.

House Democrats have also requested that the Treasury provide all suspicious activity reports on WLF's digital asset projects. The GENIUS Act, which passed in July 2025 and created a federal framework for stablecoins, was itself caught up in political debate over whether the law effectively legitimised the Trump family's stablecoin business. A group of Democratic senators attempted to delay the legislation partly on those grounds before it passed. Beyond the political dimension, WLF has faced the Justin Sun lawsuit, a governance dispute over its April 2026 token holder proposal, and criticism over its delayed reserve reports for USD1.

The OCC Trust Bank Application

In January 2026, World Liberty Financial filed an application with the US Office of the Comptroller of the Currency to establish a national trust bank called World Liberty Trust Company. If approved, the entity would take over the issuance and redemption of USD1, manage the reserves backing outstanding tokens, and offer conversion and custody services, placing the entire stablecoin operation under direct federal supervision rather than the current state-licensed structure.

The application would allow WLF to manage reserves internally, removing its dependence on third-party custodians and potentially making USD1 more attractive to institutional clients through fee-free dollar-to-USD1 conversions. Several other crypto firms including Ripple and Circle have pursued similar regulatory paths. A decision from the OCC has not yet been announced, and the political complexity surrounding the Trump family's ownership of the applicant is without precedent in the OCC's history of trust bank applications.