Trump’s $57M Haul, Ripple’s SEC Truce & SharpLink’s $463M Ethereum Gamble: The Week That Shook Crypto

Politics meets DeFi as a former president cashes in—while Ripple dodges a bullet and an obscure firm bets the farm on ETH.

Trump’s $57M windfall: Love him or hate him, the man knows how to monetize chaos. His crypto play netted a fortune—enough to buy a small country’s worth of MAGA hats.

Ripple’s SEC settlement: After years of legal trench warfare, the blockchain giant finally cut a deal. No admission of guilt, just a quiet exchange of paperwork—and a collective sigh of relief from XRP holders.

SharpLink’s $463M ETH move: Either the boldest bet of 2025 or proof that someone’s been mainlining hopium. A no-name firm just went all-in on Ethereum while traditional VCs were busy writing checks to AI startups.

Bottom line: In crypto, the outliers get rich while the ‘prudent’ investors are stuck explaining 2% bond yields to their clients. Place your bets.

Trump discloses crypto profits

• Last year, World Liberty Financial made $57.4 million for Trump.
• In addition to gold bar stakes worth $250,000 to $500,000, Trump’s personal cryptocurrency holdings are believed to be worth $1 million to $5 million.

Hoskinson proposes Cardano DeFi investment

• In order to boost the ecosystem’s native DeFi economy, the Cardano founder has proposed depositing $100 million in ADA (ADA) tokens from the Cardano Foundation’s treasury.
• The informal plan under consideration would involve purchasing assets including Bitcoin and Cardano-native stablecoins such as USDM, USDA, and IUSD.

SharpLink Gaming builds major Ethereum treasury

• The Minnesota-based affiliate marketing firm purchased 176,270.69 Ethereum (ETH) for approximately $463 million as part of its Ethereum treasury strategy.
• This acquisition positions SharpLink as the second-largest institutional Ethereum holder after the Ethereum Foundation.

SEC, Ripple, Solana

• The Securities and Exchange Commission and Ripple have jointly filed a motion in Manhattan federal court to dissolve the injunction and release the $125 million civil penalty currently held in escrow. Under the proposed arrangement, $50 million would go to the SEC while the remaining $75 million would be returned to Ripple.
• The SEC also asked issuers of proposed spot Solana (SOL) exchange-traded funds to update their S-1 filings. This request indicates the SEC is actively reviewing Solana ETF applications and moving toward potential authorization decisions.

Tether acquires stake in precious metals company

• The stablecoin and gold-backed token issuer has purchased about 31.9% of Elemental Altus Royalties Corp., a Canadian precious metals royalty corporation.
• Tether Investments undertook the transaction, the company’s linked but separate investment arm.

Strategy grabs headlines, again

• On Wednesday, the company began trading its STRD securities on the Nasdaq, which is properly known as the 10% Series A Perpetual Stride Preferred Stock.
• The new Bitcoin-backed preferred stock closed its debut day with a modest 0.24% gain.
• Meanwhile, the company paid $110.2 million for an additional 1,045 Bitcoin (BTC), which equates to an average price of $105,426 per Bitcoin.
• The acquisition brings Strategy’s total holdings to approximately 582,000 Bitcoin.

Ant Group plans stablecoin licenses in multiple jurisdictions

• The international unit of Alipay owner Ant Group intends to apply for stablecoin issuer licenses in Hong Kong and Singapore once regulatory frameworks take effect in August, according to Thursday’s Bloomberg report.
• The company also plans to pursue similar licensing in Luxembourg.

Pudgy Penguins partners with NASCAR

• The popular NFT collection announced Wednesday a partnership with NASCAR to bring the Pengu brand to racing fans worldwide.
• Few details were provided about the collaboration in the initial announcement on social media.

Stripe acquires crypto wallet provider Privy

• The payments giant has purchased Privy, a cryptocurrency wallet provider.
• Privy will remain an “independent product” while operating under Stripe’s umbrella, promising to “move faster, ship more, and serve you even better.”

Circle launches USDC on World blockchain

• The stablecoin issuer said on Wednesday that its USDC token has been deployed on OpenAI CEO Sam Altman’s World project.
• The launch follows Circle’s successful debut on the New York Stock Exchange through its highly anticipated public offering last week.

Nailwal becomes Polygon Foundation CEO

• Co-founder Sandeep Nailwal has officially assumed the CEO role at the Polygon (POL) Foundation.
• Nailwal, who launched the project in 2017 as Matic Network, will consolidate control and redirect focus toward AggLayer, Polygon’s cross-chain liquidity protocol.