UAE Official Holds 49% Stake in Trump Family's World Liberty Financial
World Liberty Financial (WLFI)
thehindu.com reports that World Liberty Financial, the crypto bank backed by Donald Trump’s family, has received conditional approval from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency to issue and safeguard its dollar-backed stablecoin, USD1. The Wall Street Journal identified Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed al Nahyan, the UAE’s national security adviser, as holding a 49% stake in the bank’s holding company, WLTC Holdings. This investment of $500 million was made in January 2025, just four days before Trump’s inauguration, with $263 million flowing to Trump family entities.
The Trump family retains a 38% stake through an affiliated entity, while CEO Zach Witkoff is the son of Trump’s West Asia envoy, Steve Witkoff. USD1 currently holds a market value of $4 billion, with backing dollars invested in U.S. Treasuries generating an estimated $150 million in annual interest. Trump’s stance on crypto has shifted significantly from his 2021 description of Bitcoin as a "scam" to his 2025 executive order creating a U.S. Strategic Bitcoin Reserve.
Financial disclosures reveal Trump earned over $1.4 billion from crypto ventures last year, including more than $500 million from World Liberty Financial. These developments have raised questions about conflicts of interest, as the President’s family benefits financially from policies set by his administration.
How the market reacted
Whalio's own Binance spot order flow for WLFI, measured when this story was written up on 29 August 2026. Not the outlet's figures.
WLFI is trading at $0.05780 with a 24-hour spot volume of $9,276,429 across 59,101 trades. The 24-hour buy ratio stands at 41.9%, indicating that buyers controlled less than half of the volume, while the 1-hour buy ratio dropped to 24.8%, suggesting immediate selling pressure. The 4-hour buy ratio of 44.6% shows a slight stabilization compared to the hourly data, but volume delta remains negative across all timeframes. Specifically, the 24-hour volume delta is -$1,482,921, meaning sellers outpaced buyers by that amount. The Cumulative Volume Delta (CVD) for the 24-hour close is -$337,223, confirming net selling pressure. Net buying occurred for only 9 of the last 24 hours, highlighting a market dominated by sellers.
The latest daily buy ratio of 43.5% sits at the 10th percentile of the last 322 days, against a median of 47.8% - weaker buying than most days.
Twenty-four hours later
What WLFI did over the 23 hours after the story broke. The market moves for its own reasons; this is what happened, not what the story caused.
Was that an ordinary day?
The same Binance spot measurements for WLFI, averaged over the days leading up to the story.
Over the preceding week, WLFI experienced a 7.5% price decline and saw volume at just 0.59 times its average. The 7-day average buy ratio was 47.3%, but the latest day fell 5.3 percentage points below that average. This week saw net buying on only 2 of 7 days, with a total volume delta of -$3,536,182. The current 24-hour buy ratio of 41.9% is lower than the weekly average of 47.3%, indicating that selling pressure is intensifying relative to the recent trend. This represents an unusual day for the coin, characterized by below-average volume and a shift toward net selling.