A UAE-backed investment vehicle has quietly agreed to buy almost half of World Liberty Financial, a cryptocurrency startup with ties to President Donald Trump, days before he returns to the White House, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal.
Aryam Investment 1, an Abu Dhabi company supported by Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan, signed an agreement to purchase 49% of shares in World Liberty Financial for USD 500 million in January 2025, the daily reports. he saidciting documents and people familiar with the case.
Half of that amount was paid upfront, the report found, sending $187 million to entities controlled by the Trump family, with additional tens of millions going to entities linked to the co-founders, including relatives of U.S. Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff.
Apparently the deal was signed by Eric Trump. The Journal reported that the deal was not publicly disclosed, even though World Liberty later revealed that the Trump family’s holdings had plummeted.
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Tahnoon’s ambitions grow after Trump’s election
Tahnoon, the brother of the president of the United Arab Emirates and the country’s national security adviser, has played a key role in Abu Dhabi’s quest to become a world leader in artificial intelligence. Under Biden, his efforts to secure advanced U.S.-made AI chips have been circumscribed due to concerns that sensitive technology could reach China, particularly through companies like G42.
After Trump’s election, these efforts gained momentum. Tahnoon met repeatedly with Trump and senior U.S. officials, and within months the administration pledged to provide the UAE with access to hundreds of thousands of advanced AI chips annually.
G42 executives helped run Aryam Investment 1 and took positions on World Liberty’s board as part of the deal, making Aryam the startup’s largest outside shareholder, The Journal reported. Weeks before the US-UAE chip structure was announced, another Tahnoon-led company, MGX, used the World Liberty stablecoin to complete a $2 billion investment in Binance.
World Liberty and the White House reportedly denied any wrongdoing. Spokespeople told the Journal that President Trump was not involved in the deal and that it provided no influence on U.S. policy.
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World Liberty faces calls for an investigation from the US
Last year, Democratic senators called on U.S. authorities to investigate alleged links between World Liberty Financial’s token sales and sanctioned foreign entities. In a November letter to the Departments of Justice and Treasury, Senators Elizabeth Warren and Jack Reed cited claims that WLFI governance tokens were purchased by blockchain addresses associated with North Korea’s Lazarus group, as well as entities linked to Russia and Iran.
Compounding the controversy is WLFI’s ownership structure, which gives entities affiliated with the Trump family control over the majority of token revenues. Lawmakers argue this creates a direct conflict of interest because most of the proceeds from token sales go to the president’s family.
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