Melania Trump launches a memecoin of her own, tanking her husband's in the process

Tweet by Melania Trump: "The Official Melania Meme is live!

You can buy $MELANIA now.  

https://melaniameme.com
"

With a black and white photo of Melania Trump laughing, with her hands covering her mouthMelania Trump's tweet announcing the memecoin (attribution)
Before people had a chance to process the fact that the incoming president of the United States had just launched his own transparent crypto cash-grab, the soon-to-be First Lady did the same. Whoever is calling the Trump family's crypto shots seemed to think they could just follow the same playbook a second time and enjoy the same results, but the launch of the new token brought a sudden crash in the $TRUMP token value.

This is not Melania Trump's first foray into the crypto world. In December 2021, she launched her own line of NFTs — only to apparently wash trade them after a tepid response.

Meanwhile, some in the crypto world are reacting with horror at Trump's decisionmaking. While they hoped that Trump's administration would be crypto-friendly, they did not seem to anticipate that the Trump family would openly embrace some of the ecosystem's worst parts to enrich themselves at everyone else's expense.