WLFI eyes 1.5B raise for public token-holding company

World Liberty Financial, the Trump family’s crypto venture, is preparing a huge fundraising push to create a public company that will hold its WLFI tokens.

Bloomberg reported that the target is $1.5 billion, with major players in tech and crypto already being approached. Talks are moving fast, but the structure of the deal is still being worked out.

The company’s website lists Donald Trump as “co-founder emeritus.” Last year, it revealed plans for a crypto-lending app and launched USD1, a dollar-backed stablecoin. Funding so far has come from sales of WLFI, a token first created as a non-transferable governance asset. That token will soon be open for trading on public markets.

Trump-backed firm aims to join wave of crypto treasury companies

The plan would put World Liberty Financial in the middle of a surge in crypto treasury firms; companies that raise money to buy and hold tokens (mostly bitcoin and ether).

So far this year, these firms have announced about $79 billion in planned fundraising for Bitcoin purchases. A friendly U.S. regulatory climate has fueled the rush, but analysts warn the approach is riskier for less-liquid tokens like WLFI. Many previous ventures have entered markets through reverse takeovers of publicly listed shell companies.

Trump’s own policies have opened the door wider. Since returning to the White House, he has signed a law regulating U.S. dollar-backed stablecoins. His family has also moved deeper into the crypto sector, branching into mining and laying out plans for crypto ETFs.

Crypto firms and Wall Street prepare for battle over tokenized stocks

While the token plan develops, a much larger fight is brewing in U.S. markets. Major crypto platforms including Coinbase, Robinhood, and Kraken are aiming at the $62 trillion equity market. Their goal is to let investors trade tokenized versions of big-name stocks like Apple, Tesla, and JPMorgan Chase. These tokenized stocks could be traded globally at any hour, not just during market sessions.

This push could trigger the biggest regulatory overhaul of U.S. stock trading in decades. Changing the rules could place crypto companies at the top tier of financial services, but only if they can get past Wall Street’s resistance. Trump has been a key driver here too, putting industry-friendly figures into top regulatory roles. That move, combined with rising token prices, has boosted confidence across the sector.

Traditional financial institutions are not sitting back. Wall Street firms are lobbying the Securities and Exchange Commission to make sure new players meet the same standards, including SEC registration and investor protections. At the same time, some traditional firms are quietly accepting crypto as a hedge.

Tokenized stocks will need some level of regulatory clearance, and this is where the battle begins. A group of major Wall Street names, including Citadel Securities, controlled by GOP donor Ken Griffin, is warning against any regulatory “workaround” that would allow tokenized stocks under looser rules.

They argue the assets are essentially the same as traditional shares and that different treatment could create an uneven market and split trading systems.

If the World Liberty Financial deal goes through, it will land at the center of two major trends; the race for large-scale crypto treasuries and the push to break into equity markets with blockchain-based trading. The next steps will depend on how fast the $1.5 billion target can be reached, how the SEC responds to tokenized assets, and whether Wall Street’s traditional guard can hold off crypto’s expansion.

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