Why The Trump Org Applied For Trademarks Covering Items From Crypto Wallet To Virtual Cologne

Forbes Breaking News

Forbes Staff Writer Zach Everson joined "Forbes Newsroom" to discuss President Trump's crypto holdings.

Transcript

00:00Hi, everybody. I'm Brittany Lewis, a breaking news reporter here at Forbes. Joining me now

00:07is my Forbes colleague, staff writer Zach Everson. Zach, thanks so much for joining me.

00:13Thanks for having me. We've got another development in Trump crypto world to discuss.

00:17Exactly. You and I have talked a lot in detail about the Trump family's crypto ventures

00:22and their new ventures in the digital space as well. Today's conversation is just on that. I

00:28want to read your most recent headline. You wrote this, quote, Trump org applies for sweeping

00:33trademark covering items from crypto wallet to virtual clone. So first, to start off the

00:38conversation, talk to us about the application process here. How and why did they get this ball

00:43rolling? So I did a search recently on the Trump Trump for the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office

00:51just to see if there was anything new. And this one came up. So back in February, a LLC

00:58that is exclusively owned by Donald Trump through a web of other LLCs, other companies and a revocable

01:05trust filed a trademark application to apply Trump, which, you know, it's a trademark they have in a

01:10lot of other areas to dozens and dozens of products in the virtual realm. Doesn't mean they're

01:18necessarily going to launch all of these products, but it certainly gives you a insight into what they

01:22might be thinking about. The application is currently being reviewed. It takes about a year

01:27for a trademark to be processed, a trademark application to be processed all the way through

01:32if it does get approved. So we're just a few months into that period. Of course, they do not need to

01:37wait for a trademark to be approved before bringing your product to market.

01:41And so you found out what some of these virtual products are going to be, and some of them are like

01:46virtual footwear, virtual cologne. I am curious, I mean, is there a market for something like virtual

01:52cologne? Why would someone buy that? I mean, what's the appetite there?

01:56Well, we saw a lot of interest in virtual digital trading cards of Donald Trump. We put out those

02:02NFTs a couple years, starting a couple years ago. There's obviously the meme coin, which people threw

02:06hundreds of thousands of dollars at, you know, in part because it came with the very real world

02:11experience of getting to hang out with Donald Trump briefly at one of his clubs and possibly

02:16getting a White House tour. So they think there's a market for this. And to some extent, there is.

02:21You know, if you look at any sort of video games out there, a lot of them have digital things that

02:25you can pay real money to get an add on on the game. You know, if it's a game like Toko World or

02:30something like that, where if I get a little extra money, I can get a nicer piece of furniture. So

02:35there certainly does seem to be a market for that. The difference is, I don't think any of those other

02:42products are being marketed by a president of the United States.

02:47And now I want to talk about a crypto wallet, because in your headline, in your piece, you talk

02:52about how the Trump organization applied for the trademark that would cover a crypto wallet.

02:56So first, for the uninitiated, what exactly is a crypto wallet?

03:01A crypto wallet is a digital tool for storing cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, NFTs, other things

03:11along that lines. And you can, there are a couple different ways you can have it. You could actually

03:14have it where it is stored, like it's all online. It's kind of like a brokerage account. You know,

03:19if you had an account with Fidelity, it'd be similar to that. They take care of everything. You can access

03:23it through their website. You can also download an application for your own computer or phone where

03:28you would hold it that way. Or you can put it totally in cold storage, which is offline. You

03:34know, the equivalent of throwing a bunch of cash in your safe and hoping you remember the code to it.

03:38So that is what a crypto wallet is. There are several ways that they can make money off it. And

03:44you know, we don't know if the Trumps are going to launch this project or what any sort of fee

03:47structure would be. But in general, crypto wallets can make money by charging transaction fees,

03:53selling user data, selling add-ons. If it's a piece of hardware, you know, you charge for the

03:59initial product right there. Some of them even sell ads. So there's a whole variety of ways that

04:04money can be made by having a crypto wallet. So is the Trump organization planning to release

04:10a crypto wallet? Because there has been some reporting this week that caused quite a stir in

04:14this department. Yeah. It first, it looked like they may have actually already launched one.

04:20There's a really great independent journalist out there, Molly White, highly recommend people

04:24look at her citation needed newsletter. She focuses on crypto. And she reported that there was a new

04:30website out there, trumpwallet.com, that was taking signups for a waitlist for people to get access to

04:37this Trump crypto wallet. And the people involved with this looked to be pretty reputable, at least

04:42in the crypto industry. They, you know, it wasn't some sort of fly by night company. And it also

04:47looked to have the buy-in of Trump's official meme coin. It has its branding. It has its name.

04:52So, you know, she wrote an article on this saying, Hey, look what I found. This looks to be,

04:56you know, what we've got going on, that they are going to launch a crypto wallet.

04:59The Trumps then pushed back on that. Don Jr. and Eric both tweeted, We have nothing to do with this.

05:05Don Jr. added, though, that World Liberty Financial, the decentralized finance platform that he and his

05:12brothers and father are involved with does have plans to launch crypto wallet. So it sounds like a crypto

05:18wallet is in the works. We don't know exactly who it's going to be with. This, this crypto wallet that

05:25launched a couple days ago, the website with signups, it is still up. It still calls itself official. We don't

05:31really know if there was just some sort of miscommunication there. Maybe the people jumped the gun. Maybe they

05:35did it without the permission. Maybe they thought they had the permission, but really the Trumps are

05:39disputing that. Not quite clear, but was interesting on this trademark application. It was done from a

05:47LLC exclusively owned by Donald Trump. There was no mention on it at all of World Liberty Financial,

05:54his meme coin or Trump Media, which is the parent company of True Social. It is also discussed

06:00launching its own wallet. So this seems to be a completely different entity from any of those

06:05companies. So if we zoom out for a second and you look at all of these virtual items that the Trump

06:12organization is applying for a trademark for, I mean, does the president, let's say they do sell

06:18these items, does the president or can he profit from them if they're sold? Yeah, absolutely. The

06:25company that filed through this trademark is exclusively owned by him. It is in a revocable trust. He is the

06:33sole donor. He is the sole beneficiary. Dodd Jr. is the trustee. Trump can withdraw money from it at any

06:39time. And some of these items are specifically pegged to the presidency, it appears. You know,

06:45some of them aren't. Virtual cologne, nothing presidential about that whatsoever. But there

06:50were talks of virtual civics lessons, a virtual museum, and images and texts that were authorized by

06:57the 45th and 47th president of the United States that would be connected to an NFT. So I mean,

07:03they specifically mentioned the presidency in this trademark application.

07:08And so you and I have talked about how the Trump family is really expanding their crypto footprint,

07:14their digital footprint. I mean, when you look at this news about this trademark, I mean,

07:18how big is their digital empire really going to be?

07:22I mean, they've seriously had big plans. I mean, there were dozens of products out there

07:27ranging from, you know, stuff we didn't talk, virtual reality headsets, digital, virtual candy,

07:34virtual footwear. It looked in some areas like Trump University might get resurrected,

07:39that they were talks of all sorts of classes in hospitality, real estate, government service,

07:46civics. So this was a really wide ranging trademark application. They go, we don't know if they're

07:51actually going to do any of these, if they're just ideas that they're thinking about, if maybe they

07:55tried to file this as a defensive measure, so some other people wouldn't try to jump on that

07:59trademark. Not quite sure. But, you know, we are looking at a president whose net worth has doubled

08:05in the last couple of years based on his crypto and tech holdings. I believe we just valued his crypto

08:12the other day and worth about a billion dollars. So, you know, he has certainly found a way to make

08:17a lot of money for imaginary products. And so read the tea leaves here. I mean,

08:23what do you think this means? What do you think that this layer adds to the conversation that you

08:27and I really have been having for weeks, months now of President Trump being the first crypto

08:32president? He went from crypto skeptic to cryptic, crypto enthusiast. And now you're seeing his entire

08:38family really expanding their digital empire. What does this all indicate to you?

08:43Yeah, it's almost like he's become a crypto fetishist. I mean, it is just nonstop anything

08:49they can do to attach to the blockchain. You know, they've realized that they are getting

08:52very real money here for not having to provide, you know, real world sneakers or anything in the

08:59real world. I mean, this has just been a devolution of Trump's business where he started off in real

09:04estate, you know, very tangible. You can see Trump Tower to where it went to marketing. Okay,

09:09you can watch his show on TV, you might see his name applied to fill in the blank. And now it's

09:15just going to but you know, they were those are real products, you know, a Trump steak was something

09:19you could eat. There was a Trump fragrance, you actually could spray it on yourself. If you so

09:23chose. Now it's going down to a virtual cologne, you know, it is just an image of cologne that they

09:29would be selling if they do decide to launch that product. So, you know, it's no surprise that he's

09:34become much more bullish on crypto when he's realized there is a lot of money to be made in

09:38it and very little overhead.

09:41Well, Zach, per usual, love our conversations. Thanks for joining me.

09:45Yep. Thanks for having me back.

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