Trump holds a gala for the best investors in his meter play, while some criticisms slam the event like Pay-Pour-Play

Hundreds of best investors in the memes of cryptocurrency from President Donald Trump gathered Thursday for an exclusive dinner in black tie with the president – which certain criticisms condemn as a cheeky event by payment for the game intended to enrich the most powerful man in the world.

Among those who arrived at the event, there was Lamar Odom of the NBA and “Keeping Up with the Kardashians”, the cryptocurrency magnate Justin Sun and Kendall Davis, a cryptocurrency investor based in Austin, who told ABC News that he “came here to defend things in the crypto space”.

Two hundred and twenty cryptocurrency merchants, many of whom were overseas, pumped tens of millions of dollars in Trump’s memes play to be admitted to the gala thanks to a competition that gave invitations to the main investors-with at least some of the funds that flow directly into the trunks of the Trump family.

Promoted on the website of the play as “the most exclusive invitation in the world”, the sumptuous affair of the Trump private golf club in the north of Virginia on Thursday evening was titled by the president himself.

Critics of the gala, including certain republican legislators and defenders of the cryptocurrency industry, castigated the disposition as an opportunity for the president and his family to unwill his position of power.

Apart from the event, dozens of demonstrators – including Senator Jeff Merkley, D -ear. – were seen bearing signs that read: “America is not for sale”, “No King” and “Stop Trump’s Crypto Corruption” and singing slogans of a feeling similar to what the participants went to the site.

“It seems that Trump is selling access to the president through his meme piece, and this money goes directly to his pocket,” said Molly White, an engineer and crypto researcher who closely followed the various Cryptos from Trump. “”[Trump] Really use cryptocurrency to stimulate his personal wealth in a way that he had really not done before. “”

Trump’s meme – a type of digital currency which is often based on an internet – was launched in January, on the eve of its inauguration, and the value of the part immediately exceeded $ 75 per token. But the medal, known as $ Trump, has been a rushed drop in weeks that followed, in terms of approximately April to $ 7.

It was at this time that the gala was announced, supervised online as an “intimate private dinner” when the best investors of $ Trump “will hear the first -hand president Trump talking about the future of the crypto”. The 25 best investors, according to advertising, would also receive a “special VIP visit” and an exclusive reception with the president before dinner.

The next day, the value of the room went bankrupt by more than 55%. He then fluctuated while those who sought to obtain admission to the gala bought the medal and others seeking to take advantage of the media threw proceeded to the sale

While investors have jockey for a place on the company Online classificationOn Thursday, the first 220 collectively spent more than $ 140 million for a headquarters at the table, according to an analysis of the Nansen data analysis company.

Several investors have declared that the opportunity to rub shoulders with the commander -in -chief – and, in some cases, the promotion of their business in front of the most powerful man in the world – was worth the price of admission.

Cherry HSU, a frame of a blockchain startup based in Singapore called the same, said that the company’s co -founder, known online under the name of “ICE”, would attend the gala on behalf of the company after Memecore finished second in the competition. HSU told ABC News that “ice” was impatient to speak with Trump about “decentralization regulation balancing” in cryptocurrencies, and that their major investment in Trump’s memes play was directly linked to the opportunity to interact with the president.

“We want to sit next to Trump, if possible,” she said. “I think it will be interesting.”

Like “ICE”, most other participants in the gala remain wrapped in mystery – their identity hidden behind pseudonyms of three or four letters linked to their cryptocurrency wallets – and seems to be located outside the United States. According to the analysis of the non -profit research group from left abroad, at least 20 of main investors abroad are based abroad.

Among those who participated are an Australian entrepreneur, an cryptography enthusiast based in New York, and Justin Sun, a controversial Chinese crypto magnate that has negotiated deep business links with the Trump family. In addition to its several million dollars investment in $ Trump, Sun has also invested $ 75 million in World Liberty Financial, another cryptographic company supported by Trump. A month after this investment, the lawyers of the SEC under the Trump administration moved to interrupt an alleged fraud case against Sun.

On X, Sun wrote that it was “honored to support @potus” and “excited to connect with everyone, to speak crypto and to discuss the future of our industry” during the gala. Sun did not respond to ABC News information requests.

We don’t know exactly how much Trump takes advantage of his meme piece. Data analysts suggest that owners of the part, who include an LLC which has been fully owned by Trump, has probably already won millions of dollars in transaction costs. An estimate using data from the Flipside analysis company said Trump and its partners have made around 3 million dollars in transaction costs.

And although the Trump family and its partners may have benefited financially, most of Trump’s investors $ have lost. According to the report of the blockchain analysis company by CNBC Channel Data Analysis58 portfolios had made millions from their investments Trump corner on May 6 – while about 764,000 cryptographic wallets had lost money.

Another Nansen analysis suggests that more than 70% of token holders have undergone losses totaling about $ 21 million since Trump announced the gala competition, including an unidentified investor who lost $ 2.5 million.

Once skeptical Crypto, Trump has completely embraced cryptocurrency both for his personal activities and as part of the political platform of his administration, declaring himself the “president of cryptography” and launching a overhaul of the posture of regulation and application of the United States to digital currencies.

“The entire crypto application program at the EXCHANGE Commission Securities has been absolutely demolished,” said the former dry lawyer John Reed Stark, on ABC News’ this week with George Stephanopoulos earlier this month. “All the SEC surveys concerning the crypto have closed. All the disputes of the dry involving the rejected or arrested cryptography.”

As his administration has worked to promote cryptocurrencies, including the announcement of a national cryptocurrency reserve, Trump and his family have plunged into companies related to crypto in recent months.

In addition to the room even $ Trump, World Liberty Financial – the separate crypto venture launched by Trump’s two eldest wires – recently joined a 2 billion dollars trade agreement with an investment company supported by the state of Abu Dhabi and the Crypto Binance exchange platform.

Anna Kelly, a White House spokesman, denied that Trump’s personal incursions in the crypto represent an influence.

“The president strives to get good deals for the American people, not for themselves,” Kelly said in a statement. “President Trump acts only in the best interest of the American public – which is why they massively re -elected him to this office, despite years of lies and false accusations against him and his companies for false media.”

Thursday’s gala takes place in the context of a fight at the Congress on the first major legislation to regulate certain types of cryptocurrencies, called the Act on Engineering. Democrats threatened for weeks to derail the legislation, partially citing conflicts of the president’s potential interests. Some Republicans have also recognized the tangles of the Trump family in the cryptographic industry made “more difficult” legislation.

“This is the concern that some people have. I know he put his things in a blind trust,” said Jay O’Brien, Senator Cynthia Lummis, R-Wyo on Tuesday. “But their children are involved in these assets, and it’s still a break of people.”

Democrats have upgraded more severe criticism. Senator Elizabeth Warren, D, Mass., Called the Thursday gala “corruption in sight”.

“We don’t know if they get something in exchange for their big investment in Donald Trump personally,” she said.

Earlier this week, senators took a key step in the progress of the law on engineering law, but he still faces obstacles by adopting the complete Senate.

Allison Pecorin of ABC News contributed to this report.