Crypto Community Reacts to Trump and Melania Meme Coins as Market Sinks

Meme coins have officially entered the halls of power.

Just a day before the inauguration of newly elected President Donald Trump as the 47th US President, he and his wife, First Lady Melania Trump, have dropped their meme coins, Official Trump ($TRUMP) and Melania Meme ($MELANIA), which sparked a wave of responses on Crypto Twitter.

$TRUMP climbed to a fully diluted valuation (FDV) of $72 billion, while $MELANIA rose more than 12,000% within hours of launch. DexScreener facts.

However, the meme coin debuts siphoning liquidity from the broader crypto market and leaves Bitcoin (BTC) stable and altcoins struggling to recover.

Popular meme coins like Dogecoin (DOGE) and Shiba Inu (SHIB) are down 7% and 6% each over the past 24 hours Pepe mint (PEPE) saw an even steeper decline, down 12.6% Coin gecko facts.

Amid the chaos, opinions varied widely – from excitement about mass adoption to sharp criticism of ethics and implementation.

Arthur Hayes, co-founder of BitMEX, called on traders to push $TRUMP to a $100 billion market cap. “Degens, let’s put the Emperor in the spotlight by sending his meme coin to 100 Billy on Monday,” he said wrote on X (formerly Twitter).

Bad move for crypto?

Others condemned the move as exploitative and unethical. Coffeezilla, a YouTuber known for exposing crypto scams, didn’t hold back:

“80% of tokens are owned by insiders DURING the presidency… “should” be a crime, but crime is legal now, I guess?” he said, explosive the meme coin debuts.

Alpha Prime Capital founder William Scythe accused Trump of prioritizing personal gain over public service:

“This is a very sad day for America when the president realizes that he himself can defraud people ranging from the most anti-crypto to a crypto maniac… who defrauds his MAGA cult with $TRUMP coins,” Scythe said . wrote.

Melania’s $MELANIA token suffered an even sharper setback. Conor Grogan, head of product operations at Coinbase, commented:

“This token was handled by a less professional team… the creator’s wallet was funded through a Solana memecoin launch pad.”

For some, like Caitlin Long, CEO of Custodia Bank, the incident hinted at future regulatory shifts:

“Well, one of the side effects of meme coining is that Trump now has a real incentive to change the taxation of #crypto in the US,” Long tweeted.

One step forward, two steps back

For others, the moment meant a step back:

“This is not onboarding. This is not education. This is not how we build a better future. We have to do better,” said Gafoor Khan, co-founder of lending platform ZeroLend wrote on X.

Many traders reflected about previous warnings from SEC Chairman Gary Gensler. Pseudonymous crypto trader Ash Crypto tweeted: “I think we all need to say this: We’re sorry Gary Gensler, you were right, our space is a joke.”

But amid the chaos, Daan Crypto made a hopeful comment about the medium-term possibilities:

“I think the market will enjoy this more than you think in the coming weeks,” the crypto trader wrote. “Especially if something happens where they bring the Trump coin to different chains (including ETH), which would make the entire market go crazy.”

Edited by Sebastian Sinclair