World Liberty Wants WLFI Locked Beyond Trump’s Second Term—Investors Aren’t Thrilled

Investors eager to access $1.3 billion worth of tokens sold by World Liberty Financial have learned that capitalizing on the Trump-backed crypto venture will likely require years of patience, with a proposed vesting schedule that’s set to outlast the president’s second term.

In a governance proposal published by World Liberty on Wednesday, the project’s team outlined a four-year pathway that would unlock 17 billion WLFI for early supporters, which is subject to a two-year cliff and two-year vesting period that would begin once the measure is enacted.

The timeline is shorter than the one proposed for World Liberty’s founders, team members, advisors, and partners that would make 40 billion WLFI tradable over the course of five years. Meanwhile, that group would see 4.5 billion in allotted tokens removed from circulation.

The proposal says the unlocks for early supporters are designed in a “measured, predictable way that the broader market can anticipate,” while the voluntary removal of tokens provides an on-chain signal that the project’s most influential figures have conviction. 

World Liberty teased the vesting schedule last week after the team drew scrutiny for borrowing $75 million in stablecoins from Dolomite, a decentralized finance protocol co-founded by a World Liberty advisor, using 5 billion WLFI as collateral.

Still, some users within the project’s governance forum were blindsided by the vesting schedule, given that the project began accepting funds in October 2024—or around 550 days ago. “WTF,” one user wrote. “So, after a full three years, we’re finally getting our next token distribution.”

“I’m going to put these bastards in jail,” another threatened.

The bitterness was shared by Justin Sun, the controversial crypto entrepreneur and Tron founder, who described the proposal as a form of “tyranny” in a lengthy X post. He argued that the proposal’s vote is moot because it essentially punishes WLFI holders who oppose it, excludes individuals with massive holdings such as himself, and can be overwritten by those controlling World Liberty’s smart contracts. He also took issue with the fact that those controlling those smart contracts are purportedly anonymous, while investors needed to disclose personal information.

“This proposal is not governance,” Sun declared. “It is an exercise of power by the selected few who are carefully engineering a further power consolidation and property expropriation operation.”

Previously, investors who helped World Liberty raise $550 million during a public token sale last year didn’t know how or when they’d be able to completely access their WLFI. When the token became tradable in September, early supporters gained access to 20% of their holdings.

At the time, WLFI was valued at $0.23, according to CoinGecko. Since then, the token’s price has plunged 65% to about $0.08 on Wednesday, situated near an all-time low set last week.

Despite the token’s dramatic fall, it’s likely that World Liberty’s early supporters have still made a profit on paper. WLFI has said that investors participating in last year’s presale purchased swathes of tokens for as little as $0.015 or as much as $0.05 apiece.

With 80% of those early supporters’ tokens remaining locked, one user wrote that the “structure feels overly punitive and risks further eroding holder confidence.” They argued that the two-year blackout period before any tokens move does not provide holders with meaningful relief.

Sun’s remarks escalated a months-long conflict that boiled over in public this weekend after he accused World Liberty’s team of using investors as their “personal ATM” following the WLFI-backed loan.

The entrepreneur, who had invested $75 million in WLFI, accused World Liberty of embedding a secret backdoor into the token’s smart contracts, enabling it to be frozen. He called on the team to grant him control over tokens that World Liberty added to a blacklist in September. Not long before, Sun had conducted what he described as WLFI “deposit tests” on an exchange.

The proposal offered by World Liberty on Wednesday noted that holders need to accept the vesting schedule or their tokens will continue to be locked indefinitely. That process includes meeting “eligibility requirements determined to be necessary or advisable under applicable law.”

Because early supporters’ tokens would remain locked if the proposal failed to pass, one investor expressed concern that their participation was ultimately meaningless.

“There is no democracy,” they wrote. “The system is a joke.”