Donald Trump’s Digital Trading Cards Are Tanking

Almost a week after Donald Trump launched his first set of NFTs in the form of digital “trading cards,” their value has increased and decreased dramatically within a matter of days.

The former president announced last Thursday that he was releasing digital trading cards to be sold as NFTs for $99 per image. This was the initial floor price, or the lowest price for a given NFT in a collection. After his announcement, interest peaked, and sales jumped.

According to the NFT marketplace OpenSea, Trump’s 45,000 digital cards sold out by Friday morning with around 14,000 people buying one or more online tokens. The NFTs brought in around $4.45 million with the creators earning 10 percent of every sale. By Saturday evening, Trump’s floor price skyrocketed from $99 to $990.

The value of these NFTs started taking a turn on Sunday. By the end of weekend, the daily trading of these cards amongst traders dropped by 57 percent with the floor price slumping down to $255. This is a 74 percent floor price drop.

Trump deciding to enter the NFT world was met with expected controversy for a number of reasons. The 45thpresident has been a known critique of NFTs expressing his disinterest in cryptocurrency in a Fox News interview back in December 2021.

"I never loved it [crypto] because I like to have the dollar,” said Trump during the interview. “I think the currency should be the dollar, so I was never a big fan but it's building up bigger and bigger and nobody's doing anything about it. I want a currency called the dollar, I don't want to have all of these others.”

It has also been alleged that Trump used stolen artwork in order to create the images. There is also skepticism surrounding 1,000 of the 45,000 tokens that were held back by the creators.

“The Apprentice” star is facing criticism in the NFT world and in the political arena from both sides of the aisle.

"I can't do this anymore," said conservative Steve Bannon and Trump’s former chief strategist on his podcast in regards to the trading cards. He also added that anyone involved in the project "ought to be fired today.”