Morning Minute: Trump Family Expands Crypto Empire With CRO

Morning Minute is a daily newsletter written by Tyler Warner. The analysis and opinions expressed are his own and do not necessarily reflect those of Decrypt. Subscribe to the Morning Minute on Substack.

GM!

Today’s top news:

• Crypto majors continue rebound, SOL leads; BTC at nearly $113,000
• Solana DeFi TVL reclaims ATH of $11.76B not seen since January
• CRO token soars 160% in 2 days following Trump Media treasury news
• PUMP jumps 9% after team discloses $10M+ in buybacks last week
• OpenSea introduces its onchain copilot ‘OpenSea MCP’

🏛️ Trump Family Expands Crypto Empire With CRO

The Trump family is getting their hands into even more crypto pockets.

The market likes it (at least for now)…

📌 What Happened

Trump Media, in partnership with Crypto.com, announced plans to build a $6.4B Cronos (CRO) treasury.

The deal will integrate CRO directly into Truth Social and other Trump-linked platforms, powering rewards, subscriptions, and payments across the ecosystem.

Key details of the partnership:

• Treasury build: Trump Media and Crypto.com will amass a $6.4B CRO treasury, positioning the token as a core asset within the Trump crypto empire
• Product integration: CRO will be embedded into Truth Social and Truth+, enabling subscriptions, rewards, and user incentives
• Timing: The move comes as Ethereum and Bitcoin treasuries dominate headlines, and yet Trump Media is moving downstream to the 14th biggest crypto asset.

Market reaction: The announcement sent CRO soaring more than 60% to $0.37. It has now gained 159% on the week ($37B FDV) and making 3-year highs.

🗣️ What They’re Saying

“The Trump family is building the most influential crypto empire in the world,” wrote one analyst, noting that CRO now joins Bitcoin, Ethereum, and other holdings in Trump Media’s growing digital asset stack.

🧠 Why It Matters

This deal cements the Trump family as arguably the most aggressive political dynasty in crypto.

And that’s likely good (near term) and bad (long term).

It’s obviously good for CRO holders from a price action perspective, and that token is likely to see continued flows.

And it’s arguably good for the broader crypto ecosystem near term to see the Trump family continue to invest, as it signals they’ll continue to work towards implementing policy to allow crypto to thrive in America (and policy that makes number go up).

But once again, the Trump family is going even deeper and becoming more intertwined with crypto—and the Democrats see that.

If a shift in power happens, the blowback could be swift.

And now another crypto token is at risk of a big crash.

I guess for now—let the good times roll.

But let’s keep monitoring the situation…

🌎 Macro Crypto and Memes

A few Crypto and Web3 headlines that caught my eye:

• Crypto majors were green, led again by SOL; BTC +1.5% at $113,000, ETH even at $4,600, XRP even at $2.99, SOL +4% at $213
• CRO (+58%), PUMP (+9%), RAY (+7%) and MNT (+7%) led to movers
• ETH ETFs pulled in another $307.2M in net inflows, while BTC tallied $81.4M
• Solana DeFi TVL has returned to its ATH level of $11.74B, last seen in January 2025
• Former Polymarket and Kalshi team members have raised $15M from Coinbase and others to build an onchain, permissionless prediction market
• The Solana Policy Insitute has pledged $500,000 to the Tornade Cash team defense
• Rex-Osprey filed to list a BNB staking ETF, extending the tokenized yield ETF push
• The CFTC adopted Nasdaq’s SMARTS to surveil crypto derivatives and prediction markets, aiming to flag manipulation
• “Know Your Issuer” tech pilots with USDC and PYUSD are aimed at curbing counterfeit tokens
• VersaBank kicked off a U.S. pilot for bank-insured tokenized deposits on Ethereum, Algorand and Stellar as a stablecoin alternative
• Thailand’s ex-PM is meeting with crypto investors to try and make it a regional crypto hub

In Corporate Treasuries

• Metaplanet announced plans to raise another $880M via stock sale to buy more Bitcoin
• Falconedge completed a pre-IPO raise with plans to build a BTC treasury

In Memes

💰 Token, Airdrop & Protocol Tracker

Here’s a rundown of major token, protocol and airdrop news from the day:

🤖 AI x Crypto

Section dedicated to headlines in the AI sector of crypto:

• Overall market cap up 12% to $13.2B, leaders were green
• FARTCOIN (+5%), VIRTUAL (+1%), TIBBIR (-7%), aixbt (+3%) & ai16z (+4%)
• OPAIUM (+14%), SPLAT (+12%) and FXN (+11%) led top movers

🚚 What is happening in NFTs?

Here is the list of other notable headlines from the day in NFTs:

• ETH NFT leaders were mixed; Punks -3% at 45.5 ETH, Pudgy +3% at 10.3, BAYC even at 9.7 ETH
• Moonbirds broke through the 2.8 ETH wall and ran to 3.1
• ACK’s ‘The Broken Keys’ saw a new ATH sale of $165,000
• Bitcoin NFTs were mostly green again, led by Quantum Cats (+23%)
• Abstract NFTs were mostly red, led by Jupis