Ethereum is dead. Ethereum will be fine. The social media takes are flying on the state of the world’s second most valuable blockchain. Conceived in 2013, Ethereum has experienced a series of dramatic ups and downs, including an existential hack in 2016 and a remarkable technological upgrade in 2022. But this year has brought unprecedented scrutiny of the current and future direction of the project.

A big part of this is due to the price of Ethereum, which is badly lagging Bitcoin. The world’s most valuable cryptocurrency has notched a series of all-time highs and a flurry of interest from Wall Street investors. Meanwhile, as of Tuesday, Ethereum was trading around $2,500, about 50% lower than its all-time high, according to data from crypto exchange Binance. 

Ether’s lackluster price movement has prompted some to proclaim Ethereum’s end. “Ethereum died,” wrote Max Keiser, a prominent Bitcoin booster, on X. “It just hasn’t been buried yet.”

This is an overstatement. But questions remain on whether Ethereum’s price slump reflects a temporary stumble, or whether the blockchain—long hailed by boosters as the computer of the future—will never grow into its promise.

Congestion fees and scaling

“Bitcoin has died many times… Ethereum has died several times,” Joseph Lubin, CEO of the blockchain technology firm Consensys and cofounder of Ethereum, told Fortune. “When there are challenges, we learn from them.”

Those challenges have been present since 2013, when a wiry 19-year-old from Canada named Vitalik Buterin had an idea for a new type of computer. Fearing that Big Tech firms had an unhealthy monopoly over cloud computing that could stifle developers, Buterin looked to blockchains instead. He and others came up with Ethereum—a decentralized blockchain-based computing platform where programmers’ code was immune to the whims of corporate behemoths.

Developers soon flocked to Ethereum, but the increase in activity brought a rise in “gas fees.” Every time users send each other assets on Ethereum, they need to pay with cryptocurrency—in the same way Amazon requires users to pay dollars to use its cloud computing network. The only difference is that Ethereum’s gas fees are distributed to the decentralized cohort of computers supporting the blockchain, instead of one corporate entity. In 2021, sending a few dollars of cryptocurrency to other users on Ethereum resulted in charges of sometimes hundreds of dollars, and developers looked for a solution.

That solution is what Ethereum’s critics say has sapped the network of some of its financial value. Instead of immediately working to speed up Ethereum’s core network, developers fostered a system of layer 2 blockchains, or L2s, built on top of Ethereum. These L2s—including Arbitrum, Optmism, and Polygon—package user data into one bundle and post that onto Ethereum, rather than ask the blockchain to process each transaction individually. 

If gas fees are any indication, that strategy has worked. Since a peak in mid-2020, transaction costs have plummeted more than 99% on Ethereum, according to data from Glassnode. 

But Kyle Samani, managing partner at crypto investment firm Multicoin Capital, believes this approach has made the core network of Ethereum less valuable. “It’s my fundamental view that a network is not sustainable or valuable without direct user activity,” he told Fortune.

Users have moved to L2s and drained Ethereum of some of the activity that propped up its cryptocurrency’s price, Samani, a noted supporter of the competing Solana blockchain, argued. 

However, Paul Brody, chairman of the Enterprise Ethereum Alliance, an advocacy group for the blockchain, said fixation on the price of Ether in the short term is missing the point. “Ethereum is the amazing world computer,” he told Fortune. “I don’t think it can or should try to be all things, all people, and, especially, I don’t think Ethereum should also try to be the best, most deflationary cryptocurrency.”

Back to layer one

Ethereum’s upgrades, not any explicit work to buoy Ether’s price, should prompt a rise in demand for the cryptocurrency, said Brody. And that’s what developers are working on, said Danny Ryan and Vivek Raman, cofounders of the Ethereum advocacy group Ethrealize—one of many wings of a robust technical and cultural community based around the blockchain that convenes at large annual get-togethers like ETHDenver in Colorado.

Programmers are now optimizing the speed of the layer-1 network, not just its ecosystem of layer-2 chains, say Ryan and Raman. Plus, the duo believe that the flood of Wall Street and Big Tech firms exploring blockchain technology will spur a rush to buy the cryptocurrency. “I don’t think that we should pretend like the asset doesn’t need to be valuable,” added Danny Ryan. His cofounder Raman even equated Ethereum to “digital oil.”

“When you ask institutions, when we go have our meetings and say, ‘Which is a civilizational infrastructure, which is the global, neutral infrastructure that you can actually deploy real assets with real trust?’” Raman added. “Ethereum is the obvious choice.”

But whether Wall Street titans decide to go with Ethereum, rather than competitors like Solana, remains to be seen. Still, proponents are hopeful. “If we do our job, and we become the first place for everybody to do business,” said Brody, “then the asset price is just something that takes care of itself.”

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Illustration by Fortune

The Senate is expected to approve legislation Tuesday that would regulate a form of cryptocurrency known as stablecoins, the first of what is expected to be a wave of crypto legislation from Congress that the industry hopes will bolster its legitimacy and reassure consumers.

The fast-moving legislation, which will be sent to the House for potential revisions, comes on the heels of a 2024 campaign cycle where the crypto industry ranked among the top political spenders in the country, underscoring its growing influence in Washington and beyond.

Eighteen Democratic senators have shown support for the legislation as it has advanced, siding with the Republican majority in the 53-47 Senate. If passed, it would become the second major bipartisan bill to advance through the Senate this year, following the Laken Riley Act on immigration enforcement in January.

Still, most Democrats oppose the bill. They have raised concerns that the measure does little to address President Donald Trump’s personal financial interests in the crypto space.

“We weren’t able to include certainly everything we would have wanted, but it was a good bipartisan effort,” said Sen. Angela Alsobrooks, D-Md., on Monday. She added, “This is an unregulated area that will now be regulated.”

Known as the GENIUS Act, the bill would establish guardrails and consumer protections for stablecoins, a type of cryptocurrency typically pegged to the U.S. dollar. The acronym stands for “Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins.”

It’s expected to pass Tuesday, since it only requires a simple majority vote — and it already cleared its biggest procedural hurdle last week in a 68-30 vote. But the bill has faced more resistance than initially expected.

There is a provision in the bill that bans members of Congress and their families from profiting off stablecoins. But that prohibition does not extend to the president and his family, even as Trump builds a crypto empire from the White House.

Trump hosted a private dinner last month at his golf club with top investors in a Trump-branded meme coin. His family holds a large stake in World Liberty Financial, a crypto project that provides yet another avenue where investors are buying in and enriching the president’s relatives. World Liberty has launched its own stablecoin, USD1.

The administration is broadly supportive of crypto’s growth and its integration into the economy. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent last week said the legislation could help push the U.S. stablecoin market beyond $2 trillion by the end of 2028.

Brian Armstrong, CEO of Coinbase — the nation’s largest crypto exchange and a major advocate for the bill — has met with Trump and praised his early moves on crypto. This past weekend, Coinbase was among the more prominent brands that sponsored a parade in Washington commemorating the Army’s 250th anniversary — an event that coincided with Trump’s 79th birthday.

But the crypto industry emphasizes that they view the legislative effort as bipartisan, pointing to champions on each side of the aisle.

“The GENIUS Act will be the most significant digital assets legislation ever to pass the U.S. Senate,” Senate Banking Committee Chair Tim Scott, R-S.C., said ahead of a key vote last week. “It’s the product of months of bipartisan work.”

The bill did hit one rough patch in early May, when a bloc of Senate Democrats who had previously supported the bill reversed course and voted to block it from advancing. That prompted new negotiations involving Senate Republicans, Democrats and the White House, which ultimately produced the compromise version expected to win passage Tuesday.

“There were many, many changes that were made. And ultimately, it’s a much better deal because we were all at the table,” Alsobrooks said.

Still, the bill leaves unresolved concerns over presidential conflicts of interest — an issue that remains a source of tension within the Democratic caucus.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., has been among the most outspoken as the ranking member on the Senate Banking Committee, warning that the bill creates a “super highway” for Trump corruption. She has also warned that the bill would allow major technology companies, such as Amazon and Meta, to launch their own stablecoins.

If the stablecoin legislation passes the Senate on Tuesday, it still faces several hurdles before reaching the president’s desk. It must clear the narrowly held Republican majority in the House, where lawmakers may try to attach a broader market structure bill — sweeping legislation that could make passage through the Senate more difficult.

Trump has said he wants stablecoin legislation on his desk before Congress breaks for its August recess, now just under 50 days away.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Richard Drew—AP

On the campaign trail last year, then-candidate Donald Trump promised the crypto industry that he would become the first president to embrace blockchain technology. At the time, he didn’t reveal that he also planned to make crypto a cornerstone of his growing business empire.

On Friday, the White House released Trump’s first financial disclosure report as president, revealing new details on his web of business ventures, including his golf courses, sponsorship deals, and publicly traded media group. Notably, the report also provided a window into Trump’s crypto platform, World Liberty Financial, which his sons announced last summer.

According to the disclosures, Trump has earned over $57 million from token sales on the platform and holds nearly 16 billion of the governance tokens—the crypto version of voting shares—launched by World Liberty. Based on earlier sales of those tokens to accredited investors, which valued them between 1.5 and five cents, Trump’s holdings could be worth nearly $1 billion, though the token is not currently trading. Bloomberg recently estimated his total net worth at around $5.4 billion.

As government watchdogs argue that Trump’s ventures in the crypto industry represent a conflict of interest with Congress debating blockchain regulation, the new report provides the first substantial look at the president’s increasing entanglement with digital assets.

The first crypto president

Before his third run for president, Trump had expressed skepticism of crypto, describing Bitcoin as a “scam” just a few years ago. But he increasingly embraced the blockchain industry on the campaign trail last year as companies such as Coinbase and Ripple poured tens of millions of dollars into donations—a reaction to the Biden administration’s crackdown on the sector.

Trump not only touted the technology at industry events, including a Bitcoin conference last summer, but also began to explore his own ventures in the space. Trump had previously launched a series of NFTs, but the newer projects represented a full-blown move into the crypto business, primarily through the vehicle of World Liberty Financial.

The platform, first announced by his son Eric last August, promised a “new era of finance,” though its exact function is still unknown. In the ensuing months, World Liberty has launched a series of products. That has included the governance token, as well as a dollar-pegged stablecoin called USD1, which an Emirati investment firm used to invest $2 billion into the leading crypto exchange Binance in May.

While the exact ownership structure of World Liberty, as well as Trump’s potential profit from token sales, remained largely opaque, the financial disclosure report offers the first details on the president’s profit, including the $57 million earned off token sales. World Liberty offered WLFI to accredited investors, including the Chinese crypto entrepreneur Justin Sun, who had previously faced charges from the Securities and Exchange Commission that were dropped after Trump took office.

The report does not include details on Trump’s other major crypto project—his memecoin, also called Trump, which he launched the weekend before his inauguration. While Trump’s memecoin has plummeted in value since its release, dropping from a market capitalization of $9 billion in January to around $2 billion today, it has remained a source of potential profit—and controversy—for Trump, whose organization likely owns around 80% of the total supply. Trump hosted a dinner for the top holders of the memecoin in May, drawing criticism from lawmakers across the aisle and even industry lobbyists.

Trump continues to advance crypto industry priorities, including legislation in Congress that would establish regulation for stablecoins and token issuance. But even as real estate dominates his holdings, Friday’s financial disclosure report demonstrates the increasing importance of crypto to his business empire.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Anna Moneymaker—Getty Images

President Donald Trump earned $57.7 million from token sales by the crypto firm he and his sons helped launch last year, according to his required federal financial disclosure forms.

The financial disclosure, released Friday by the Office of Government Ethics, provided details on his sprawling empire, including hundreds of millions of dollars in income from his hotels, golf resorts and cryptocurrency ventures.

The $57.7 million came from sales by World Liberty Financial, the crypto firm launched last year before the election. Trump and his three sons, Donald Trump Jr., Eric Trump and Barron Trump, are among the company’s founders, according to its website. 

That haul wasn’t the largest source of the president’s income from private holdings. Trump Endeavor 12 LLC, a Miami-based company that owns golf courses and a resort, produced $110 million. His Mar-a-Lago Club generated more than $50 million in resort-related revenue.

Trump, who’s worth an estimated $4.8 billion according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, valued 22 assets at more than $50 million, including Mar-a-Lago, his Turnberry, Scotland, golf resort and his stakes in World Liberty Financial and Trump Media & Technology Group Corp., which owns his Truth Social platform. Officials disclose the values of their holdings in broad ranges with “over $50 million” the highest, which means that they can’t be used to calculate an individual’s net worth. Trump Media, for example, is currently worth $2.2 billion.

Fight Fight Fight LLC, which sells Trump’s meme coin, was launched in January and wasn’t included in the disclosure, which covers 2024. The company hosted a dinner that Trump attended for the 220 largest holders of the $TRUMP coin in May. The event, when announced in April, caused the coin’s price to shoot up 56%.

CIC Digital LLC, the entity that earns money through licensing Trump’s image on nonfungible tokens, produced income of $1.1 million in 2024. It also holds a wallet holding Etherium worth at least $1 million.

The 234-page disclosure also lists hundreds of trademarks Trump owns across the world, including in China, Taiwan, South Korea, Venezuela and other countries, and details his personal investments that aren’t part of his business empire, as well as first lady Melania Trump’s holdings.

Trump listed 11 outstanding debts on the form, including two judgments against him won by author E. Jean Carroll involving allegations of sexual assault and defamation and one owed from the criminal fraud case for which he was convicted of 34 felonies. Those debts were stayed pending the outcome of appeals Trump has filed. 

He did not list any outstanding debt to lawyers or law firms stemming from the criminal and civil cases. Save America, his leadership political action committee, has paid most of those fees. 

Trump had seven outstanding real estate loans, including mortgages in amounts of more than $50 million on Trump Tower, Trump National Doral and 40 Wall Street. He also listed debt on his American Express credit card of at least $15,000. 

Vice President JD Vance also disclosed assets for him and his wife, Usha Vance, worth at least $6.5 million.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Kenny Holston—The New York Times/Bloomberg via Getty Images

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