Wired Magazine: Trump’s Second Son and the Secret Entanglement with American Bitcoin

Unique writer: Jessica Klein, Wired Journal

Translated by: Luffy, Foresight Information

Eric Trump (the second son of U.S. President Trump and Govt Vice President of the Trump Group) attended the “Bitcoin 2025” convention held in Las Vegas, Nevada, on Might 28, 2025.

At the starting of Trump’s second time period, Asher Genoot, CEO of the infrastructure firm Hut 8, and Michael Ho, Chief Technique Officer, loved thin-crust pizza with Eric Trump at the Trump Golf Membership in Jupiter, Florida. Genoot recalled that they talked for hours and proposed a marketing strategy that enormously Eric Trump: forming a Bitcoin mining alliance.

The 2 initially met by way of mutual buddies at the finish of 2024: Genoot stated he had proven Eric footage of a “lovely liquid-cooled information middle” in Amarillo, Texas. Eric was fairly and shared his experiences rising up on development websites with his father. In response to Genoot, after that pizza night time, they met nearly day by day. The top consequence was the institution of American Bitcoin (ABTC) on April 1, with Hut 8 holding 80% of the shares (the firm claims to “handle 1,020 megawatts of power capability throughout 15 areas in the U.S. and Canada”), whereas the Trump brothers (Eric and Donald Jr.) and their information middle firm American Information Facilities held the remaining 20%. Eric serves as the co-founder and Chief Technique Officer of American Bitcoin.

Matt Prusak, CEO of American Bitcoin (who can be the former CEO of Hut 8’s affiliated Bitcoin mining firm Ionic Digital), said that the Trump brothers introduced “two issues.” First, they opened up capital markets by way of the Trump household’s worldwide enterprise connections; second, in Prusak’s phrases, a extra enticing “narrative worth” stemming from the Trump household identify.

Though Prusak stated Eric “can attain many potential companions with a cellphone name,” each he and Genoot insisted that Eric’s place didn’t grant them direct entry to the President. They emphasised Eric’s relationships with giant household workplaces and establishments. “Establishments in Europe, Canada, and even the Center East are keen on strategic partnerships with American Bitcoin,” Prusak stated.

In March, cryptocurrency trade Binance introduced a $2 billion funding from a fund backed by the Abu Dhabi authorities. Two months later, the stablecoin USD 1 from the Trump household’s crypto mission World Liberty Monetary was chosen as the buying and selling settlement foreign money. On July 18, President Trump signed the GENIUS Act, establishing a regulatory framework for stablecoins. The Home handed a cryptocurrency market regulation invoice the day earlier than, and the President requested that the invoice be delivered to the White Home earlier than August.

“We will leverage the U.S. power market,” Prusak stated, mentioning that Eric and Donald Jr. have a big and more and more crypto-interested viewers. Hut 8’s CFO Sean Glennan (previously of Citigroup) said that the business he’s in is “extremely imitative,” and having an government from certainly one of the world’s most talked-about households in the highlight is actually not a nasty factor.

“American Bitcoin has a novel benefit to develop sooner and function extra effectively than any participant in the business,” Eric said in a written assertion to Wired, noting that Hut 8’s previous efficiency, infrastructure, and power experience are “unmatched.”

Will Foxley, co-founder of Blockspace Media, which focuses on Bitcoin mining, put it extra bluntly: in the aggressive Bitcoin mining business, “there are few methods to face out. Having the President’s son concerned in founding an organization is certainly one of them.”

From its institution in April to Might 31, American Bitcoin has mined 215 Bitcoins, additional enhancing the Trump household’s cryptocurrency enterprise portfolio. As of July 1, American Bitcoin has raised $220 million from buyers, which is deliberate for buying Bitcoin and mining machines. Alongside with the Trump household’s earlier crypto ventures (together with meme cash, stablecoins, and a $2.5 billion Bitcoin treasury funding by Trump Media & Know-how Group, which owns Fact Social), American Bitcoin is additional solidifying the household’s affect in the cryptocurrency ecosystem. The present crypto ecosystem is repeatedly rising and more and more linked with establishments and governments.

Experiences point out that as of mid-March, the Trump household’s crypto enterprise has contributed roughly $2.9 billion to their wealth. The core aim of American Bitcoin is to build up Bitcoin, which can additional improve the household’s wealth. First, by mining Bitcoin at a price under market value (miners obtain rewards for his or her computational contributions, which is cheaper than buying on exchanges); second, by buying to develop their Bitcoin strategic reserves.

On June 18, Prusak informed Wired that he couldn’t disclose when the firm would begin buying Bitcoin or by way of which trade, however Coinbase Prime is at present its “main market.” (It’s reported that Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong has met with President Trump to help in shaping U.S. crypto coverage.)

Foxley famous that when Hut 8 introduced its partnership with the Trump brothers to ascertain American Bitcoin, many in the crypto mining circle have been “caught off guard.” Meme cash like TRUMP can generate buzz and seize headlines, however Foxley believes Bitcoin mining is a “area of interest space” in the crypto subject—neither enticing nor well-covered, leaving just some articles criticizing its excessive power consumption.

Nevertheless, Foxley added that this structure is smart in conjunction with the “America First Vitality” coverage promoted by the Trump administration. In June 2024, the President met with a number of of the largest miners in the U.S. throughout a marketing campaign occasion at Mar-a-Lago to debate how America may turn out to be “the world’s main Bitcoin mining nation.” The next month, he reiterated this aim at the Nashville Bitcoin convention.

Throughout the 2024 election, the crypto business invested $135 million to take care of political affect by way of lobbying Congress and approaching the President. Whereas President Trump promoted crypto-friendly laws and deliberate a federal Bitcoin strategic reserve, he additionally ensured that he may straight profit from business income.

Though President Trump had proposed tariffs on Chinese language mining machines, which might not be excellent news for the U.S. crypto mining business, the coverage has not but been applied. On Might 12, American Bitcoin introduced plans to go public by way of a merger with Nasdaq-listed Gryphon Digital Mining. In response to Gryphon’s SEC filings, it “operates roughly 5,880 Bitcoin mining machines at third-party websites in Pennsylvania,” with these units sourced from Chinese language firm Bitmain.

In response to American Bitcoin’s SEC filings, after accumulating sufficient Bitcoin by way of mining and acquisitions, the firm’s final aim is to “lead the Bitcoin ecosystem,” which can embrace supporting the growth of Bitcoin expertise and selling its widespread software.

“Like all of the Trump household’s ventures, American Bitcoin’s aim is to turn out to be an business big,” Eric stated in an interview at the Consensus blockchain convention in Might. In response to Gryphon’s SEC filings, the merger with American Bitcoin will create a publicly traded firm “centered on constructing the largest and best pure Bitcoin mining big in the world.” After the merger, the firm’s board will consist of 5 members: Ho, Prusak (who can be the founder and companion of the enterprise capital agency Protection Angels, which claims to “put money into the way forward for nationwide safety”), and three exterior administrators—FabFitFun co-founder Michael Broukhim, Tinder co-founder Justin Mateen, and Genoot.

“Going public will change the sport. It unlocks capital and institutional entry, which can drive us to realize our mission of making the largest and most investment-worthy long-term Bitcoin accumulation platform,” Eric stated.

Nevertheless, Hut 8 gives the infrastructure. In response to SEC filings, American Bitcoin pays Hut 8 for power, operational, and shared companies, together with “accounting, human sources help, payroll, advantages, IT help,” and authorized companies. Hut 8 gives mining websites for American Bitcoin (at present situated in Niagara Falls, New York, Drugs Hat in Alberta, and Olra in Texas), and Prusak said that American Bitcoin will help Hut 8 “increase and deploy important capital” with out “burdening Hut 8’s steadiness sheet.” Foxley believes that with American Bitcoin centered on mining, Hut 8 can consider supporting rising applied sciences like AI, competing for “hyperscale information middle customers”—akin to firms like Meta and Google that require high-energy information facilities.

Since Hut 8 funds the information facilities, American Bitcoin solely wants to obtain mining machines. The corporate inherited an settlement from Hut 8’s subsidiary Zephyr, planning to buy roughly 17,280 Bitmain U3 S21 EXPH mining machines for as much as $320 million. As of Might 31, American Bitcoin has over 60,000 mining machines, primarily together with Bitmain’s Antminer S21+ sequence (Glennan described these machines as “Cadillacs… not Ferraris”) and China’s MicroBt M5X and M6X sequence mining machines.

The U.S. holds 30%-40% of the international Bitcoin hash price, however 90% of the mining machines come from China. “Bitcoin is more and more turning into the core of the U.S. monetary ecosystem,” stated Sanjay Gupta, Chief Technique Officer of U.S. crypto mining provider Auradine (a competitor to Bitmain). As President Trump pushes for Bitcoin to be built-in into the U.S. monetary system, consultants warn that connecting Chinese language {hardware} to crucial U.S. energy infrastructure may pose safety dangers. For instance, Bitmain is a non-public firm with ties to AI firm Sophgo, which has been blacklisted by the U.S. authorities on safety grounds (Bitmain and Sophgo share a co-founder however haven’t but been positioned on the entity checklist).

Bitcoin mining should confront more and more harsh financial realities: it depends on value volatility, and mining rewards are halved roughly each 4 years; at present, over 19 million of the 21 million Bitcoins have already been mined.

Glennan said that sustaining low debt and hedging dangers by way of the Bitcoin derivatives market will assist American Bitcoin “climate market fluctuations.” The corporate additionally plans to boost its hash price to enhance profitability, which can contain changing outdated machines with extra environment friendly new ones or buying different mining firms.

All of this requires capital, and the firm hopes that the Trump household’s identify will appeal to funding. Though representatives from Hut 8 and American Bitcoin each declare that their enterprise is unrelated to Trump’s political connections, at the Bitcoin convention in Las Vegas in Might 2025, the firm couldn’t assist however flaunt this affiliation. At an occasion hosted by American Bitcoin, the Winklevoss twins (every donating $1 million to Trump’s 2024 marketing campaign) and Cantor Fitzgerald Chairman Brandon Lutnick (son of U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick) have been in attendance.

On the stage the place Vice President J.D. Vance had simply spoken a couple of hours earlier, Donald Jr. participated in a panel dialogue with Prusak and Ho, addressing the considerably conservative viewers, saying, “My father made many guarantees to the crypto group… (Eric and I) have proven our sincerity in all our actions on this subject.” The very first thing he talked about was American Bitcoin.