It was January 2025, crypto fever was raging, and Donald J. Trump was preparing to return to the White House. So, when Fatime Elrgdawy’s friend told her about an online message from the U.S. president-elect hyping the launch of his own crypto coin – "GET YOUR $TRUMP NOW" – she thought: "Oh my God, this is brilliant."

If Trump was putting his name behind it, Elrgdawy recalls thinking, "it must be a legitimate investment."

The 29-year-old software project engineer in Santa Barbara, California, put $2,000 of her savings into the $TRUMP meme coin. The price plummeted. At the end of May, her $TRUMP holding was worth less than $120.

A Reuters examination shows that the Trump family generated at least $2.3 billion in profit from investors since Trump retook the presidency. On the other side of that cash bonanza: the more than a million investors whose net losses totaled $2.3 billion at the end of April.