Mysterious UAE fund: what Reuters has learned about the Trump project's biggest investor

The largest publicly known investor in the crypto platform World Liberty, associated with Donald Trump, is an unknown fund from the UAE called Aqua 1 Foundation. Last month, it bought $100 million worth of World Liberty tokens. However, there is virtually no public information about the foundation itself and its founder Dave Lee - neither in corporate registries nor in public profiles, Reuters writes in its investigation. The lack of business transparency and possible conflicts of interest may undermine trust in the government, as the Trump family receives most of the revenues from this project, the agency notes.

In June, the little-known Aqua 1 Foundation purchased $100 million worth of tokens from the Donald Trump-linked cryptocurrency platform World Liberty,  As a result the foundation became the largest publicly known investor in the project, reports Reuters. At the same time, the agency notes, a check of Aqua 1's corporate registries and digital footprints yielded almost no information about the origin of its funds or the person identified in a press release about the token purchase as the fund's founder and partner, Dave Lee.

- On its website, Aqua 1 describes itself as "a UAE-based Web3 fund with a global market focus and an eye on the long-term prosperity of the crypto ecosystem." Such funds typically invest in blockchain and cryptocurrency companies developing products for the decentralized internet of the future, Reuters notes. The site was set up in May, a month before World Liberty announced its investment in World Liberty, with the domain owners' details classified. There is no information about the company's management or investors on it.

- Whether Aqua 1 is registered with any of the UAE's regulatory bodies could not be ascertained by Reuters. As NeosLegal lawyer Zeinab Kamran explained to the agency, crypto funds in the UAE usually register with Abu Dhabi Global Market, Dubai International Finance Center or the local financial regulator. However, the public registers of none of these bodies show neither Aqua 1, Aqua 1 Foundation, nor any mention of Dave Lee, whom the company claims as its founder. Dubai's crypto regulator VARA also said it has not interacted with either Aqua 1 or Dave Lee.

- Little is also known about Dave Lee himself and Reuters has been unable to contact him directly. Hisaccount at X was registered in 2023 and contains only a few publications, starting with the announcement of the World Liberty deal.

- The deal with World Liberty is the fund's only current investment. Aqua 1's assets total $100 million, Reuters notes, citing the fund's profile on Medium. Prior to that, it had no other major transactions recorded. From the aqua1.eth cryptocurrency wallet, two large transfers worth $80 million to World Liberty left in early June, the agency adds, citing Arkham data. Earlier in the spring, there were transfers of $9 million and $3 million to anonymous cryptocurrency wallets. Between March and June, about $90 million came to this wallet from an account on the OKX exchange.

The identities of almost all investors who bought World Liberty tokens ($WLFI) for large sums remain unknown - their transactions go through anonymous cryptocurrency wallets, Reuters notes. However, more is known about some of the largest buyers, the agency adds. Among them, for example, Chinese investor Justin Sun, who was the previous largest publicly known buyer of tokens worth $75 million, and Dubai-based DWF Labs, whose managing partner is Russian crypto entrepreneur Andrei Grachev. DWF Labs representatives told Reuters that the company was not familiar with Aqua 1 or Lee. Abu Dhabi's state investment fund MGX, which has invested $2 billion in Binance through the World Liberty stablecoin, and Justin Sun's Tron have not commented on Aqua 1.

The Trump family receives 75% of the proceeds from the sale of World Liberty tokens - the Aqua 1 deal has brought them tens of millions of dollars in personal income, Reuters emphasizes. Since the launch of the platform last fall, the Trumps have already earned about $500 million, the agency estimated. White House deputy press secretary Anne Kelly told Reuters that President Trump, despite pushing the cryptocurrency agenda, is separate from his family's financial interests. His assets are in a trust managed by his children, so "there are no conflicts of interest," Kelly emphasized.

World Liberty and the Trump Organization did not respond to Reuters' requests for comment.

Crypto projects World Liberty and other Trump-linked crypto businesses are increasingly being criticized in the United States for possibly using them to lobby for their interests: it is the Trump administration that is now shaping the rules for this area, Reuters points out. Richard Painter, a former chief ethics lawyer in the administration of President George W. Bush Jr. noted in a statement to Reuters that the lack of transparency regarding investors like Aqua 1 undermines public trust in the government. Without more information, he said, everyone tends to assume the worst, suspecting attempts at foreign influence on the White House. "We need to know who is transferring money to the president," he said.

This article was AI-translated and verified by a human editor