American Bitcoin, a crypto mining company linked to the Trump family, ended its choppy first day on the Nasdaq up over 16%, adding millions to the US first family’s wealth.
The company, backed by US President Donald Trump’s sons Eric and Donald Trump Jr., went public after merging with the existing Bitcoin (BTC) mining company Gryphon Digital Mining (GRYP).
In early trading on Wednesday, American Bitcoin (ABTC) shot up 91% from Gryphon’s Tuesday closing price of $6.90 to a peak of $13.20 before falling by half to an afternoon low of $6.72.
The Nasdaq halted trading of American Bitcoin shares five times throughout the day due to volatility, but it ended the day’s session up 16.52% at just over $8 and has climbed over 5% after-hours to $8.45.
American Bitcoin is the Trump family’s latest addition to its growing crypto portfolio and joins a trend of public companies that have joined the sector by going public or switching to focus on buying crypto.
Bitcoin “floodgates” are opening, says Eric Trump
Eric Trump, American Bitcoin’s co-founder and strategy chief, told Bloomberg on Wednesday that his company’s public launch was “an unbelievable day and a lot of hard work that’s finally come to fruition.”
He added that he started the business after owning Bitcoin for several years and seeing “how much it’s being embraced globally.”
“The floodgates are just starting to open, so it’s kind of a perfect time,” he added.
The US rose to second place on Chainalysis’ crypto adoption index, which was released on Wednesday, with the analytics firm citing President Trump’s crypto-friendly policies as a major driver.
Eric Trump swatted away concerns that the venture could be seen as profiting from his father’s crypto-friendly policies, saying the criticism was “totally illegitimate.”
“I got into this business because I was illegitimately debanked from every financial platform in the country,” he claimed. “My father has nothing to do with this business.”
He added that President Trump had “always been a proponent” of cryptocurrency, which “probably helped get him elected.” Donald Trump previously said cryptocurrencies are “based on thin air” and that Bitcoin “seems like a scam.”
American Bitcoin to buy and mine
Eric Trump said that the firm would both mine and buy Bitcoin, switching between the strategies to “whichever is better at the time.”
“There’s only a certain amount of Bitcoin that can be mined every day, and we’re going to harness that to the absolute fullest,” he said. “At the same time, we can be creative. We can go out and we can purchase Bitcoin, hold down the treasury and again allow the mining to dollar cost average down.”
“We’re going to be implementing both strategies; whichever is best for shareholder value is obviously what we’re going to…
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