US President Donald Trump will host top purchasers of the cryptocurrency that bears his name at a gala dinner on Thursday.
$TRUMP was launched shortly before his inauguration in January, initially rocketing in value before falling sharply shortly afterwards.
"It's fundamentally corrupt -- a way to buy access to the President," Democrat senator Chris Murphy wrote on X, one of a number of people to question the ethics of the event.
Some have also suggested the expected attendance of many foreign investors poses a threat to national security.
But the White House has batted away such allegations, saying Trump is only motivated by public service.
"This is something that doesn't have obvious utility. It's not being used for payments. It's not being used as a store of value," said Rob Hadick, General Partner of Dragonfly, a crypto venture fund.
The dinner - which is being held at Trump's golf course near the nation's capital - is advertised on the website gettrumpmemes.com as "the most EXCLUSIVE INVITATION in the World."
The top 220 purchasers of the meme coin, viewable on a leaderboard, received invitations to the "black-tie optional" event.
The top investor in the $TRUMP meme coin is billionaire crypto entrepreneur Justin Sun who was charged with fraud and market manipulation by the US Securities and Exchange Commission during the Biden Administration.
A Trump administration official told the BBC that the meme coin has nothing to do with the White House.
White House spokesperson Anna Kelly pushed back on concerns about potential conflicts.
"The President is working to secure GOOD deals for the American people, not for himself," Kelly said in a statement.
But one former financial regulator likened the meme coin to gambling.
"It's like selling membership cards for his personal fan club which are then traded," said Timothy Massad, Director of the Digital Asset Policy Project at Harvard.
"They have no value. But people speculate on the price and those purchases and that trading enriches him."
- Btw, here's the Leaderboard if anyone's interested.
