CHINESE BUSINESSES MADE MILLIONS FROM TRUMP, COINBASE IN THE PHILIPPINES? Asia Express

Chinese KOLs get millions from the US president's memecoin

US President Donald Trump has paid millions of dollars to Chinese-language business accounts since the launch of MemCoin.

Trump launched the token in the days leading up to his January 20 presidential inauguration. A friend token named after First Lady Melania Trump, before its debut, memecoin's market capitalization skyrocketed and in no time was ranked among the top 15 cryptocurrencies.

Mandarin-language blockchain media outlet Blockbeats analyzed trading data to report that the TRUMP token's price spike was linked to Asian trading hours.

Chain Insight, a Chinese-language key opinion leader (KOL) wallet tracker, identified 12 addresses of Solana's prominent Mandarin-speaking merchants as some of the top earners of TRUMP tokens. According to their ranking, 12 accounts have earned more than $1 million each, while one trader, known as 0xSun, has accumulated $27 million. In general, these wallets are listed by Chain Insight's Jan. According to 22 Amendments, they earned an eye-popping $121 million.

Detailed Profit and Loss Analysis 28 addresses with a total net profit of more than $10 million are tied for the top five Chinese-language merchants in China Insight's ranking.

The beginning of the token mine was not without controversy. Critics from both the crypto world and the political sphere have condemned it.

Congresswoman Maxine Waters has accused the token of being a tool to circumvent national security and anti-corruption laws.

“Buyers may include large corporations, allied countries pushing to show ‘respect' to the president, and our adversaries like Russia and China who have much to gain from influencing a Trump presidency,” she said in a statement.

“Anyone globally, even individuals sanctioned by the US or banned from our capital markets, can now trade and profit from $TRUMP on a variety of unregulated platforms.”

Vitalik Buterin, founder of Ethereum, thinks that “coins of politicians” are “dangerous for democracy”.

Although the token was announced on the president's official X account, Trump said at a press conference on January 21 that “they don't know much about it other than that I launched it.”

Brian Armstrong went to the seafood market

Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong appears to have set his sights on Southeast Asia as the US cryptocurrency giant looks to expand its regional footprint.

Armstrong was recently seen in Davos, Switzerland. He met with Filipino Finance Secretary Ralph Recto at the 2025 World Economic Forum.

According to the Department of Finance, he initiated the meeting to discuss Coinbase's possible entry into the Philippines.

The move will raise eyebrows, as it contradicts earlier indications that the exchange was less interested in expanding into Southeast Asia. However, there were some clues.

At the December 2024 crypto conference, Coinbase revealed that its Coinbase Wallet and Base Layer-2 network are actively supporting applications from Southeast Asian developers, including future stablecoins tied to the currencies of Thailand and the Philippines.

In addition, the Q4 Coinbase-commissioned report analyzed citizens' perceptions of their financial systems and the role crypto can play in improving them. The Philippines was one of the four countries studied, along with Argentina, Kenya and Switzerland.

Coinbase already has a foothold in Southeast Asia through its branch in Singapore. The firm recently received a license to conduct digital payment token trading without transaction limits.

Line accepts the design of Telegram as a small DApp portal startup

Line then unveiled a DApp portal featuring Kaia-powered “mini decentralized applications” created through the merger of South Korean messenger Kakao Clite and Line Finance, the Web3 arm of Japanese messaging app Web3.

The DApp portal allows users to access Web3 services within the Line Messenger app. Mini DApps cover categories such as games, social media and digital content. It also comes with an integrated wallet where users can earn rewards and trade crypto assets.

The move reflects a growing trend in Telegram, whose messaging platform claims nearly one billion active users.

Telegram's integration of small applications into the ecosystem has already proven successful among crypto enthusiasts.

Last year, games like NotCoin and Hamster Kombat reportedly attracted millions with cool incentives and simple gameplay. These mini-applications are often integrated with the Open Network (TON), the blockchain conceived by Telegram, contributing to the proliferation of TON blockchain accounts.

In the year At the start of 2024, Tons had less than 4.5 million accounts, a figure that had risen to more than 137.8 million as of January 23.

Indian business school launches its own blockchain currency

Birla Institute of Management Technology (BimTech), an Indian business school, has launched its own blockchain-based digital currency, “BimCoin”.

Bimtech is now a pioneer in blockchain adoption among Indian educational institutions alongside IIT Madras. Last year, IIT Madras deployed blockchain technology for its student elections using in-house software to enable transparent and remote voting.

The business school's currency focuses on campus transactions between students, suppliers and administrators. The permissioned blockchain architecture draws inspiration from central bank digital currency (CBDC) models rather than cryptocurrencies based on public blockchain networks such as Bitcoin.

This is consistent with India's broad regulatory stance. The Reserve Bank of India, the country's central bank, has previously taken a negative view of cryptocurrencies in its efforts to impose restrictions. Recently, Indian regulators have reportedly consulted with experts who support crypto bans to pave the way for the country's CBCC, which is in pilot phase from 2022.

John Yun

Yohan Yun is a multimedia journalist who has been reporting on blockchain since 2017. He has contributed to the crypto media outlet Forkast as an editor and covered Asian tech stories as an assistant reporter for Bloomberg BNA and Forbes. He spends his free time cooking and experimenting with new recipes.