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World Liberty Financial – the blockchain-based DAO founded by President Trump, U.S. Special Envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff, and their families – has proposed a four-year token unlock schedule following backlash over the fact that 80% of token remain locked, with no apparent path to liquidity.
What's the Scoop?
- WLFI Drama: World Liberty Financial has become a focal point of attention within the crypto industry, and not in a good way. The Trump-backed crypto project became the object of widespread ire last week, after the its team cashed out $40M of stablecoins against a WLFI borrow position. Fueling the fire, crypto billionaire Justin Sun started an open revolt against WLFI just days later, denouncing "the ongoing token scandals by the bad actors at WLFI" and voicing disdain for the WLFI token’s “backdoor blacklisting function,” which gives its issuer, “unilateral power to freeze, restrict, and effectively confiscate the property rights of any token holder, without notice, without cause, and without recourse.”
- Proposed Fix: In an apparent attempt to appease its disgruntled token holders, World Liberty Financial has proposed a vesting schedule, which would subject both insiders and external "early supporters" to a mandatory two-year cliff, during which time no locked tokens will be liquified. Following this period, "early supporters" will have their tokens gradually unlocked on a two-year linear vesting schedule, while insiders will have their tokens unlocked across a three-year linear vesting schedule.
- Insiders Retain Control: Positioned as a signal for "long-term governance alignment," the World Liberty Financial team will burn 10% of locked insider tokens, approximately 4.5B WLFI. With insiders controlling 45B locked WLFI against the 17B tokens held by "early supporters," the team will retain majority control over project governance at all times, despite the burn.
- Poison Pill: Any “early supporters” who do not assent to World Liberty Financial’s vesting schedule will have their tokens locked indefinitely, effectively forcing compliance or rendering their remaining allocation worthless.
For early supporters:
— WLFI (@worldlibertyfi) April 15, 2026
All 17,043,666,558 locked early supporter tokens move to a 2-year cliff followed by a 2-year linear vest. Full allocation retained. Zero burn.
Holders who do not affirmatively accept the new schedule remain locked indefinitely under existing terms.
