A look at Donald Trump’s new line of NFTs
Yahoo Finance senior columnist Rick Newman joins the live show to break down former President Trump’s new NFT venture and how it fits into the catalog of former Trump-branded products.
Video transcription
DAVE BRIGGS: That’s right, NFTs are back in the news. But this time it’s Non-Fungible Trump. Yes, the former president now has his own line of NFTs. And our senior columnist, Rick Newman, actually bought one of those trading cards. Rick, before we get to you, I want to play this ad that somehow inspired you.
RICK NEWMAN: [LAUGHS]
[MUSIC PLAYING]
DONALD TRUMP: Hi all. This is Donald Trump, hopefully your favorite president of all time, better than Lincoln, better than Washington, with an important announcement to make. I’m doing my first official Donald J. Trump NFT collection right here and right now. They are called Trump Digital Trading Cards. These cards feature some of the truly incredible artwork that pertains to my life and career. It has been very exciting.
[LAUGHTER]
DAVE BRIGGS: Sorry.
JARED BLIKRE: Taking on Mount Rushmore.
DAVE BRIGGS: I don’t… here’s the thing, Rick. I don’t know what “Saturday Night Live” is going to do with it. There’s no way to improve it, man. You can’t make it more fun. It’s like buying a cinema in the spring of 2020. Which one did you buy, and why? Why were you inspired by that ad?
RICK NEWMAN: When I saw what was going on here – and look, I’m not a pioneer in NFTs. And I’ve asked David Hollerith, our crypto reporter, to sort of guide me. But when I saw what happened here, I said, we have to buy one of these. So I dropped my editor and said, can I buy one of these on the Yahoo Finance business card? And she said OK.
And you won’t believe it. I bought it for $99. And I checked a few moments ago. Today it was worth $182. So Yahoo Finance is making money off of Trump. Now you ask me, what– what card did I buy? I was given no choice. It didn’t ask me what type of card I bought. I could have missed it on the entry form somehow. I just went along a bit blindly.
And I got Trump, the baseball player. There you see him. I have Trump the baseball player. He has very large hands, I noticed. And as I’ve been going through, looking at it– I’m sure you’ve looked at some of the other Trump cards– I like the cowboy hat ones because Trump looks ridiculous.
But it looks like what they did was they kind of took the body of Daniel Craig when he was playing James Bond and they just photoshopped Trump’s face and then put a bunch of different hats on it. But they’re – I guess they’re non-fungible tokens, NFTs. And there are 45,000 of them now.
JARED BLIKRE: Well, I have to tell you that we… I don’t know where to start either, Dave. Do I have a question for you, Rick? I don’t really have a question. I mean, we did some models with our own computer CGI department here, and I don’t know if they’re NFTs or not, but came up with some pretty fun examples. But– and I don’t even know if we have them here to show you. Rick, what’s the next step here for Trump to raise money in addition to the fact that he had to fund his–oh, there’s one. We have these available.
DAVE BRIGGS: This is real, Jared. I don’t know what you are talking about.
JARED BLIKRE: OK, these–
DAVE BRIGGS: Rick, these are– Yahoo didn’t just buy a Trump NFT. We create our own. There was mine. It’s Jared’s. It’s obviously his real body.
JARED BLIKRE: I don’t remember that one.
DAVE BRIGGS: And then the big reveal–
RICK NEWMAN: Guys, what’s your purchase? Oh yes!
DAVE BRIGGS: There’s yours, Rick. There’s yours.
RICK NEWMAN: Oh my God! I did it!
JARED BLIKRE: My Biden is 5 Doge.
DAVE BRIGGS: So–
[LAUGHTER]
–here’s the thing. It doesn’t– Rick, and you listen to that ad, which I’ve had about 97 times, it doesn’t sound like Trump’s heart is really in this. He literally says, you can have dinner with me, if you find it exciting. He doesn’t seem to care much about this, but maybe they make money. What are you reading on it? Good investment?
RICK NEWMAN: Well, I mean, I’m sure Trump is making money off of this. There’s no question – I mean, he’s getting the money right off the top because this is standard Trump format, which is that it’s not his company. He licenses his name and he gets a sweep right off the top for everything they sell. So I think this is money straight in for Trump, and I don’t think it matters what — even if these things would go to zero in the secondary market, I think Trump has already gotten his money by then.
But look, other former presidents at this point, after they’ve been out of office, they start their libraries. Jimmy Carter worked on suffrage in a bunch of other countries. And some of them, I guess, were trying to plan for what their political future might be. Barack Obama developed a Netflix program.
Trump sells goods. That’s– he’s– that’s what he’s doing. He is a showman. And I guess he’s always a showman. And I just can’t imagine how this is going to morph into his 2024 presidential campaign, but I can’t wait.
DAVE BRIGGS: Well, I can tell you what. Digital World Acquisition Company is down 9% today, so apparently they don’t like it. Where do you rank it with Trump Water, Trump Vodka, Trump Airlines and some of the true beauties?
RICK NEWMAN: Honestly, that’s why I wanted to buy this. And my purpose is not to make $82 for Yahoo Finance. My goal is just to follow this and see what happens. So some of these Trump–some of these Trump-com-ons were really outright scams, and some of them were just cheesy.
So I think Trump Water is just cheesy. I think Trump University was a total sham. And that’s really what I’m looking for here. So I will have a story about this at some point in the future. At the moment, I’m just enjoying myself, guys.
JARED BLIKRE: Me too. Looking forward to the story. I have nothing to add to this conversation.
DAVE BRIGGS: Clearly.
JARED BLIKRE: I think we have done it thoroughly.
DAVE BRIGGS: We noticed.
JARED BLIKRE: Yes. Yahoo Finance’s Rick Newman, thanks as always.
RICK NEWMAN: Hate guys.
