Four days before US President Donald Trump’s inauguration in 2025, lieutenants of Abu Dhabi’s royal “spy sheikh” signed a deal with the American president’s family to buy a 49 percent stake in their growing cryptocurrency venture for half a billion dollars, a new report said, citing company documents and people familiar with the matter.
Abu Dhabi’s royal Sheikh Tahnun bin Zayed Al Nahyan is behind the deal. (AFP/File Photo)According to the deal with World Liberty Financial, the buyers will pay half upfront, giving the Trump family entity $187 million, and the deal was signed by Eric Trump, the president’s son, the Wall Street Journal reported. What is noteworthy about this deal is that a foreign government official took a major ownership stake in the initiative of the incoming US president.
Who is ‘Spy Sheikh’?The Abu Dhabi royal behind the deal is Sheikh Tahnun bin Zayed Al Nahyan, who is demanding access to protected artificial intelligence chips from the United States, the report said, citing people familiar with the matter.
Tahnun, sometimes referred to as the “spy sheikh”, is the brother of the president of the UAE and serves as the national security adviser to the UAE government, as well as the head of the country’s largest wealth fund.
Notably, he is responsible for overseeing an empire of more than $1.3 trillion that is financed by his personal wealth and government funds. Tahnoon is one of the world’s most powerful single investors.
How was the deal made?Trump’s re-entry into office paved the way for the “spy sheikh” to get AI hardware that he wasn’t able to during the Joe Biden-led administration.
Following Trump’s election, Tahnoon held a series of meetings with Trump and US Ambassador Steve Wittkoff, including a visit to the White House. During that visit, he said he was interested in working with Washington on artificial intelligence and other areas, the report said.
Two months after the March meeting, the administration agreed to give the small Gulf state access to about 500,000 advanced AI chips per year. This amount would be enough to build one of the largest AI data center networks in the world Under the framework agreement, about one-fifth of the chips were set to go to the G42, The Journal previously reported.
Arium InvestmentsOf the first $250 million in payments from a Tahnun-backed firm called Arium Investments 1, $187 million went to Trump family-related companies DT Marks DEFI LLC and DT Marks SC LLC, according to the documents.
In addition to payments to Witkoff family-related companies, another $31 million was sent to a company associated with co-founders Jack Folkman and Chase Hero.
The deal will make Arium World Liberty’s largest shareholder and its only known investor outside the founders. The deal also places two Arium executives who hold senior roles at Tahnun’s G42 on World Liberty’s five-member board. At the time, the board included Jack Wittkoff, son of Eric Trump and Steve Wittkoff, the documents said.
On January 16, 2025, Arium representatives signed a $500 million deal with Trump and Wittkoff’s company, World Liberty.
On Trump’s first full day in office, five days after Arium World completed a deal with Liberty, the president announced plans at the White House for a $500 billion, AI-focused data center project involving OpenAI and SoftBank. Tahnun’s MGX was named as one of two additional investors.
On May 8, the Treasury Department said it was launching a fast-track pilot scheme for foreign investors. This was the expedited review process that the UAE was seeking.
During Trump’s visit to Abu Dhabi later that month, he announced that the two countries had reached a “very big deal” for the UAE to buy US-made AI chips. After further negotiations, the Trump administration later approved the sale of 35,000 chips to the G42, less than what the UAE had sought.
What people say about the dealA person familiar with Tahnun’s investment told the Journal that Sheikh and his team studied World Liberty’s plans for “several months” before he and “several co-investors” completed their investment. The funding did not come from G42, the person said. “At no time during or after that due diligence was the investment discussed with President Trump,” the source said. The person added that Tahnun is a “significant investor” in the cryptocurrency company.
White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly said President Trump acts only in the best interests of the American people. He added that Trump’s assets are held in a trust managed by his children and said that ” There is no conflict of interest.” Kelly also said Witkoff is working to “advance President Trump’s goals of peace around the world.”
A Trump Organization spokeswoman said the organization “takes its ethical obligations very seriously and is deeply committed to preventing conflicts of interest,” and that it follows all applicable laws, according to the report.
