An Abu Dhabi royal known as the “spy sheikh” reportedly bought a massive stake in the Trump family’s crypto firm for half a billion dollars in secret just four days before President Trump took office.
Two months later, the Trump administration allowed the United Arab Emirates access to 500,000 of the most advanced AI chips each year – a sharp reversal from Biden-era export curbs, according to The Wall Street Journal.
Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan – a bearded, wiry man almost never seen without his signature dark sunglasses – entered into a deal with the Trump family to purchase a 49% stake in World Liberty Financial, The Journal reported, citing company documents and sources.
The deal – which was signed by Eric Trump, the president’s son – would pay $187 million to the Trump family upfront, according to the Journal.
It would also set aside $31 million for entities affiliated with the family of Steve Witkoff, a World Liberty co-founder and Trump’s longtime golfing buddy who was named US envoy to the Middle East just a few weeks prior, according to the report.
Tahnoon – the United Arab Emirates’ national security adviser and brother to the Gulf monarchy’s president – had been pushing the US for access to AI chips after the Biden administration sought to restrict exports over concerns they could be diverted to China.
It raised questions around whether the deal violates the emoluments clause of the Constitution, which blocks the president from receiving profits from foreign governments through his businesses, The Journal noted.
Tahnoon’s AI firm G42 had earlier raised concerns among American lawmakers for its close ties to sanctioned Chinese firms like Huawei, according to the report.
After Trump’s re-election, though, Tahnoon met with Trump, Witkoff and other US officials several times, including a visit to the White House in March, sources told the newspaper.
Just a few months later, the Trump administration granted the UAE access to 500,000 advanced chips yearly – demanding the equivalent of more than two Hoover Dams worth of power, and enough to build one of the largest-ever data center sites, according to The Journal.
Roughly one-fifth of those chips were slated to go to G42, the report said.
White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly told The Post that Trump’s assets are in a trust managed by his children and there are “no conflicts of interest,” and that Witkoff has “spent considerable time away from his family” on his own dime to advance “goals of peace around the world.”
She accused legacy media outlets of spreading lies and “lodging smears” against Trump officials.
“President Trump performs his constitutional duties in an ethically sound manner and to suggest so otherwise is either ill-informed or malicious,” White House counsel David Warrington told The Post.
Warrington said Witkoff has divested from World Liberty Financial and does not “participate in any official matters that could impact his financial interests.”
The 49% stake sale would make Tahnoon’s firm Aryam Investment 1 the largest shareholder in World Liberty Financial, and add two Aryam execs – who also held top roles at G42 – to World Liberty’s five-person board, The Journal reported, citing documents.
A few weeks before the UAE chips deal was announced in May, World Liberty CEO Zach Witkoff – Steve Witkoff’s son – announced that MGX, another Tahnoon-backed company, would use World Liberty’s stablecoin to complete a $2 billion investment in Binance.
That helped skyrocket World Liberty’s stablecoin – USD1, which is pegged to the US dollar – up the rankings of the largest stablecoins, according to The Journal.
In October 2025, Trump pardoned Binance founder Changpeng Zhao, who had pleaded guilty to violating anti-money laundering rules. People close to UAE royals had been pressuring the Trump administration to pardon Zhao, The Journal reported.
Tahnoon’s MGX is also one of the investors behind the new joint venture operating TikTok in the US, under a deal negotiated by the Trump administration.
MGX is also one of the investors backing Stargate, a $500 billion data center project involving OpenAI and SoftBank that Trump unveiled on his first full day in office, but has yet to announce much progress.
Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner also raised $1.5 billion for his investment firm in 2024 from a Tahnoon-backed company, according to The Journal.
