Justin Sun’s TRON stock is dying

Justin Sun, the creator and face of TRON, went public with a company called TRON Inc. last year. Since then, its price has tumbled from a high of $12.80 to a recent close of $1.36 — a fall of nearly 90% in eight months.

But what exactly does TRON Inc. do and why is it fairing so poorly？

A toy company with a TRON treasury

TRON Inc. “specialize[s] in creating imaginative, high-quality toys and products that celebrate the worlds most beloved characters.”

These beloved characters include The Smurfs, Zoonicorns, and ICEE. However, TRON doesnt control the intellectual property for these brands; instead it produces related merchandise, including, but not limited to, plushies, backpacks, and dinnerware.

A smattering of the merchandise TRON Inc. offers.

For some reason, it also purchased the rights to the film The Kid, starring Ethan Hawke, Chris Pratt, and Vincent DOnofrio (RottenTomatoes: 43%, IMDb: 5.9/10).

Importantly, however, that‘s not everything. There’s also TRX.

The company calls the TRX token “an attractive digital asset which can create long-term value for… shareholders.”

It claims, “Our TRX token strategy generally involves from time to time… (i) issuing debt or equity securities or engaging in other capital raising transactions with the objective of using the proceeds to purchase TRK tokens, and (ii) acquiring TRX tokens with our liquid assets that exceed working capital requirements.”

What TRON Inc. is engaging in is akin to the Strategy Bitcoin Treasury concept, but with fewer guardrails, a very small product line outside of the TRX token treasury, and a just as significant dependence on unrealized gains.

A family company failing miserably

While TRON Inc. is now basically a penny stock, barely sitting above the $1/share price, Sun has built up a strange board of directors.

This board includes his father Weike Sun, who‘s being paid in private investment in public equity (PIPE) offerings and warrants, and a 27-year-old blockchain investor and Chinese national named Zi Yang, who also works for Tronscan (the barely functional explorer that’s supposed to allow TRX users to view wallet addresses and transactions on the blockchain).

The executive leadership and board of directors have collectively been able to accumulate millions of shares of TRON Inc. through these PIPE offerings and warrants (Weike Sun isnt listed as an insider).

No real path to profitability

Outside issuing debt to fund more TRX purchases, TRON Inc.‘s 10-Q from September points to a company that’s completely unprofitable, with no path toward a way of making money.

Its merchandising business, when coupled with operating expenses and the cost of sales, is a net loser for the company, and without the unrealized gains from TRX tokens and the unrealized gains from staking TRX tokens, it bled over $5 million last year.

Without the unrealized gains from TRX and staking TRX, TRON Inc. bled over $5 million last year.

How TRON Inc. is able to profit from the unrealized gains of its crypto treasury is unclear. However, what‘s more understandable is that it’s essentially become a vehicle for Justin Sun to purchase hundreds of millions of TRX tokens to prop up the price of his personal cryptocurrency.

Since Sun rang the opening bell on Nasdaq, TRON Inc. is down ~90%, but TRX is down only 9%, in stark contrast to bitcoin which is down more than 43% over the same period.