- Former US Pres. Donald Trump's net worth increased to more than $400M Thursday after Truth Social parent company Trump Media & Technology Group Corp. (TMTG) stock rose 8% to just shy of $49 a share. Forbes (LR: 3 CP: 5)
- The stock rise comes after TMTG Chief Executive Officer Devin Nunes in a securities filing requested multiple GOP chairs of House committees investigate several financial firms that are short selling the company's shares. Forbes (LR: 3 CP: 5)
- TMTG stock has gone through many value fluctuations since the company merged with a special purpose acquisition vehicle in order to go public in March. It has traded for as little as $23 and for as much as $66. Barrons
- Previously this week, Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee for the 2024 presidential election, was awarded 36M shares as a result of the stock hitting certain price benchmarks — increasing his total ownership to 114M shares valued at a total of approximately $5.2B. Associated Press (LR: 3 CP: 5)
- However, Trump is prohibited from selling any shares for six months because TMTG went public without a waiver from the company's board that would allow him to sell sooner. Associated Press (LR: 3 CP: 5)
- This comes as data from Similarweb, a data intelligence company, shows Truth Social's average number of daily active users dropped nearly 20% year over year in April and dropped 4% during the last month alone. CNN (LR: 2 CP: 5)
Pro-Trump narrative:
- TMTG is doing all it can through Securities and Exchange Commission filings and potential Congressional action to make sure retail investors who believe in the company don't get exploited by short sellers. By standing up for its investors, TMTG is maintaining the value worthy of anything related to a billionaire businessman who could be the next US president.
NEWSWEEK (LR: 1 CP: 5)
Anti-Trump narrative:
- TMTG is a meme stock and, as is the case with all meme stocks, there's never a rhyme or reason for their success or failure in the early going. In this case, Trump's notoriety could be affecting the stock price. But eventually, all meme stocks settle at a realistic price, and TMTG might not be able to overcome its poor business performance.
BUSINESS INSIDER (LR: 3 CP: 4)
Nerd narrative:
- There's a 50% chance that Trump's net worth in 2024 will be at least $2.4B, according to the Metaculus prediction community.
METACULUS (LR: 3 CP: 3)