Topline
Former President Donald Trump’s net worth ticked up over $400 million on Thursday as shares of the parent company behind his social media platform Truth Social shot up over 8%, giving the 2024 GOP presidential nominee his latest windfall, though he will not be able to liquidate that bonus just yet, even as he’s ordered to pay over $550 million in three civil judgments.
Former President Donald Trump’s net worth stands at a comfortable $7.5 billion, according to Forbes’ ... [+]
Key Facts
Shares of Truth Social parent Trump Media & Technology Group Corp. shot up nearly 8% on Thursday, closing at just under $49 per share, reversing a single-day drop on Wednesday.
Shares of the parent company had climbed earlier this week to a three-week high at $47 per share on the heels of the company’s move to protect against short sellers—investors who profit from a declining share price—and Trump took in another $1.8 billion on Tuesday when he secured 36 million shares of TMTG, increasing his majority stake to 64.9%.
Thursday’s stock boost comes as Trump Media CEO Devin Nunes urged the GOP chairs of multiple House committees to investigate a group of financial firms over potential short selling of Trump Media shares, according to a securities filing released Thursday.
In that filing, Nunes called for “quick action” to “protect retail shareholders, identify wrongdoers, and determine whether any laws including RICO statutes and tax evasion laws have been violated,” citing “anomalies in DJT trading.”
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Contra
Despite the windfall, Trump will not be able to immediately cash out on his shares—or put it toward the remainder of his $454 million civil fraud judgment in New York—due to a set of lock-up restrictions keeping his and other executives’ shares in place. Those restrictions, which are common in newly public companies as a means to prevent market volatility, prevent Trump from dumping his shares for another five months.
Forbes Valuation
With the extra $400 million, Forbes estimates Trump’s net worth now stands at roughly $7.5 billion, making him the 349th richest person in the world. A substantial chunk of his valuation comes from his expansive $1.1 billion real estate portfolio as of March, plus another $810 million in golf clubs and resorts, including his south Florida Mar-a-Lago estate.
Key Background
Acquisition firm Digital World Acquisition Corp. announced in March TMTG would go public under the ticker DJT, culminating a months-long and delayed move to bring Truth Social to Wall Street. After one day, Trump’s net worth more than doubled, with the former president making over $4 billion off his majority stake in the Nasdaq-traded company. TMTG’s debut marked Trump’s latest windfall following a host of merchandising initiatives, including his comic-book style NFT trading cards and his $399 custom sneaker launched earlier this year, though Trump has also taken repeated blows from three civil judgments. In January, Trump was ordered to pay $83.3 million to writer E. Jean Carroll in a defamation suit stemming from an allegation of sexual assault, adding to the $5 million Trump was previously ordered to pay Carroll in a separate judgment. Two months later, Trump was ordered to fork up over $454 million after being found liable in his New York civil fraud case for inflating the value of his assets. A judge in New York later ruled Trump could delay the full payment and post a partial bond of $175 million.
