'This could look bad': Why Trump could dump his majority stake in Truth Social in 30 days

20 August 2024

In 30 days, former President Donald Trump may be about to tank his own company in order to save himself, as he'll be legally able to liquidate his tens of millions of shares in the media company trading under his initials.

Bloomberg reported Tuesday that the ex-president will soon be allowed to sell as many of the roughly 78 million shares he owns in Trump Media and Technology Group (TMTG), which is trading under $DJT on the Nasdaq Composite, as he wants. TMTG was only able to launch its IPO (initial public offering) by merging with a Special Purpose Acquisition Company (SPAC) named Digital World Acquisitions. And under the merger agreement he and his business partners, Andy Litinsky and Wes Moss, signed prior to its March IPO, Trump has to hold onto his stake until at least September 20.

Trump currently owes more than half a billion dollars in multiple civil judgments against him in 2023 and 2024, all of which he is currently appealing. This includes a $454 million judgment for defrauding the State of New York in artificially inflating the value of his real estate assets, $83 million for defaming former Elle columnist E. Jean Carroll — who accused him of sexually assaulting her in a New York department store in the 1990s — and another $5 million for sexually abusing the writer.

Should Trump liquidate his stake in TMTG could cover his judgments, it could end up devaluing the company to the point where its shares become effectively worthless. New York University professor Michael Ohlrogge, who is an expert on SPACs, told Bloomberg that if the former president offloads his approximately 78 million shares in TMTG, it may "be perceived as sending a signal about his lack of confidence in the company."

"This could look bad in its own right, and a drop in share price could look bad for him as well," Ohlrogge said.

As Investopedia reported in 2022, a sell-off by majority stakeholders (defined as "the accelerated selling of securities, including stocks, bonds, commodities, and currencies beyond the daily ebb and flow of market prices") could signal to investors that their stocks have no real value. This typically triggers a mass dumping of shares by institutional and retail investors alike, rendering the company into a penny stock.

Bloomberg reported that the value of $DJT — which is currently trading at an all-time low of $21.56 per share according to Yahoo Finance — is better seen as a barometer of Trump's chances to win back the White House, as opposed to the company's performance. TMTG's balance sheet is deep in the red, with the outlet reporting that the company has a staggering $344 million in losses in the first six months of 2024 compared to just $1.6 million in sales.

Despite the stock's poor current performance, it could get lose even more value between now and September 20. Two days before the window opens for Trump to potentially offload his shares, he'll be sentenced in New York to as many as 20 years in prison for his 34 felony convictions.

TMTG's share price has already been precipitously declining since July 21, when President Joe Biden announced he was exiting the 2024 race. When markets opened on Monday, July 22, the stock was trading at more than $35 per share. In the weeks since Biden dropped out and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris, TMTG has shed another $14 off of its share price.

While TMTG representatives didn't respond to inquiries from Bloomberg, they've said in the past that speculation about whether Trump would dump his shares was "utterly baseless," and "without any conceivable sign anywhere that he plans to do so."

Click here to read Bloomberg's report in full (subscription required).

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