Topline
Former President Donald Trump, who was found guilty Thursday on 34 felony counts for falsifying records, became a much less rich man Friday, as shares of the social media company that constitute a majority of his net worth tanked.
A jury convicted Trump of felony crimes for falsifying business records
Steven Hirsch
Key Facts
Shares of Trump Media, parent company of the Truth Social social media platform traded under the ticker $DJT, fell 5% by Friday afternoon.
That downward swing initially came after Trump, who owns 65% of the company, became a convicted felon, with shares falling about 9% in the first hour of limited after hours trading following the Thursday afternoon verdict.
Trump Media’s stock remarkably was up over 5% in pre-market trading Friday before turning negative again during normal hours, a positive move apparently linked to social media momentum among Trump’s supporters to put their financial weight behind Trump, further evidence of the highly volatile and often confounding activity for the stock.
The share price drop amounts to a $316 million decline in the value of Trump’s shares.
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Forbes Valuation
Trump’s net worth was $7.5 billion Friday morning, according to our latest calculations, making him the 357th-richest person on the planet. That’s down from his $7.8 billion net worth as of market close Thursday, when he was the 334th-richest person in the world. A majority of Trump’s fortune stems from his $5.6 billion stake in Trump Media, holdings that were worth $5.9 billion as of Thursday.
Crucial Quote
“All this noise” is because the largely retail investor base trading Trump Media shares are “trying to unravel after the fact” the implications of the verdicts on the stock, Yale School of Management professor Raphael Duguay explained to Forbes. “People are forming their beliefs and they’re not behaving like a hedge fund that would have hired lawyers to really understand the implication of a verdict like these before and then then have a trading rule that’s preset,” Duguay continued.
Key Background
Trump Media went public in March via a reverse merger with a blank-check company after two years of regulatory and legal hiccups. In its two months on the public markets, Trump Media has performed shockingly well, and its after hours share price is still about 25% higher than its blank-check predecessor’s stock traded at before the merger’s completion. The strong performance appears to be entirely divorced from Trump Media’s financial reality, as its $771,000 in revenue during the first three months of 2024 is not exactly what a fundamental-focused investor would expect out of a company with a market capitalization of $9 billion.
Tangent
In Oct. 2021, Trump Media took the unusual step of disclosing the potential of a “materially disruptive” event for potential shareholders should Trump be convicted of a felony. Despite owning most of the company, Trump is not a member of Trump Media’s board of directors, though his son Donald Trump Jr. and other allies are.
For in-depth coverage of the Trump verdict and implications, view our coverage linked below.
Further Reading
