Trump Media & Technology Group The stock is in free fall (again).
After the lock-up period for Donald Trump’s shares came to an end on FridayShares of Trump Media – the company that owns the former president’s social media site, Truth Social – have fallen to a new low. Shares fell 8% to trade at $12.44 Monday afternoon.
That brought the company’s market capitalization to $2.5 billion, a drop of almost 80% from its market capitalization high flying days in the wake of its Nasdaq debut on March 26.
Despite speculation, Trump himself said so earlier this month he has “absolutely” no plans to dump his stake in the company – even though he would make more than $2 billion from a potential stock sale.
“The reason I built it is because I don’t want my voice to be suppressed,” Trump said at a press conference on September 13 at his golf course near Los Angeles. “A lot of people think that my shares, you know, they’re worth billions of dollars, but I don’t want to sell my shares. I don’t need money.”
Trump owns 114.75 million shares of Trump Media, or about 60% of the company’s outstanding shares. In one regulatory filing in June, Trump Media cited Trump’s divestiture from the company as one of the biggest risks to its business.
But even with Trump holding on to his shares, that’s true significantly depreciated the past few weeks, incl after his debate performance against Vice President Kamala Harris.
That’s because much of the company’s success is tied to the former president’s personal and political fortunes. The company itself has warned in documents that “negative reactions to publicity regarding [Trump]or the loss of its services, could adversely affect TMTG’s revenues and results of operations.”
As the presidential elections approach, the stock may continue to face challenges. John Rekenthaler, vice president of research at Morningstar (MORN), previously told Quartz that he “would expect the stock price to go to zero or something close to that [Trump] would lose the elections.”