The Trump White House Money Laundry
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Finally the Democrats are getting the word. Before the presidential election, I didn’t hear a dicky-bird from anyone about how Kamala Harris would lose for not addressing inflation, planting mines along the southern border, reaching out to young men or soccer moms, or making her case (without a lot of abortion bumper stickers) to Latinos who are already in the country.
Now I cannot walk past a phone, laptop, or television without hearing from a Democratic poobah—usually it’s James Carville riffing in his Cajun accent, although sometimes it’s Jen Psaki on MSNBC—listing all the reasons why Harris lost.
“She didn’t go on Rogan…she failed to come to Jesus on Gaza…too many kids skipped off happily to grade school only to come home the opposite sex…” I am sure you have heard it all.
Prior to the election, all that mattered was that she wasn’t either Donald Trump or Joe Biden. Now all that matters is how you can buy a piece of Donald Trump.
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The same day that Trump won back the presidency—November 5—his own Hole-in-the-Wall gang running Trump Media and Technology Group (TMG or just Trump Media) released its third quarter results and other SEC filings, proving yet again that the presidency only matters to Trump as a get-rich-quick scheme.
Trump didn’t run again for the White House to deal with Ukraine “with one phone call” or so that he could attend endless meetings on Social Security funding reforms. He ran, as he did in 2016, to stay one step ahead of the bailiffs and to rob trains.
In theory, Trump Media should be winding up its business, which, according to its filings, has this stated goal:
The mission of TMTG is to end Big Tech’s assault on free speech by opening up the Internet and giving people their voices back. TMTG operates Truth Social, a social media platform established as a safe harbor for free expression amid increasingly harsh censorship by Big Tech corporations.
Given that Trump has won the presidency and given that he has now appointed Elon Musk, the proprietor of X (emblematic of “Big Tech”), to head up what Trump is calling the Department of Government Efficiency, the reasons to hang on to Trump Media have gone away.
But Trump Media only ever truly had one “mission,” which was to set up a public company under Trump’s control that could act as a drain on his supporters’ cash and allow Trump bag men to use a stock market listing to collect direct “investments” in the new president.
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Don’t kid yourself for a minute thinking that Trump Media is an operating social media business or a going concern.
As of September 30, 2024, Trump Media posted nine-month revenue of $2.6 million, which was down from $3.3 million the year before, but stunning when you consider that the market capitalization of TMTG on that date was about $6 billion and that the company’s accumulated losses for the nine-month period were $363 million.
Plus the SEC filings indicate that the company hasn’t even been paid for the few ads that have run on its social media pages. The report notes: “Unearned revenue of $2,453.5 was recognized as revenue for the nine months ended September 30, 2024…”
So pretty much all of its revenue is fictitious, and the SEC states proudly that TMTG will not divulge traditional measurements (numbers of clients, etc.) of a social media concern.
Putting the above in layman’s language, the figures means that Trump Media has no paying customers, millions of dollars in start-up losses, no business plan that makes any sense, and a terrible management team consisting of Trump remittance men.
I doubt in the history of Nasdaq if there has ever been a company with a $6 billion market capitalization—and no revenue.
TMTG isn’t even a meme stock; it’s a cryptocurrency issued on the assumption that the likes of Tulsi Gabbard, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Matt Gaetz can bring down the American government.
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Trump Media does, however, now have a mountain of cash—close to $700 million, raised by flogging the dubious stock on both the gullible Trump base and directly to heavy hitters who are looking to corner the market of Trump’s presidency.
In exchange for not one dollar of investment capital, Trump was given close to 60% of the company’s outstanding shares.
In other words, Trump’s stake in Trump Media (a company with no earnings and accumulated loses ofclose to half a billion) is worth in today’s market about $3.5 billion. (As Trump’s cultural hero, Al Capone, liked to say: “You can go further with a smile and a gun, than with a smile alone.”)
Even if Trump Media’s stock price were to drop from $29 today to $3.5 (closer to its book or liquidation value), Trump would still have a claim on 60% of the balance sheet cash, about $420 million, again without having invested one dollar of seed capital.
All Trump has ever done for Trump Media is promise to post his social media messages there for six hours. After that, he’s free to post wherever he pleases, including on the site of his Department of Government Efficiency tsar’s social media company, X.
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During the third quarter of 2024, Trump Media raised an additional $339 million through the issuance of its common stock, which is why the company’s management can now boast that it has a “clean balance sheet” with no debt and almost $700 million in cash.
In theory, even a terrible management should be able to invest some of that money in operating businesses that could throw off earnings that pay better than money-market time deposits.
That could be promising if, say, Donald Trump had the investment chops of a Warren Buffett or Charlie Munger and if he was drawn to operating businesses that have good management and are selling at low multiples.
Buffett took the railroad Burlington Northern Santa Fe private for about $44 billion, and since the transaction he has realized more than $50 billion in dividends, while still retaining 100% of the business.
By contrast, in the third quarter Trump Media spent $132 million to acquire an entity called WorldConnect Technologies, LLC (WCT), so that the Trump social media mouthpiece can stream its own television and video content.
I cannot say whether the company paid too much for WCT, but I can say that WCT only has value if Trump Media remains a going concern. If it fails, in any resulting bankruptcy (something Trump does often and well) WCT will be valued at nothing.
* * *
Given that Trump is heading back to the White House and given that Elon Musk (the Dr. Evil of Big Tech when Trump Media was formed), does Trump Media have a role or future other than as Donald Trump’s piggy bank and black bag, through which sketchy oligarchs can buy influence with the incoming American president?
I think not. Where Trump Media shines is as a funnel into the money-hungry soul of Donald Trump.
Until mid-September, Trump’s shares in the company were “locked up” for six months, but since that deadline has passed, Trump has been free to sell his TMTG shares to anyone, including Vladimir Putin, the Saudi royal family, or Kim Jong Un, all of whom might well like, for example, to own 20% of Trump Media for $1.2 billion. In buying his shares, they can pay the money directly to President Donald Trump, and it’s all perfectly legal.
It’s the first time in American history that a president-elect or president has been listed on a major stock exchange.
Of course, another option is for Trump to sell his controlling 58% stake of TMTG to his new government efficiency expert, Elon Musk.
What could be more “efficient” for both Trump and Musk than for Trump to invoice his new best friend $1.2 billion for bringing him into the government in a cabinet-level position? As Bertolt Brecht liked to ask: “What is the robbing of a bank compared to the founding of a bank?”
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The real problem with Kamala Harris wasn’t that she was soft on transgenderism or that she could not control the border. Her problem was that she failed to conceive of the presidency as an initial public offering or leveraged buyout.
Trump ran on the platform that anyone who pays him can find a voice in his administration, and Musk, for example, showed the proper democratic spirit by passing out million–dollar checks on Trump’s behalf in the swing districts of western Pennsylvania. (Only for “little people” is the presidential contribution limit $3,300.)
When Trump talks about bringing back “market efficiency” to government, what he means is that the Trump presidency will be accessible to the highest bidders, and for the moment the most efficient way to settle your accounts with the incoming president is to buy shares in Trump Media (ticker symbol DJT).
After the polls closed, it was clear that Harris never could have won. By about 3 a.m. on November 6, it was evident that the country had its heart set on electing to the presidency a man with 34 felony convictions, adjudications as a sexual offender, pending cases under the sedition and espionage acts, and court judgments for fraud and defamation totaling almost half a billion dollars.
Unless Harris managed to come up with a similarly impressive rap sheet, she was never going to win the presidency. She was running as Sergeant Preston when what the country wanted was Butch Cassidy.
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