Trump Media & Technology Group (NASDAQ:DJT), operator of the social media platform Truth Social, began trading Tuesday on the tech-heavy NASDAQ.
Former U.S. President Donald Trump owns 80 million shares, or 58% of the company. Based on the current price of DJT shares, which were up by 42.94% mid-morning Tuesday to US$71.40 per share, his stake is worth about US$5.7 billion.
Trump will not be able to sell his shares for six months, which might prove costly given Trump Media’s history of dismal financial performance.
The company generated US$3.4 million in revenue – including US$49 million in losses – over the first nine months of 2023, which is about 160 times less than Reddit, a recent IPO. Despite this disparity, Wall Street valued Trump Media at about US$14 billion, with Reddit coming in at only US$6.4 billion.
Trump Media describes its flagship asset, Truth Social, as a social media platform that protects free expression against the censorship efforts of big tech corporations. According to CNN, the platform had 494,000 monthly active users in the U.S. across iOS and Android in February 2024, a far cry from 75 million on X (formerly known as Twitter) and 142 million on Facebook.
Trump Media & Technology Group, says this morning’s news release, “is dedicated to ending big tech’s assault on free speech by opening up the internet and giving people their voices back.”
DJT shares popped $7.06, or 12.2%, Wednesday to $65.05.
