When Donald Trump offered some financial advice on social media, stocks were wavering between gains and losses.
But that was about to change.
“THIS IS A GREAT TIME TO BUY!!! DJT,” he wrote on his social media platform Truth Social at 9.37am on Wednesday.
Less than four hours later, the US president announced a 90-day pause on nearly all his tariffs. Stocks soared on the news, closing up 9.5 per cent by the end of trading. The market, measured by the S&P 500, gained back about $US4 trillion ($A6.5 trillion), or 70 per cent, of the value it had lost over the previous four trading days.
It was a prescient call by the president. Maybe too prescient.
“He’s loving this, this control over markets, but he better be careful,” said Trump critic and former White House ethics lawyer, Richard Painter, noting that securities law prohibits trading on insider information or helping others do so.
“The people who bought when they saw that post made a lot of money.”
The question is, was Trump already contemplating the tariff pause when he made that post?
Asked about when he arrived at his decision, Trump gave a muddled answer.
“I would say this morning,” he said.
“Over the last few days, I’ve been thinking about it. Fairly early this morning.”
Asked for clarification on the timing in an email to the White House later, a spokesman didn’t answer directly but defended Trump’s post as part of his job.
“It is the responsibility of the president of the United States to reassure the markets and Americans about their economic security in the face of nonstop media fearmongering,” wrote White House spokesman Kush Desai.
Another curiosity of the posting was Trump’s signoff with his initials.
DJT is also the stock symbol for Trump Media and Technology Group, the parent company of the president’s social media platform Truth Social.
It is not clear if Trump was saying buying stocks in general, or Trump Media in particular. The White House was asked, but didn’t address that either. Trump did not include “DJT” on his other posts Wednesday but he does use it intermittently, typically to emphasise that he has personally written the message.
The ambiguity about what Trump meant didn’t stop people from pouring money into that stock.
Trump Media closed up 22.67 per cent, soaring twice as much as the broader market, a stunning performance by a company that lost $US400 million ($A650 million) in 2024 and is seemingly unaffected by whether tariffs would be imposed or paused.
Trump’s 53 per cent ownership stake in the company, now in a trust controlled by his oldest son, Donald Trump Jr., rose by $US415 million ($A674 million) on the day.
Trump Media was bested, albeit by only two-hundreds of a percentage point, by another Trump administration stock pick — Elon Musk’s Tesla.
In March, Trump held an extraordinary news conference outside the White House praising the company and its cars. That was followed by a Fox TV appearance by his commerce secretary urging viewers to buy the stock.
Tesla’s surge on Wednesday added $US20 billion ($A32 billion) to Musk’s fortunes.
Kathleen Clark, a government ethics law expert at Washington University School of Law, says Trump’s post in other administrations would have been investigated, but is not likely not to trigger any reaction, save for maybe more Truth Social viewers.
“He’s sending the message that he can effectively and with impunity manipulate the market,” she said.
“As in: Watch this space for future stock tips.”
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