Trump Media Technology launches high-speed data stream of presidential posts, triggering collective boycott on Wall Street
Trump's social media company plans to provide high-speed priority access to the president's posts for a fee, as Wall Street's opposition continues to grow. Executives across major industries resisted the paid service and worried about the legal risks. Trump Media Technology Group (TMTG), a Nasdaq-listed company, operates Trump’s social platform Truth Social. The company launched a new data service last week, which allows organizations to obtain the content of posts from the top accounts of the platform with millisecond latency. According to multiple people familiar with the matter, the monthly fee for this service is as high as $100,000. This new product is another way for Trump to cash in on his status in the White House. According to the financial filing documents disclosed last month, Trump’s diversified business landscape will have total revenue of US$2.2 billion in 2025, and its business covers many fields such as cryptocurrency and Bible peripherals. However, this product also brings a series of legal problems to Wall Street financial institutions: Financial companies and their legal teams need to study and judge what potential compliance risks they may face if they spend money to get the president’s views and policy trends in advance. Many lawyers bluntly said that this product is full of legal minefields. Richard Painter, a professor of corporate law at the University of Minnesota and a former White House ethics adviser during the George W. Bush administration, said that institutions subscribing to the service may incur legal risks. “If I were the general counsel of any institutional investor, I would make it clear that unless Truth Social provides a written guarantee that any posts involving administrative actions of the U.S. government will not be leaked in advance, this service must not be used.” A White House spokesman declined to comment, referring media inquiries to Trump Media. A company spokesperson responded: "TruthAPI helps customers crawl all Truth Social's public data as quickly as possible. Critics have fabricated a new theory based on public information that can also constitute insider trading." Since it is difficult to predict the direction of the current government's policies, hedge funds and large investment institutions have long regarded Trump's posts on Truth Social as a key variable affecting the market prices of stocks, foreign exchange, commodities, and bonds. TMTG's official press release did not directly identify Trump's personal posts, but the promotion PPT for potential customers obtained by the media listed 10 presidential posts that had stirred the market. Typical cases include: Trump posted a post about "Liberation Day" tariffs last year, and U.S. stocks fell 12% in response; in June this year, he posted a post saying he would "strike Iran hard," and international oil prices soared in response. The promotional material also deliberately hinted that some investors had placed large bets before Trump released his blockbuster policy posts. For example, on March 23, before Trump announced that the US-Iran negotiations had made positive progress and oil prices plummeted, some institutions bet US$580 million in advance. TMTG said last week that many institutions have signed contracts to purchase; however, after the official announcement of the product, Trump’s posts have not yet contained content that can clearly influence the market. When Trump announced the latest tariff plan on Monday, he did not announce it through the Truth Social account. Even so, lawyers warned that there are still legal risks to the subscription because Trump holds a $1.1 billion stake in the company. James Cox, professor of corporate and securities law at Duke University, commented: "Trump and his White House team have no right to commercialize information generated during the performance of his duties." This paid preemptive service is equivalent to Trump using information related to public office for personal gain. A lawyer analyzed: The risk of liability under securities laws at the federal level is not extremely high, but state attorneys general have independent investigative powers, which is a more imminent risk. “State regulators have a variety of enforcement tools at their disposal to pursue accountability in this matter.” For high-frequency quantitative trading institutions, this high-speed data flow is of the highest value. In the high-frequency trading circuit, huge profits can be made by obtaining information milliseconds earlier than your opponents. A macro hedge fund executive said frankly: "His posts were enough to stir up the market, and we were forced to pay for access. Chaos is endless, and I would not be surprised if anything happens again now." Another macro hedge fund executive blasted the deal as "scandalous," but acknowledged that some hedge funds had to subscribe out of a fiduciary duty to clients to avoid falling behind in industry competition.
"This is a blatant abuse of public power. It has a very bad impression and is completely inconsistent with the neutral and impartial position that the president should have." A cryptocurrency trader commented. Many institutions also stated that their trading strategies do not require millisecond-level preemptive authority. A third hedge fund executive said: "It's just a few milliseconds. This is the key point for them to exploit. For institutions that are not trading at extremely high speeds, this advantage is actually very limited."
"This is a blatant abuse of public power. It has a very bad impression and is completely inconsistent with the neutral and impartial position that the president should have." A cryptocurrency trader commented. Many institutions also stated that their trading strategies do not require millisecond-level preemptive authority. A third hedge fund executive said: "It's just a few milliseconds. This is the key point for them to exploit. For institutions that are not trading at extremely high speeds, this advantage is actually very limited."