Trump’s New ‘Media And Technology Group’ Will Go Public In What Some See As A Clever New Way To Fleece His Supporters: The Stock Market

Can you say: Redirection? While the January 6th committee continues its investigation into the possible role Donald Trump might have played in the Capitol insurrection, Trump is on to the next thing—and he can’t make it happen fast enough.

On Wednesday, the former president—who has been booted off just about every legit social media platform the average American uses—announced that he was finally making good on his promise/threat to launch his very own social media site. It’s called TRUTH Social, which would actually be funny if it was tongue-in-cheek. But it’s not. The site will be run by a brand-new Trump company, the Trump Media & Technology Group, which might be one of the only Trump organizations that isn’t currently under investigation, but give it time. Because the other part of the announcement is that the Trump Media & Technology Group—yes, the company you had never heard of until yesterday—is also going public. So how exactly does that work?

Here’s the short version, a.k.a. Shady Stonks 101: Trump Media & Technology Group went public via a SPAC, which means it’s a “special purpose acquisition company,” or what’s more typically known as a “blank check company” or a shell corporation. Essentially, it’s a way to get a company listed on the stock market as a way to attract private investors who don’t want to deal with the whole IPO hullabaloo.

Twitter user @BillSPACman, who runs a substack specifically about SPACs, gave a great rundown of what he found out about the company, which is already shady as hell. You should read the whole thread, but here’s what he has so far uncovered:

In its marketing materials, Trump Media & Technology Group notes that its targeted competitors are Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, Google, Disney, and Hulu.

The company’s CEO is former investment banker Patrick F. Orlando, who is based in… Wuhan, China? And who purchased $11 million worth of shares a month ago, long before the news of the SPAC was made public.

The company’s CFO is Luis Orleans-Braganza, whom The Wrap describes as “a right-wing royalist and member of Brazil’s national legislature.”

Together, Orlando and Orleans-Braganza had a $7 billion SPAC with Giga Energy Inc. that fell apart just last month.

The company’s official address is a WeWork in Downtown Miami.

Others who weighed in on the deal were also skeptical:

John Aravosis, editor of Americablog News, was much more direct in his criticism of the transaction:

Trump now claims he’s going to launch a social media company that’s going to go public via a SPAC. In other words, they’re going to sell stock. So he’s going to fleece his own supporters, again. I give the man credit, he always finds a new way to profit off his own people.

This is certainly one way to get people talking about something other than January 6th.

(Via @BillSPACman)