Geoff Bennett:
President Trump is selling early access to his social media posts. His company recently launched Truth API, a subscription service giving businesses and trading firms a first look at posts from the president and other high-profile accounts, the price tag reportedly up to $100,000 a month.
Critics are raising alarms because that head start means paying customers see market-moving statements from a sitting president before the public does.
For more, we’re joined now by Bobby Allyn, technology correspondent for NPR.
Bobby, it’s always good to see you.
So break down how this actually works. The service is already live. How much sooner are subscribers seeing these posts from President Trump?
Bobby Allyn, Business and Technology Reporter, NPR: So it’s called Truth API, and basically investment banks, hedge funds, and other investors can get a sneak peek at President Trump’s posts on TRUTH Social maybe a couple milliseconds before the rest of the public.
But when we’re talking about high frequency trading and other types of really fast Wall Street trading, I mean, Geoff, the difference of a few milliseconds could be tens of millions of dollars easily. And, remember, I mean, Trump regularly turns to TRUTH Social to make announcements about the war in Iran, economic news, maybe announce some kind of big government contract with a private company.
So this is information Wall Street traders would really like to get before anyone else. So potentially this is going to be a really lucrative new line of revenue for the Trump family.
Geoff Bennett:
President Trump is the largest shareholder in TRUTH Social’s parent company, which his son Don Jr. controls through a through a trust. So when the president’s own posts can move markets, as we know they so often do, how is the company defending against the allegations of insider trading?
Bobby Allyn:
What the Trump company says is that they are just sharing what they call public information with Wall Street, and they say, look, the president’s posts and the posts of other high-profile users on TRUTH Social has a lot of value to Wall Street traders, and maybe some are even willing to pay the $1.2 million a year to get a jump-start, get a head-start, get early access to some of these posts.
So when — I talked to the spokeswoman for the Trump Media Company, and she says all these accusations of insider trading, all these accusations that we’re offering material nonprofit information to traders are completely false because it’s public information.
But, again, Geoff, I talked to many people who study Wall Street and former SEC enforcers who said, no, this is not public information because the very service is offering it to people before the rest of the world. I mean, that is the value add. You can get Trump’s posts before anyone else.
So experts told me that is the definition of material nonpublic information, and one executive at a very large Wall Street firm told me, if this was any other administration, this would be considered criminal. And I put that to the Trump media spokesperson, and she said that is absurd.
Geoff Bennett:
Based on your reporting, do you know which firms have signed up for this service?
Bobby Allyn:
It’s a great question, and we don’t know just yet. As far as I can tell, I mean, Citadel, Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan, all of the big Wall Street players are staying mum on this.
And I asked one of my sources who is an executive on Wall Street why this might be. And they said, look, no one is going to stick their neck out and potentially land in the crosshairs of President Trump right now.
But adopting this, if you’re a big Wall Street bank, just really exposes you to potential law enforcement investigation or an SEC probe in the next administration if the next administration sees this a little differently.
So while this does fit into the larger narrative for Trump, the Trump Media Company, of trying to monetize access to power, access to the president, and they’re hailing this as a huge win for Wall Street traders in terms of having a leg up, having an edge on everyone else, big Wall Street banks, as far as I can tell, are not widely adopting it just yet.
But it’s a good question. Who has signed up? The company says they have customers, but they won’t say who.
Geoff Bennett:
When it comes to matters of precedent, clearly, we’ve never had a sitting president with his own social media company that he actively uses.
Have we ever seen a social media company sell early access like this before?
Bobby Allyn:
Offering sort of API access, it’s what is called, sort of back-end data, is something that all the major social media platforms offer. Many of the big social media companies charge a sort of monthly or annual fee for this.
But the real difference here, Geoff, is, this isn’t just data from a social media company. These are posts from the sitting president of the United States. There are some people, scholars, who say that every time Trump makes a TRUTH Social post, that is an official government record.
And because of that, it is being viewed by critics of the president as a type of insider trading, that he is basically monetizing the proprietary information of the U.S. government. If he was just a private citizen and he was offering early access to his and other posts, I think we wouldn’t be having the same discussion.
But because he’s a sitting president, this is just being examined under a very critical legal lens right now.
Geoff Bennett:
Bobby Allyn of NPR.
Bobby, thank you for sharing your reporting with us tonight.
Bobby Allyn:
Thanks, Geoff.
