Trump Media stock yo-yos following guilty verdict

As of 12:00 p.m. ET, shares of Trump Media were down more than 7%. That followed a pre-market spike that sent shares briefly within sight of 52-week highs and a drop of as much as 14% following the verdict yesterday. A press conference by Trump on Friday morning did not give the stock any immediate boost. (In fact, share prices fell slightly as he continued to talk, then dropped further after he finished.)

Simply put: Investors seemingly just don’t know what to do with the news yet.

Overall, the parent company of Truth Social shored up support in the days leading to the verdict. Over the past five days, Trump Media shares are up 12%—though they’re down 1% in the past month.

Individual investors own much of the company’s stock, and most of them are Trump loyalists. The stock price is seen by some observers as a way to track their reactions to the trial, as prices fluctuated when news emerged from the courtroom over the past few weeks.

The Trump campaign and its allies have been utilizing the trial, and now the verdict, to boost fundraising. Following the conviction, the Republican Party’s WinRed fundraising platform collapsed as people seemingly rushed to donate.

Meanwhile, the financials at Trump Media have been less robust. The company has reported steep losses and unremarkable revenue so far. In the first quarter, it reported an operating loss of $12.1 million as revenue sank 30% from a year ago to $770,000.

Trump is the company’s largest shareholder, but he has long been identified as the company’s biggest risk as well. Two years ago, Digital World Acquisition Corp. (Trump Media’s SPAC partner) filled five pages with warnings about the former president in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

“If President Trump becomes less popular or there are further controversies that damage his credibility or the desire of people to use a platform associated with him, and from which he will derive financial benefit, TMTG’s results of operations could be adversely affected,” the filing read, later adding “Neither the personal nor political conduct of President Trump, even if such conduct could negatively reflect on TMTG’s reputation or brand or be considered offensive, dishonest, illegal, immoral, or unethical, or otherwise harmful to TMTG’s brand or reputation, shall be considered a breach of the license agreement.”