Trump Media Worth Almost as Much as Elon Musk’s X

Trump Media & Technology Group, which operates the Truth Social service, has seen its stock shoot up in recent days ahead of the Nov. 5 presidential election — and it is currently worth almost as much as Elon Musk‘s X, the social-media company formerly known as Twitter.

On Monday, shares of TMTG, which trade under the symbol “DJT,” were up more than 15% to over $45.08/share as of 11:04 a.m. ET, following Trump’s Sunday rally at New York City’s Madison Square Garden. That gives TMTG, which has reported total revenue of $1.6 million for the first half of 2024 and steep losses, a market cap of about $9 billion.

Musk, who acquired Twitter in 2022 in a $44 billion deal, has seen the value of the company — which he renamed X — since his takeover. According to a September disclosure by Fidelity, which owns a minority stake in X, implied that the company is valued at $9.4 billion, as reported by Forbes.

Trump beneficially owns 56.6% of TMTG’s outstanding shares, making his stake currently worth north of $5 billion.

Industry analysts believe the jump in TMTG’s stock price reflects growing enthusiasm among its investors that Trump will win the 2024 presidential election over VP Kamala Harris. Referring to TMTG’s surging stock price, Gene Munster, managing partner of venture-capital firm Deepwater Asset Management, told CNN in an article published Monday, “I’ve never seen anything quite like this. This company’s value is almost entirely based on the outcome of an election.”

Musk, the world’s richest individual who is the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, is also a major Trump backer. The techno-billionaire spoke Sunday at Trump’s MSG event.

TMTG hit a recent low closing price of $12.15 per share on Sept. 23 in the wake of the expiration of a six-month lockup period during which TMTG insiders were not allowed to sell their stock. Trump has said he has “absolutely no intention” of selling his shares.

TMTG, which has posted net losses to date, has not released any notable financial news. For the second quarter of 2024, TMTG reported $836,900 in net sales and a net loss of $16.37 million, per its 10-Q SEC filing for the period. For Q1, the company reported $770,500 in revenue and a net loss of $327.6 million; most of the loss for the first three months of the year was due to expenses associated with TMTG’s merger with special purpose acquisition company Digital World Acquisition Corp. to become a publicly traded company.

TMTG calls Truth Social a “safe harbor for free expression amid increasingly harsh censorship by Big Tech corporations.” Trump formed TMTG in 2021 after the former president had been kicked off Twitter (now called X), Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and other internet platforms, which said he had violated prohibitions against inciting violence in connection with the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.

Musk reinstated Trump’s account on X, and the former president also has been let back on Meta’s Facebook and Instagram, YouTube and others. However, Truth Social remains his preferred social media platform.

Truth Social launched in early 2022. The company has not disclosed how many people use Truth Social, saying in a recent filing that, “At this juncture in its development, TMTG believes that adhering to traditional key performance indicators, such as signups, average revenue per user, ad impressions and pricing, or active user accounts including monthly and daily active users, could potentially divert its focus from strategic evaluation with respect to the progress and growth of its business.”