Former president Donald Trump’s social media startup gained 16 per cent in its first trading day as a public company, after the most high-profile blank-check deal in years added billions to his fortune — at least on paper.
Trump’s windfall has now landed him for the first time on the Bloomberg Billionaires’ index, a list of the world’s 500 richest people. He sits 422nd with a net worth of $US6.53 billion. A day before, Trump Media CEO Devin Nunes, a former House Republican, said, “As a public company, we will passionately pursue our vision to build a movement to reclaim the Internet from Big Tech censors.”
Research firm Similarweb estimates that Truth Social had roughly 5 million active mobile and web users in February. That’s far below TikTok’s more than 2 billion and Facebook’s 3 billion — but still higher than other “alt-tech” rivals like Parler. “I think there is a possibility of, sooner or later, the stock price falling by 95 per cent,” said Jay Ritter, a professor and expert on initial public offerings of stock at the University of Florida’s Warrington College of Business.