Untrue and antisocial

Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG) is the parent company of Truth Social, the social media network founded in 2021 by that humble devotee of facts, Donald Trump. It claims to be building the future of media and technology, and describes itself as a uniting force for freedom of expression, involving no political discrimination, cancelling cancel culture and standing up to big tech.

It has certainly attracted investor attention since it started trading under the ticker symbol DJT, the initials of the big man himself.

It bounded ahead in its first days of trading to a valuation north of $13bn, which is not too shabby for a company that lost $49m in the first nine months of 2023 on revenues of a mere $3.4m. This gives the former, and possibly future, president a paper gain of around $5bn, which might be a drop in the ocean compared with how rich he says he is, but which should at least cover his legal fees and fines for a year or two.

All this enthusiasm values the company at an impressive 2,000 times annual revenue, which will be a lot to live up to compared with Nvidia, which is leading the AI revolution on a valuation of 38 times sales.

There remains a strong suspicion that the hype is not being driven as much by the pinstriped professionals of Wall Street but more by punters with outsized collections of MAGA leisurewear day-trading from the comfort and safety of their basements. To the outside observer, TMTG looks about as likely to succeed as a Trump presidential campaign, but look what happened in 2016.