DONALD TRUMP (72)

The ruthless negotiator

She was quite alarmed when she saw the US commander-in-chief’s signature for the first time, Australian handwriting expert Melissa Becker told Aussie online newspaper The New Daily.

“He simplifies to the point where they are zigzags to the exclusion of other connecting forms. This can be used by very intelligent people,” she says. “It’s also the favourite signature of very aggressive and, actually, very violent people. You can decide where you think he fits on the spectrum.”

Also worrying is the cramped, thick, angular form, she says.

“There’s no empathy. It’s, ‘I’m going from place to place in this very big, consistent way and there’s no concern for anybody else.’ I think you’d have to say it’s pretty ruthless.”

Michelle Dresbold, a graduate of the US secret service’s advanced document examination training programme, has a similar assessment of Trump’s spiky scrawl.

It’s completely devoid of curves, showing he “lacks empathy and craves power, prestige and admiration”, she told political site Politico. “Besides the bigheadedness that shows in his script there’s something else that’s rather oversized – the ‘p’ in ‘Trump.’ This large phallic symbol shouts, ‘Me . . . big hunk of man’.”

Tracey Trussell, a UK-based consultant graphologist, says the former reality TV star is a bold, tough, direct negotiator who thinks he knows best, she told the Daily Mail. “The flooding of letters reveals his explosive temper if he doesn’t get his own way.”