Trump Media Scraps Side Ventures, Sells Fast Access to President’s Posts

Trump Media & Technology Group announced Monday that it will scale back much of its expansion into new business lines and refocus on its original media operations centered on Truth Social, according to AP News. The strategic pivot comes as the company reported a $238 million loss in the second quarter—more than 10 times the loss from a year earlier—and unveiled a new paid service that grants subscribers fast access to President Donald Trump’s posts.

A Year of Expansion, Now Reversed

The company behind Truth Social had spent the past year branching into unrelated industries—online betting, cryptocurrency, financial services, and even nuclear fusion—in an effort to lift its struggling stock price. But nothing worked. Shares have plunged from about $62 shortly after the company went public in 2024 to single digits, erasing billions in shareholder value.

“We made the disciplined choice to pivot in order to invest more time and resources in our most important initiatives,” CEO Kevin McGurn said on an investor conference call. “We will say no to things or change course as warranted.”

The company has lost more than $1 billion since the start of 2025, and its earnings report released Monday showed no immediate relief. The per-share loss widened to 86 cents from 8 cents a year earlier, though much of the damage was due to unrealized paper losses from the falling value of its bitcoin holdings, as AP News reported.

The Truth API: Selling Speed to Wall Street

Key to McGurn’s turnaround plan is a new service called Truth API, which offers paying customers faster access to posts from top Truth Social accounts—including President Trump’s. Subscribers can receive posts within milliseconds of publication, allowing high-frequency trading firms to profit from market movements triggered by presidential announcements.

The service has already signed up 10 customers in its first week, mostly high-frequency trading firms, each paying between $60,000 and $100,000 per month. Collectively, those customers are paying between $7 million and $12 million annually—two to three times the revenue the company took in for all its businesses last year.

“We’re in the early innings,” McGurn said, noting that the potential market includes data center companies, news organizations, and developers of large language models.

McGurn has dismissed ethical concerns about the service, arguing that “providing licensed real-time public data through commercial APIs is a well-established business practice across the technology, financial information and media industries.”

Ethical Concerns Mount

Critics argue the service represents an unprecedented blurring of the line between the presidency and private profit. Kathleen Clark, a government ethics expert at Washington University School of Law, called it “yet more brazen corruption, an improper exploitation of government power to enrich himself,” as reported by AP News.

“He’s selling expedited, privileged access to information about what he is doing as president,” Clark said.

Dylan Hedler-Gaudette, an expert on federal ethics rules at the Project on Government Oversight, was equally blunt: “It’s odious, selling access to highest bidders on Wall Street. Everything he says has market implications.”

The ethical concerns extend beyond the new service. Trump’s posts on Truth Social have repeatedly moved global markets—his tariff announcements sent stocks plunging nearly 5% in hours, while his suspension of those tariffs added $4 trillion to investor wealth. His posts about an Iran ceasefire sent oil prices plunging instantly.

Researchers at QUT’s Digital Media Research Centre found 15 instances in a 73-day window where oil markets appeared to move before Trump posted on the topic, suggesting possible advance knowledge. “It looks extremely suspicious,” said Stephen Harrington, an associate professor at the centre. “What it seems like is that there are trades being placed by someone with inside information about what the president is about to say in the hour or two leading up to him posting on Truth Social.”

Dewan Rahman, a finance researcher at the University of Queensland, noted that the insider trading concern arises when subscribers have an information advantage. “If someone has private information beforehand, or even an indication that an announcement is coming, that’s where the concern begins,” he said.

Legal Loopholes and Political Pressure

Conflict of interest laws would bar U.S. government officials from owning a company that profits off their office by selling access to their decisions. But the president and vice president are explicitly excluded from that provision—a loophole Trump has exploited. All presidents since the law was passed have acted as if it applied, selling stocks or placing assets in blind trusts, but Trump has refused.

The company faces mounting political pressure. Several Democratic senators, including Elizabeth Warren, have said they will hold formal investigations of Trump’s businesses if Democrats take control of Congress after the November midterms, as NBC News reported.

A CNN/SSRS poll released in late July found 64% of respondents believed Trump had gone too far in pursuing personal financial interests while in office.

Financial Pressures and Deadlines

The timing of the strategic shift is critical. Trump Media has $1 billion in debt from special convertible notes, and lenders can demand the company buy back the notes on November 30—just after the midterms. At the end of the quarter, the company had more than $400 million in cash and short-term investments, plus $1.2 billion in bitcoin and bitcoin-related assets.

McGurn is keeping one side venture: the company’s merger with nuclear fusion company TAE Technologies, which he called “the single most important driver of long-term value for this company.” The U.S. Department of Energy released a “road map” in June committing government funding to speed the development of nuclear fusion, raising conflict-of-interest questions of its own.

“There’s a huge conflict of interest,” said Richard Painter, former chief White House ethics lawyer in the George W. Bush administration. “The United States government is going to get all involved in it.”

What’s Next

The company’s future hinges on whether the Truth API service can generate enough revenue to offset mounting losses, and whether the political and ethical scrutiny intensifies after the midterms. The stock fell another 3.3% to $9.08 on Tuesday, suggesting investors remain skeptical.

Trump remains the platform’s biggest draw with 13 million followers—far ahead of his son Donald Jr.’s 7.5 million. But a bigger question looms: what happens to the service’s value when Trump leaves office in 2028? As The Guardian noted, traders are unlikely to pay $1.2 million a year for sneak peeks at posts from a former president who can no longer declare tariffs or ceasefire agreements.

For now, the company is betting that selling speed to Wall Street is the answer to its financial woes. Critics say it’s a bet that further entangles the presidency with private profit—and one that could have lasting consequences for both.

This story draws on reporting from AP News, ABC News (Australia), and India Today.