https://www.bbc.com/news/business-68609007Why Trump may reap billions in Truth Social stock market merger
7 hours ago
By Natalie Sherman,Business reporter, New York
Donald Trump appears to be scrambling for funds to pay a $464m (£365m) fraud fine. Could the stock market ride to his rescue?
Trump Media, which runs the social media platform Truth Social, is poised to become a publicly listed company, with shareholders of Digital World Acquisition Corp set to vote on Friday on whether to acquire it.
Mr Trump would have a stake of at least 58% in the merged company, worth more than $3bn at Digital World's current share prices.
Digital World, or DWAC (pronounced D-whack), is what is known as a SPAC, or a shell business created expressly to buy another firm and take it public.
It's an astonishing potential windfall for Mr Trump in exchange for a business whose own auditor warned last year it was at risk of failure.
Never mind the many red flags associated with the deal, including unresolved lawsuits from former business partners. There's also an $18m settlement that Digital World agreed to pay last year to resolve fraud charges over how the merger plan came together.
Backers of Digital World - the vast majority of whom are individual investors instead of Wall Street firms, many apparently Trump loyalists - seem undaunted.
"This is putting your money where your mouth is for free speech, to save your country, potentially losing it all," Chad Nedohin, a deal supporter, said recently on his show DWAC Live, on the video platform Rumble.
If the purchase is approved, which is expected, shares will start trading on the Nasdaq stock exchange under the ticker DJT.
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