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Trump Media stock is halted after sudden plunge in DJT shares
Trump Media & Technology Group, whose stock trades under the ticker DJT — the same as former President Donald Trump’s initials — was briefly halted on Wall Street Tuesday after the stock suddenly plunged.
The pause occurred at 2:42 p.m. Eastern Time, with trading resuming about five minutes later, according to the New York Stock Exchange. Trading was temporarily suspended after a mechanism was triggered when stocks exhibit unusual volatility.
DJT shares had climbed earlier on Tuesday, reaching an intraday high of $33.85 a share, representing a 13% gain. But the stock plummeted in the afternoon, triggering the halt. Trump Media’s stock price continued to sink after the pause was lifted closed at $27.06, down $2.89, or 9.6%, on the day.
The downdraft erases some of the recent gains that had helped lift Trump Media from a September 24 low. The shares have been seen as a proxy for Trump’s chances of winning the November 5 presidential election, with DJT swinging upwards when his odds appear to improve. In recent days, two prediction markets have switched to favoring Trump after previously giving Vice President Kamala Harris a better chance of winning.
While the polls haven’t changed much, one of Trump’s business ventures got off to a rough start on Tuesday, according to CNBC. The Trump family’s new cryptocurrency platform, World Liberty Financial, suffered outages for much of the day, limiting the number of sales, the media outlet report.
It’s unclear if that could cause DJT’s stock to falter, given that Trump Media’s shareholders largely consist of small investors who are also Trump supporters, rather than investors who are seeking profits, dividends or other traditional measures of financial health.
The volume of trading in DJT stock was also elevated on Tuesday, with about 97 million shares trading hands, according to financial data firm FactSet. The average daily trading volume for the prior 30 days has been about 20 million shares, FactSet shows.
On Tuesday, Trump Media investors took to Truth Social to question the stock’s halt and price decline, with some blaming short sellers, a frequent target of both DJT shareholders and its management.
“None of us long-term DJT holders are fooled one bit by what happened today,” one member of the DJT investing group wrote Tuesday on Truth Social. “Shorts were losing control, quickly and they called in their chips at the SEC” to halt trading.
The Securities and Exchange Commission doesn’t control trading halts, which are activated by stock exchanges.
Earlier this year, Trump Media complained to Nasdaq, the stock exchange where the company is listed, that it was the victim of “potential market manipulation” due to short-selling activity.
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Legendary TV icon Betty White will be honored in 2025 with a stamp, the U.S. Postal Service announced on Friday.
The “Golden Girls” and “Mary Tyler Moore Show” actor “shared her wit and warmth with viewers for seven decades,” the news release from the USPS read.
U.S. Postal Service
“The comedic actor, who gained younger generations of fans as she entered her 90s, was also revered as a compassionate advocate for animals,” the USPS said.
The image of White, who died in 2021, was created based on a 2010 photograph, the USPS said. The USPS said the list of new stamps released on Friday is a partial one, with additional stamps to be announced in the coming weeks and months.
“This early glimpse into our 2025 stamp program demonstrates our commitment to providing a diverse range of subjects and designs for both philatelists and stamp enthusiasts,” said Lisa Bobb-Semple, stamp services director for USPS.
White launched her TV career in daytime talk shows when the medium was still in its infancy and endured well into the age of cable and streaming. Her combination of sweetness and edginess gave life to a roster of quirky characters in shows from the sitcom “Life With Elizabeth” in the early 1950s to oddball Rose Nylund in “The Golden Girls” in the ’80s to “Boston Legal,” which ran from 2004 to 2008.
White died in December 2021. She was 99 and just a few weeks shy of what would have been her 100th birthday on Jan. 17.
When asked how she had managed to be universally beloved during her long career, White summed it up with a dimpled smile: “I just make it my business to get along with people so I can have fun. It’s that simple.”
The USPS said it will also honor pianist and composer Allen Toussaint, who died in 2015 at the age of 77.
