The U.S. stock market is up more than 3 percent since Election Day four weeks ago.
One person who hasn't benefited: President-elect Donald Trump.
In a call with reporters, transition spokesman Jason Miller says Trump sold all of his holdings in the stock market over the summer. The move could remove some, but not all, potential conflicts of interest as the billionaire businessman takes office as president.
Even before the sale, stocks accounted for a tiny fraction of Trump's personal fortune. Most of his money is in real estate.
"I've never been a big investor in the stock market," Trump said this summer in a telephone interview with Fox Business.
A financial disclosure form filed in May with the Federal Election Commission showed Trump held individual stocks and stock mutual funds worth tens of millions of dollars. Trump's net worth is estimated to be between $2.9 billion and $10 billion.
The news of the June stock sale came after Miller was asked if the president-elect still held shares in Boeing. On Tuesday morning, the president-elect criticized the aerospace giant in a tweet and suggested the company is overcharging the government for a replacement for Air Force One. According to the FEC filing, Trump held between $50,000 and $100,000 in Boeing as of May.
"The president-elect sold all his stock back in June," Miller said.
That may put to rest some questions about how the incoming president's decision-making will affect individual companies. But it won't resolve other potential conflicts of interest stemming from the sprawling nature of the Trump Organization itself. Trump has said he plans to separate himself from the operations of his company and has scheduled a news conference for Dec. 15 to discuss the details.
Over the years, Trump's preference for building skyscrapers over buying stock may have cost him. National Journal estimated in 2015 that Trump might be even wealthier today had he steered clear of the real estate business and simply invested his multimillion-dollar inheritance in stock index funds.
Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.
