Shares of Trump Media & Technology Group, the company behind former President Donald Trump’s Truth Social, neared their lowest level since debuting on the Nasdaq $NDAQ in March, following Trump’s return to rival social media platform X $TWTR.
Elon Musk and the former president held a discussion on X's Spaces
Shares of Trump Media & Technology Group, the company behind former President Donald Trump’s Truth Social, neared their lowest level since debuting on the Nasdaq $NDAQ in March, following Trump’s return to rival social media platform X $TWTR.
The company’s stock fell more than 3% to $24.01 at market open on Tuesday, trading at its lowest level since mid-April. Shares were already trending downwards after Trump Media reported a $16.4 million net loss in the second quarter and a 30% drop in revenues.
But his appearance on Elon Musk’s X continued to push shares down into Tuesday morning. Trump posted on the social media platform for the first time since August 2023, when he shared a photo of his mugshot and linked to his website in the caption.
The former president and the Tesla $TSLA (TSLA) chief held a discussion on the platform’s livestreaming function, known as Spaces, on Monday evening. Their conversation lasted a total of two hours, plus an hour of delays due to technical difficulties. Musk blamed the issues on a cyberattack. The stream received 73 million views in three hours, according to a post from the official X account.
Trump Media depends heavily on Trump’s sole use of Truth Social. The company said in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission in June that its “business plan relies on President Donald J. Trump bringing his former social media followers to [Truth Social].”
It has also cited Musk’s X as a potential threat to Truth Social’s success. X’s “sustained commitment to free speech principles” could create more competition for Truth Social, which has billed itself on offerings, the company said in the same filing.
Truth Social had 16 million total visits in June, compared with X’s 4.8 billion, according to data from the analytics site SimilarWeb.
Trump launched his social media platform, Truth Social, in February 2022, after he was removed from major sites like Facebook $META and X (then Twitter). The site was marketed as a conservative answer to mainstream social media platforms, and has billed itself as a “platform for all Americans to freely express themselves.”
Earlier this month, Trump Media began the phased rollout of its new live TV streaming service, Truth+, which includes include news, commentary, weather, lifestyle, and entertainment channels. The company said it will have full control over its tech delivery stack for streaming across a private network content delivery network, “rendering the service uncancellable by Big Tech.”
Join 500,000+ readers who start their day with Quartz.
By subscribing, you agree to our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.