Accusations of market manipulation and insider trading began flying as President Donald Trump announced a 90-day pause in tariffs that sent the stock market soaring Wednesday afternoon after days of distress.
Democrats, Trump loyalists-turned-critics, and journalists suggested that people with knowledge of Trump announcing the tariffs and then withdrawing them a week later got rich off the information.
“So, who in the Trump administration shorted the market and profited off the pain of the American people?” tweeted former South Carolina state lawmaker and CNN pundit Bakari Sellers.
Shannon Watts, founder of the gun control group Moms on Demand, posted to X: “A lot of people just made a s— ton of money thanks to Trump’s corruption and incompetence.”
Joe Walsh, a former Republican congressman from Illinois-turned-radio talk show host who went from Trump supporter to Trump critic, claimed the president was in on the “corruption.”
Walsh was responding to Trump’s Truth Social post made Wednesday morning: “THIS IS A GREAT TIME TO BUY!!! DJT”
DJT is the ticket symbol for Trump Media & Technology Group Corp., the social media company owned by the president which runs Truth Social.
The stock soared Wednesday more than 18% on Wednesday.
“Corruption, right out in the open,” Walsh tweeted.
Ahmed Baba, a journalist and columnist for the Independent, said the market swings warranted questions about possible manipulation.
“I want to know what trades were made by members of the Trump Administration before these unhinged tariff moves? Who, if anyone, shorted stocks before the tariffs were first announced?” he tweeted.
“Who bought back into the market before this pause was announced? Who is profiting from this?”
The S&P 500 was up 7.8% in afternoon trading. It had been down earlier in the morning amid worries about Trump’s trade war and whether it would cause a recession, as economists fear.
But it spiked immediately after Trump sent the social media posting that investors have been waiting for.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 2,476 points, or 6.6%, as of 1:35 p.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 9% higher.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.