The Nasdaq Market site is seen on the day that shares of Truth Social and Trump Media & Technology Group start trading under the ticker “DJT”, in New York City, U.S., March 26, 2024.
Shannon Stapleton | Reuters
United Atlantic Ventures LLC, a major shareholder in Trump Media, has sold or otherwise gotten rid of nearly 11 million shares in the company, according to a regulatory filing Thursday.
The move left UAV, a partnership of former “Apprentice” contestants Andrew Litinsky and Wes Moss, owning just 100 shares in Trump Media, which operates the Truth Social app.
UAV was allowed to sell any of its 5.4% stake in DJT’s outstanding shares after a lock-up agreement that had barred company insiders from selling expired on Sept. 19.
UAV is the only known insider to sell off shares since last week.
Litinsky and Moss had pitched the idea of a social media company to former President Donald Trump, and co-founded the company with him in 2021. The duo later fell out with Trump, and have been embroiled in lawsuits over their shares since then.
Trump owns more than 56% of Trump Media shares, which trade under the ticker DJT on the Nasdaq. The stock closed at $13.98 per share on Thursday.
CNBC has requested comment from Trump Media and a lawyer for UAV.
Securities and Exchange Commission filings show that UAV owned 7,525,000 shares of Trump Media as of March 25, the day the company completed a merger with the blank-check company Digital World Acquisition Corp.
UAV later was awarded another 3.44 million shares that were issued “for no additional consideration based on the performance of our shares of Common Stock,” Trump Media said in an SEC filing on Sept. 5.
That left UAV owning more than 10.96 million shares.
Thursday’s SEC filing does not say when UAV shed its shares in the past week, and at what price or prices it received for that stock.
But DJT has traded at prices between $15.50 per share and $11.75 in that period. That suggests UAV would have received between $128 million and $170 million for the shares it appears to have sold.
Trump Media had warned in a Florida lawsuit against UAV that the company was planning to sell “all of its shares as soon as possible” once the lockup expired.
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