President Donald Trump has long touted his family business as a source of pride. The real estate company has buildings around the world, and it’s unsuccessfully tried to place buildings in other locales, like Russia. Amidst the tumult of his presidency, some concerned investigators on both the state and federal levels have tried to get access to the president’s tax returns, which could shine a light on the true financial nature of that family real estate business. Trump has resisted every step of the way, and this week, financial journalist Adam Davidson seemed to reveal a possible explanation — Trump’s net worth may be far less than he claims. In other words, Trump seems to be a liar, through and through.
Davidson posted on Twitter:
‘Hot take: Trump is demonstrably far poorer than he claims. Again: Scotland holds the key. His audited UK financials show money-losing properties with arbitrarily inflated values with no tie to actual market conditions. Those are his ONLY audited financials.’
As he went on to explain, Trump’s “three [U.K.-based] businesses lose around 5 million pounds a year and have a collective value of, say, 70M pounds (being generous)” but “are claimed to bring in 150 million pounds a year.” The president’s team’s claims of these outrageous profits simply don’t seem to square up with reality, and more than that, the numbers also suggest financial ineptitude and lies across the rest of his business empire.
So, three businesses that lose around 5 million pounds a year and have a collective value of, say, 70M pounds (being generous) are claimed to bring in 150 million pounds a year!
And, again, those are his MOST trustworthy numbers.
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— adamdavidson (@adamdavidson) July 20, 2020
Saying that his “best guess” is that Trump got a $200 million inheritance from his late father and is now worth about $150 million, Davidson explains:
‘All of his other financial claims have no constraint at all. They’re just made up with no oversight… I do think there is fairly strong evidence that he, also, makes money by helping oligarchs launder money. BUT, he seems to also be bad at that. He makes dumb deals that involve too much risk and too little return. There are huge error bars around every number related to Trump. We have no idea how much his businesses make, how many assets he owns, and how much debt he has. There is a good chance he, himself, has no idea. Because he has a small and inept finance team. And he, himself, doesn’t understand business.’
Check out the rest of the thread from Davidson below:
Back in the 80s and 90s, Donald Trump was losing huge sums of money. In a major piece, The New York Times reported that throughout that time period, Trump “appears to have lost more money than nearly any other individual American taxpayer” — not exactly a great milestone. Who would’ve guessed that the guy losing more money than apparently any other American from at least 1985 to 1994 would eventually be president? When he pointed to his business background in an attempt to convince Americans that he’d be a good president, the results of actually looking into that business background weren’t exactly promising.
While in office, Trump has run the country much like he ran his business — poorly. The legacy of Trump’s presidency will consist of destruction.
