Trump Media says it's starting a Truth Social streaming TV service
Trump Media & Technology Group on Tuesday announced plans to start a streaming TV platform to air news, film and other content the company claims other media outlets refuse to show.
The announcement comes three weeks after Trump Media began trading on the Nasdaq stock market, briefly valuing the company at $10.8 billion. After reaching peaking at $79.38 per share on March 26, the stock — which trades under the ticker DJT, the initials of former President Donald Trump — has plunged by almost 70%.
The slide continued on Tuesday, with Trump Media shares slipping $3.29, or 12.4%, to $23.32 in early afternoon trading. Its market value now stands at about $3.1 billion.
Trump Media's primary asset is Truth Social, the social media service that Trump created in 2022 after he was booted from major platforms following the January 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol. From its founding, the company aimed to create what it called a "media powerhouse" with multiple platforms, including social media and digital streaming. Until now, however, the company had only introduced Truth Social.
Going public has helped bolster the money-losing company's coffers, with Trump Media CEO Devin Nunes telling Fox Business earlier this month that it has "$200 million in the bank" to fund its plans.
Key to building a major media company will be building an audience, which in turn could convince advertisers to open their wallets. Although Trump Media doesn't disclose its user numbers, the service had an estimated 494,000 monthly active users in February, compared with 142 million for Facebook and 75 million for X (formerly known as Twitter), according to web data company Similarweb.
That may explain why Trump Media's revenue last year was $4.1 million, or about half the annual sales booked by an average single Chick-fil-A location, while it lost $58 million. Recent advertisers on Truth Social include groups like Patriots for America, a group hawking Trump hats, and USA Gear, selling American flag hoodies.
Trump Media didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.
Trump's streaming plans
Trump Media said its streaming TV platform will first unveil on the Truth Social app before eventually making its way to home TV streaming. The company didn't provide a timeline for the rollout.
"There is a lot of great content that simply can't find an audience for unjust reasons, and we want to let these creators know they'll soon have a guaranteed platform where they won't be cancelled [sic]," Nunes, a former Republican congressman from California, said.
The company added that its TV content will include "news networks, religious channels, family-friendly content including films and documentaries; and other content that has been cancelled, is at risk of cancellation, or is being suppressed on other platforms and services."
To be sure, conservative-leaning TV networks already exist, including One America News Network (OANN) and Christian Broadcast Network, which produces the 700 Club. And conservative commentator Tucker Carlson debuted his Tucker Carlson Network after parting ways with Fox News last year.
Sliding stock price
Meanwhile, one of Trump Media's main assets — its publicly traded stock — is continuing to lose value. That's noteworthy because one route for a publicly traded company to raise additional capital is through secondary stock sales. If its shares become less valuable, that can hinder its ability to raise money from the public market.
Trump Media's stock plunged 18.4% on Monday after the company filed a regulatory document that opens the door for the potential sale of millions more shares. The document, called an S-1, relates to warrants held by investors that can be transformed into shares of stock, as well as shares held by company insiders.
The former president's 57% stake in his media business was valued at $1.8 billion on Tuesday afternoon, a sharp decline from its $6.3 billion valuation at the stock's peak.
Trump Media's stock are at risk of falling further, Ben Emons, senior portfolio manager at NewEdge Wealth, said in an April 15 research note. The price of the warrants, which give their holders the right to buy the stock at a certain price, has plunged 43% from their March 26 peak and now indicate the share price could decline to $17.50, he said.
"There is plenty of opportunity for the DJT stock price to recover, but it likely goes down first," Emons added.
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