President Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs in April 2025 pushed financial markets into a tailspin, sending Wall Street and everyday investors scrambling to shield themselves from the fallout.
Trump’s money managers were also busy. In a series of trades on April 3 and April 4—the days after Trump announced global tariffs in the Rose Garden—his investment accounts bought and sold hundreds of individual stocks, according to financial disclosures released this week.
The strategy shifted somewhat on April 8, when his accounts only purchased 327 individual stocks, spending more than $3.6 million to scoop up Apple, Berkshire Hathaway and other blue chips. There was no selling that day.
Trump posted on social media the next morning that it was “a great time to buy” and paused much of his tariff regimen that afternoon. Markets boomed.
The trades were among the more than 21,000 moves by Trump’s investment accounts that were largely kept under wraps until a 900-page government disclosure filing this week.
The April trading in the midst of markets’ tariff turmoil was typical for the president’s accounts, which often made hundreds of individual trades per day and moved $4.2 million per day on average, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis. Some investors say the activity resembles common trading strategies designed to mitigate capital-gains taxes.
Even so, Trump’s trading surges around major policy decisions, as well as positions in companies receiving government backing, have drawn scrutiny from ethics watchdogs.
Trump has said he isn’t involved in trading in the accounts, which are managed by financial advisors. Many of his assets are held in a trust overseen by Donald Trump Jr. The president said Wednesday that he profited on his investment accounts in 2025 because stock markets rallied.
“Neither the President nor his family has ever engaged—or will ever engage—in conflicts of interest,” White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly said.
Federal law requires the president and other executive-branch officials to disclose securities trades worth more than $1,000 within 45 days. Trump previously filed public disclosures for about 1,000 of the 21,000 trades made in his accounts last year.
Federal employees who disclose such moves beyond that timeframe and any extensions granted to them are subject to a $200 fine per late report. The cover page of Trump’s filing this week shows he paid the late fee.
Here is some notable trading by the accounts:
A $75 Million Day
On Aug. 18, Trump’s accounts made their biggest trades of the year. They moved more than $75 million, the filing shows, more than double their next busiest day.
One account bought between $5 million and $25 million apiece in shares of Nvidia, Meta Platforms and Microsoft. That same account purchased at least $1 million worth of stock in other major tech companies, as well as big firms including Eli Lilly, JPMorgan and Visa.
The account also snapped up at least $250,000 worth of stock in Intel that day. Days later, Trump announced plans for the government to take a roughly 10% equity stake in the American chip giant. The company’s shares have since risen by more than 370%.
MP Materials
Just days after his inauguration last year, Trump began acquiring stock in MP Materials, a Las Vegas company little known outside of the mining industry. In a series of eight trades through May, the disclosures show, Trump’s accounts purchased between $22,000 and $155,000 of stock in the rare-earths producer.
The China-dominated market for rare earths had largely been seen by Wall Street as uninvestable–until the Trump administration in July took a 15% equity stake in MP Materials as part of a first-of-its kind deal to boost the domestic industry.
Trump’s investment accounts unloaded at least some of their MP shares after the company’s stock price skyrocketed, the disclosures show. The president reported between $100,001 to $1 million in capital gains last year from his stake in the rare-earths miner.
Big AI investments
The White House in July 2025 announced an “AI Action Plan” aimed at providing a blueprint for winning the artificial intelligence, including streamlined permitting for data-center development and chip factories. That same day, one Trump investment account bought between $6 million and $30 million worth of stock in some of the biggest tech companies on the planet.
As part of a wide-ranging series of stock purchases across industries, Trump’s account purchased up at least $1 million apiece in Broadcom, Amazon, Apple, Microsoft and Nvidia, the disclosures show. The account bought at least $1 million in Alphabet shares in separate transactions.
