The insider trading suspicions looming over Trump's presidency
bbc.com
bbc.com
This and the title are journalistic malpractice. This is an article designed to report on obvious insider trading, and the writer clearly knows and agrees that it's obvious, but goes out of their way to throw in concessions and a build a veil of neutrality. You are legally allowed to accuse public officials of crimes. You do not have to gesture at "looming suspicions." A neutral reporting of the facts would make such an accusation, and tie it into the broader pattern of criminality. But it's more important to perform neutrality than to be honest, so we get this garbage. "Mr President, would you please comment on the allegations that-" "Shut up, piggie."
… but you've explained it more thoroughly.
Furthermore, defamation/libel is not covered under criminal law, it’s considered a tort so it would be a civil suit.
So no, not at all like the UK.
EDIT: But yeah sure if you want to try to defend your point, start linking cases to support the claim.
I am confident in stating the UK has much weaker free speech laws and no constitution to base free speech protections on. FFS, this is the country a dude was arrested and fined for filming his dog doing a hitler salute. We have had a few cases not related to violence in the US but they usually end up overturned even when there’s a conviction (thinking of this guy as an example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglass_Mackey )
But it is a higher and more restricted standard to say a crime has been committed. Journalists can uncover and publish evidence that a crime has been likely committed.
Journalists cannot make a legal determination that a crime has or has not been committed. This is left for courts.
If I have evidence that a crime has been committed based on my layperson understanding of the law, I will surely inform others before the case is even brought to courts. Journalists can and should do the same.
By your logic, reporting based on evidence provided by whistleblowers shouldn't exist. Things like Watergate would likely have never happened.
Journalists shouldn't accuse anyone of committing a crime, and goes without saying that facts shouldn't be fabricated, which is unfortunately common nowadays as well, but they should report events that happened based on the information they have, whether these happen to be related to crimes or not.
Going beyond the evidence and jumping straight to the crime is where the situation becomes tricky as the defense would be unlikely to prove beyond doubt that the accused person was actually guilty - that's why terms are used such as "alleged child abuser". Alternatively, the evidence/facts can be reported e.g. "Trump featured in many victim reports as an abuser".
In the US, careful journalistic organizations follow ethical and legal guidelines that often split hairs.
Have a look here: New York Times - Ethical Journalism A Handbook of Values and Practices for the News and Opinion Departments
https://www.nytimes.com/editorial-standards/ethical-journali...
I would love to hear more about this clear evidence. There is smoke, sure, but clear evidence, I would love to hear more on your investigation.
I've been algorithmically trading for several years now, collecting data, running machine learning prediction algorithms and whatnot. Anyway, I made 4500% off a high risk 1 DTE options play between Thursday/Friday. This trade was put in right before the geopolitical announcements sent the Russell 2000 into Captain Insano mode overnight. This isn't the first time I've done this - it's a valid trading strategy with the continuous drama/volatility that Mr DJT brings to the markets. I'm sure if there are any insider trading flags I set them off on Friday, and for people who have no idea how markets work and what volume normally looks like, it would definitely look like an insider.
I realized long ago that to make money doing this, all bias/emotions need removed and the only thing that can be relied on is math. Have you ever considered that some of the bigger prop shop trading firms with a lot of buying power are just extremely good at what they do?
Next, there are definitely ML algorithms running in prop shops as we speak that are trained on the probability of DJT and media announcements, especially in volatile weeks like we've had. I cannot post the data here, but there is an article on Axios that shows this: https://www.axios.com/2017/12/15/how-and-when-trump-tweets-1...
So not only was a mean reversion probability high, but there were probably prop shop ML algo green lights going off for the probability of an announcement that would give the mean reversion some more fuel. Regular algorithmic trading shops probably added to this volume when their programs saw larger orders coming in, which made the volume spike even larger.
Lastly, Nick Marsh is a journalist, not a professional trader or a professional in algorithmic trading. If he was, he wouldn't be making shock and awe articles for the BBC. For one low hanging fruit, why did he not pull historical data on oil futures - including other derivatives (not only Brent)? He would have needed to pull at least several years of data to understand if this was an actual outlier spike or not. If you have ever even remotely paid attention to the oil futures markets, you would know there tends to be higher volume spikes at any given time, especially after the futures market closes and re-opens between 5 and 6pm, and especially during volatile times like the last couple months.
This article isn't the full picture at all whatsoever and comes from someone who has an elementary understanding of the equity and futures markets. But it served its purpose, which was triggering an easily triggered society. Surely there has been some DJT-linked insider trading, but I personally cannot jump on board until there is more evidence - AKA the scientific method.
The rule of law hasn’t been an impediment for some, when the legal machinery has been co-opted
the BBC is required by its charter to provide a “balanced” view and this often result in unbearable smugness and vaulting to “we are the ultimate arbiters of truth”
this is a big pity, because the alternative is Fox News / GB News
I find this hilarious; the BBC has rarely provided a balanced view on many things. Indians (at almost every point in the political and social spectrum) will easily notice the bias and smug holier-than-thou attitude on India-specific news/opinion.
It's pretty clear that newspapers around the world are now decoupling from the actual wishes and necessities of their subscribers/licensees. The latter are not to blame, especially when they are willing to pay for their news.
Plus I don't have to read the BBC if I don't want to, but media literacy, combing through nonsense and finding the actual necessary bits, etc. are important, and that needs me to read news from different sources and countries, including that of BBC sometimes.
You say this like it is a bad thing.
The BBC journalism is rather good and quite rightly seeks to be as impartial as possible. To compare the likes of Rupert Murdoch as a credible alternative to be BBC (or indeed, any news media which lacks a 'fairness doctrine') is simply idiotic.
I believe in an active, pluralist and free press.
Simplistically, this should emerge spontaneously from a free market in publications and subscribers. But newspapers are prone to capture by rich folk who can then manipulate political destinies (Heart, Murdoch, Bezos).
Realistically, a state funded media channel such as the BBC is a good balance to that, but it is idiotic cant to pretend that a “neutrality charter” is meaningful since such organs tend to become captured by “dinner party activists” and foster groupthink about what neutral is. So I agree with the top comment that the BBC has a tendency to be a righteous preachy outfit.
None of this kleptocracy is normal, or sane, or acceptable.
Otherwise how could you stop it? It’s not like when you work at big co and you just stop trading their stock. You get access to information that clearly will be material potentially months in advance.
The second one has made an even stronger case for doing so though.
I suspect even of Republicans voting in the lines today, they don't like him or his behavior but are too self-interested to do anything about it. When a new administration comes in, between Republicans happy to avoid a Democrat or one of their own have that power again, and Democrats ready to ensure another Trump can never happen again, we'll have bipartisan support for crippling presidential power.
https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/statistics/data/executive-or...
Looks like it really started under Teddy Roosevelt. Obama's 276 is lower than most of his predecessors.
https://constitution.congress.gov/browse/essay/artII-S2-C1-3...
Those should fix most of the problems with time.
Sometimes managers will only hire through staffing agencies owned by family friends and get indirect kickbacks.
When I first heard about this my initial question was how do they not get caught when the assets are gifted or transferred to the manager's name. Turns out they don't actually transfer the assets to their name but they effectively own it through free usage.
Stock market at all time highs
Miami houses selling north of $150,000,000.00
No one cares about that crisis anymore
The markets keep ripping no matter what
Just some hiccups along the way
We got rid of it last year.
The American system is flawed and has been continuously eroded and dismantled.
Much like "There are looming suspicions over the effectiveness of colored quartz and homeopathic water." [0]
This administration highlights why the pardon provisions of the constitution need amendment.
1. The Supreme Court is not some neutral arbiter of a hallowed intractable document. They are political actors. Just like history books now write about the disastrous Court of the 1850s that went completely off the rails (Reconstruction wasn't much better), history will likewise write about the Roberts court as (IMHO) the worst in American history, particularly Citizens United and Trump v. United States. The latter is most directly responsible for all of this. There is now absolutely no prospect of consequences for any of this. The president himself is immune and is now free to openly sell pardons for anyone gets indicted. And let's be real, nobody is getting indicted. This is brazen, unfettered kleptocracy; and
2. The Democratic Party itself, the donor class and the consultant class is completely on board with everything that's happening.f The term here is controlled opposition. Now you just feckless pronouncements like "Trump bad" but, for example, no objection to policy. Instead the objection is to process. For example, Hakeem Jeffries saying Congress should've authorized the Iran War. That's not an objection to the war. The Democratic establishment likes the war. All of these political careers are just stepping stones to their eventual private industry paydays. It's their children getting fake jobs at thinktanks, management consultancies, lobbying firms and so on.
My personal opinion is that nothing will be solved. It's too late to do anything about this with electoral politics. Democratic politicians and the mainstream media has spent more effort attacking Hasan Piker in the last month than attacking Trump's foreseeably disastrous war or outright corruption with insider trading and pardons.
This feels like a "So long and thanks for all the fish" moment.
Princeton did a study on the effect of public opinion on what Congress does, specifically the impact of popularity of a bill passing and it actually passing [1]. It should surprise no one that public opinion has almost zero impact.
Did he say, "Congress should have authorized the Iran War," or did he say "Congress should have to authorize the Iran War." Those are two very different statements.
More to the point, did he say he would personally vote to authorize the Iran War? Did he say Democrats should vote to authorize the Iran War?
Jeffries does not support the war with Iran; he has strongly criticized it as a "reckless war of choice". He is actively leading efforts to pass a War Powers Resolution to force the immediate cessation of hostilities.
[1]: https://www.uscpraction.org/scorecard
[2]: https://static1.squarespace.com/static/67243caa6cdc511f81910...
To the point, I'd never heard of him before this and he's clearly being used as a low bar of zero importance .. being used as such to indicate just how little effort opposition politicians and mainstream US media have devoted to Trump's biggest grifts and unforced errors.
What? This is obviously untrue. You can add up every piece of Hasan Piker content CNN has ever run and it won't add up to a single day of Iran war coverage. Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries have not, as far as I can tell, ever so much as mentioned the guy.
We all get over our skis sometimes, but if this claim sounded even a tiny bit plausible to you, I beg you to reevaluate your media consumption diet. Someone's working hard to convince you that things are worse than they are and that Democrats stand for things they don't.
Back in the presidential election, Kamala called Iran our greatest threat. Today’s leaders are variations of this.
The most prominent race in this time has been the Michigan Democratic Senate primary where Al-Sayed is against it but I’ve honestly seen more hit pieces about Piker campaigning with him than anything about Iran as an issue in the race.
Look past all the stories like “this is the Strait of Hormuz”, “it’s open/closed”, “rising gas prices” and peace talks. Those are just telling you what’s going on.
What Democrats have you really seen that have talked about being against the actual policy? It’s surprisingly little.
As he mentions, while you may consider a war powers resolution "milquetoast", it's important to understand that this is the best lever he has available to try and stop the war. It's easy for Hasan to be mean and dunk on hypocritical Republicans, because Hasan's not the one who has to convince hypocritical Republicans to cross the aisle and vote for his bills.
I would be more interested to know if the traders had insider knowledge of timing of the announcement or if it was leaked.
The BBC is not exactly known for unbiased reporting. It's been accused of systemic anti-Trump bias, including the misleading 2024 Panorama edit of his Jan 6 speech for which the network was forced to apologize.
Again, proof or evidence? No direct names mentioned of insiders, or any leaks traced. I do not see it. The BBC cites trade volume spikes that were timed to the announcements and analyst opinions. But is that not how Forex and Future exchanges/trades work? Are they not driven by geopolitics? If anyone is calling for a SEC probe, then the investigation should start with the entire congressional body. If it were me, I would start by enacting term limit legislation for senate and house. I'd then start speaking to any politicians that have been expelled out or sacrificed by their own political parties. I'm sure they'll have a rather good story to tell. It will be interesting to see how many of these people will be open to public hearings on the matter.