Truth Social trading suspended several times amid volatile pre-election rally

Trading in the owner of Donald Trump’s Truth Social was suspended several times on Wall Street on Tuesday as extraordinary volatility engulfed shares in the tiny social media empire ahead of next week’s election.

Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG) rallied by 14% during early trading on Tuesday, before quickly reversing all its gains. By late morning, it was up 1.5%.

The stock has surged in recent weeks, tripling its value this month alone, as Trump courted voters during the final stage of the presidential campaign.

TMTG is now valued at some $9bn on the stock market, and has at times in October overtaken the estimated valuation of X, formerly Twitter: a far bigger social network than Truth Social, taken over by Trump ally Elon Musk two years ago.

The former president’s majority stake in TMTG is currently worth around $5.1bn on paper, after a wild ride on the market this year.

The fledgling company staged a remarkable rally in the spring, joining the ranks of so-called “meme stocks” such as the video games retailer GameStop, which rattled Wall Street by staging unexpected, volatile rallies as day traders piled in.

As with GameStop, however, the peak TMTG scaled during its rapid rally set the stage for an almighty crash. The group’s shares, which rose above $66 in March, stooped to $12.15 last month.

But, with presidential election polls closely tied, and betting markets putting Trump ahead in the contest, TMTG recovered. Its market valuation has quadrupled since shares in the firm hit their September low.

Truth Social, in the spotlight on Wall Street, remains a very small social network. It received 13.5m visits last month, according to Similarweb. X received 706.2m visits over the same period.