this post was submitted on 14 Nov 2023
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Since launching in early 2022, former President Donald Trump‘s Truth Social took in $3.7 million in net sales, and lost $73 million.

The numbers are the first time that any internal financial details on the social platform have been shared publicly, and they suggest that while Trump has made Truth Social his primary social media platform, it has not been translating into meaningful revenue for the tech startup, which is owned by Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG).

The numbers were revealed in a new financial disclosure from TMTG’s SPAC merger partner Digital World Acquisition Corp. The filing revealed that in 2022, Truth Social lost $50 million on just $1.4 million of net sales, and through the first 6 months of this year it brought in $2.3 million, but lost $23 million.

The financial situation of TMTG is such that “TMTG’s independent registered public accounting firm has indicated that TMTG’s financial condition raises substantial doubt as to its ability to continue as a going concern,” according to the filing.

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[–] Treczoks@lemmy.world 44 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Good. The more the looser loses, the better.

[–] interceder270@lemmy.world 10 points 10 months ago (3 children)

Is he actually losing here?

[–] Cheradenine@sh.itjust.works 25 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Unsurprisingly it's pretty murky, but it seems most of the money came from China, then later from Russia, and he didn't put any in himself.

He seems to be mostly the figurehead, and would gain if it were going well. Which is a common trope for him. Other people put up the money, if it sinks he disavows it, if it works he gets a cut.

[–] interceder270@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)
[–] TrickDacy@lemmy.world 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)
[–] interceder270@lemmy.world 4 points 10 months ago (1 children)

How he's scamming people by letting them use his name in an attempt to scam others.

[–] TrickDacy@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Sounds like the textbook definition of "sad" to me

[–] interceder270@lemmy.world 3 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

Schadenfreude.

You people and your 'uhm achktuallys' lol.

[–] TrickDacy@lemmy.world 0 points 10 months ago (1 children)

It's hilarious that the world is falling apart! I so agree lolz /s

[–] interceder270@lemmy.world 0 points 10 months ago

You okay there, bud?

[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 10 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

There was a clever scheme to sell Truth Social to investors for no less than $1 billion!🤪
The plan failed AFAIK because it was somehow illegal.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-dwac-returning-investor-money-truth-social/

Allegedly there should be another plan, that if successful would raise $250 million for Trump. Not as good as a billion, but still a pretty penny.
Actually it's a lot more than a pretty penny. 😋

But also allegedly, Trump uses almost $50 million per month, you know private jet and lawyers and all that. So even $250 million, would only last him a measly 5 months!! And some say his current financials are pretty dire, which I hope is true.

[–] SpaceNoodle@lemmy.world 4 points 10 months ago

I guess he's not very tight

[–] sylver_dragon@lemmy.world 18 points 10 months ago (4 children)

While I'd be happy to see Trump Social fail and go away, social media tends to be an unprofitable business. Twitter regularly posted losses, and did so regularly early in it's existence (source). And Idiots Social isn't about profits it's about pushing right wing propaganda. Profits and losses don't matter, only the platform being available and in the news.

[–] Semi-Hemi-Demigod@kbin.social 18 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

Truth Social is a fork of Mastodon, and Mastodon.world only costs $1200 a month to run. They could have a propaganda arm that at the very least breaks even.

This sounds more like money laundering.

[–] Wiz@midwest.social 3 points 10 months ago

Money laundering? With Trump? NEVER!

And by never, I mean, every fucking minute he can get away with it.

[–] interceder270@lemmy.world 8 points 10 months ago

It's only unprofitable if you run it like an idiot.

So yeah, most social media ventures are unprofitable. But that doesn't mean they aren't successful. Profit can be distorted based on how much employees are getting paid.

A business may be unprofitable, but if their CEO is taking in $400k/year, is it really?

[–] KneeTitts@lemmy.world 1 points 10 months ago

Its a propaganda outlet, those dont have to mask money in the long run because thats not their purpose.

[–] DrPop@lemmy.one 1 points 10 months ago

Yeah social media platforms are expensive b and part of the reason it's monetized with ads or, in Facebook I'm other countries, subscriptions.

[–] _haha_oh_wow_@sh.itjust.works 14 points 10 months ago

A Trump business losing money?

Yeah, that's pretty on-brand.

[–] Ghostalmedia@lemmy.world 14 points 10 months ago

Friendly reminder. Truth Social is a fork of Mastodon.

It cost Rudd $1200 to admin and host mastodon.world and Lemmy.world last month. And he has a full time job and family.

[–] afraid_of_zombies@lemmy.world 11 points 10 months ago

73 million, average salary is around 50k in total compensation, works out to 1,460. For the amount of money lost on this vanity project you could have hired the working age population of a village to spend a year planting trees, with paid vacation, 401k matching of about 3% and 80% of health insurance coverage. Still leaving enough left over for weekly Pizza instead of pay raise parties.

I found a reference online claiming that by handtools a human can plant between 800 to 2000 trees a day. I am going to assume they all are bad at their job and can only plant 500 a day. At the end of the year 73,000 trees would been planted. The Pacific Northwest forest has 40,000 trees per square km so our planters could reforest 1.825 square km.

Glad we have our priorities correct as a civilization

[–] GrammatonCleric@lemmy.world 9 points 10 months ago
[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 7 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I bet that's a lowball number.

[–] FuglyDuck@lemmy.world 4 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I find it unfathomnable that he’s lost ten million on it.

It’s only been around for what? 2 years? 40-some employees, most of whom are probably paid shit wages…. Even at 100k average salad … that’s only 4 million…and apparently they’re loosing 1.7 million, each month. (Or we’re/are)

Wooopz…

[–] Entertainmeonly@lemmy.blahaj.zone 8 points 10 months ago (3 children)

You may be overlooking the cost of infrastructure. Running servers is a huge overhead.

[–] anon_8675309@lemmy.world 9 points 10 months ago

And whatever else they can toss on the debt pile so they can write off as much as possible from taxes.

[–] EmergMemeHologram@startrek.website 5 points 10 months ago

Looking at cloud billing pages makes me long for the days of owning your own racks.

[–] ours@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago

And you can't lowball tech workers too much if you want to have a working solution.

[–] Witchfire@lemmy.world 7 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Imagine having that much money to just throw around. Hell, I'll take 1/73 of that and it'll be enough to have a decently comfortable life without worrying about any expenses. Or imagine if that $73M was towards social net programs.

[–] OldWoodFrame@lemm.ee 5 points 10 months ago

How much did Trump stake for equity? Considering that he's the main draw to the platform and the only thing keeping them in the news, I assume he got an ownership stake worth a lot more than he contributed, he might still make money if they sold now.

So this news is only really telling us that it's probably not going to stay in business past the election if he loses.

[–] Iwasondigg@lemmy.one 5 points 10 months ago

So, on par with the rest of his business ventures then?

[–] Raxiel@lemmy.world 3 points 10 months ago

So it's more profitable than Xitter?

[–] QuentinCallaghan@sopuli.xyz 2 points 10 months ago

This is really satisfying.

[–] originalucifer@moist.catsweat.com 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

i cant stop seeing teenage mutant ninja turtles

[–] AnyProgressIsGood@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Is it really or is this a fraud claim

[–] frezik@midwest.social 3 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Could be, but this is also the man who ran a casino into bankruptcy.

[–] mateomaui@reddthat.com 1 points 10 months ago

Correction: 3 casinos, and the parent holding company, and then the renamed parent holding company… and a hotel

https://www.thoughtco.com/donald-trump-business-bankruptcies-4152019

[–] TWeaK@lemm.ee 1 points 10 months ago

Such a fine businessman!

[–] WashedOver@lemmy.ca 1 points 10 months ago

Anyways like I was saying...