10 ms·

Pelosi and a lifetime of trading

311 points by amin 5y ago

KETpXDDzR 5y ago
Sounds like smart insider trading. I know some forums only accessible via the TOR network that trade insider info. Your first post is for verification, the ones after for either selling them or trading with others. If you trade your company's quarterly numbers with numbers from another company it's nearly impossible to proof that you used insider information. IMHO the whole system needs a reformation. You should only be allowed to invest long-term, at least one month, probably years. Day trading and option contracts enable illegal insider trading.
mullingitover 5y ago
> Her one year returns for her stocks is 45.59%, and her option returns are 66.7%. I mean, any other year and that'd be extraordinary, but I'm just some schmuck who put my 401k mostly in a high growth index fund and I got over 70% last year. I wasn't even trying.
vidoc 5y ago
Many years ago, 60 minutes interviewed her about these kind of dealings: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ReZ7DdT5ZoI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ReZ7DdT5ZoI
samstave 5y ago
Pelosi et al are fucking criminals. They should be in prison... I dont think its my responsibility to tell you why, and how... If you have not been paying attention to the corruption that is all abound between tech and politics, or even if you havent even had a glimpse/perception of it or a gut feeling for it, then nobody can help you on that path. She is scum, there are so many that are scum. She needs to have AGE limits and EARNING limits applied to her seat in congress.... Get the fuck out. She attempted to place her god-son (Newsome) as the next presidential candidate and he fucked up so badly in CA that they went with her next best minion, the prison person: Kamala Harris.... You remember her? The Coked out girlfrien of Willy Brown? The one who created a secret Masonic Police in the state of california, the one who wanted to jail parents if their kids missed school. The one who wanted to keep people in for profit prisons beyond their release dates so the prisons got more tax payer money? Yeah - I am not doing the research for you... go look it up if youre ignorant to what pieces of shit these people are....
kmonad 5y ago
+56% vs the S&P's +36%. This does not look "suspicious", from a purely statistical point of view.
- La1n 5y ago
  Especially considering this is a multiple testing issue. When checking a lot of politicians there is likely going to be someone who is doing really well, even if it's just by chance. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_comparisons_problem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_comparisons_problem
- stonemetal12 5y ago
  As a single data point I agree, I wonder if there is a long term view. Especially something that tracks before office, during office, after office.
UncleOxidant 5y ago
I'll have what she's having.
txsoftwaredev 5y ago
Nancy Pelosi is as dirty as they come. Of course she will use any advantage she can to gain wealth and power. Why this is allowed is beyond me. Martha Stewart spent time in prison for doing much less.
takeda 5y ago
Instead of fixating that Pelosi made more than others I think right question is, why someone who actually can impact stock options and also has information not available to the public is allowed to trade?
- curtis3389 5y ago
  Because they are also the person that would write the rule that they aren't allowed to trade.
- kcdev 5y ago
  The STOCK Act is supposed to prevent this. But the same politicians who passed the law and had the media cover it as much as possible, then later quietly passed another that the law would not be enforced.
  - eganist 5y ago
    Do you have a reference to the specific legal code which includes the amendment? Thanks for coming through on this ask. I'm having a hard time finding it, and it's a point of contention I plan on raising with Virginia legislators if any of them voted in favor.
    - atatatat 5y ago
      These same cunts are shareholders in the media, 'course it's not all around.
    - at-fates-hands 5y ago
      Here you go. Happened in 2013 under Obama: But on Monday, when the president signed a bill reversing big pieces of the law, the emailed announcement was one sentence long. There was no fanfare last week either, when the Senate and then the House passed the bill in largely empty chambers using a fast-track procedure known as unanimous consent. https://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics/2013/04/16/177496734/how-congress-quietly-overhauled-its-insider-trading-law https://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics/2013/04/16/17749...
underseacables 5y ago
Congress has some of the richest people in America. I’ve always been intrigued by that.
- syshum 5y ago
  Yes but they are the virtuous rich.. The evil rich are in the private sector... We have to remember that at all times /s
- atatatat 5y ago
  "Intrigued"? You mean suspicious?
  - underseacables 5y ago
    Yes, deeply suspicious, I was trying to split the difference and not get political. I think it’s terrible. Members of Congress should not be allowed to own, trade, or have anything to do with the stock market. I always heard a rumor that members of Congress are always richer when they leave than when they entered. That should really piss Americans off, but it doesn’t depending on which party is in power, and which party that person subscribes to. Edit: Grammar and Spelling
    - trident5000 5y ago
      I have no issue with them owning a handful of broad ETF's like the SPY. Other than that they shouldnt be placing bets on specific parts of the economy they clearly have influence over.
    - sokoloff 5y ago
      I do think there's dirty play here, but I think you can't realistically prevent the ownership of equity instruments by politicians. You could demand they be held in blind trusts; you could demand they be able to be long-only on broad-based mutual funds; you could make demands that they announce their trades 3 trading days before enacting them. I think you can't realistically (and shouldn't) block them from owning equities entirely though. You don't need to block them having anything to do with the stock market; you just need to eliminate the presence and appearance of dirty play.
renewiltord 5y ago
She does as well as Rentech’s Medallion fund. Looks like Warren Buffett has a competitor. Reminds me of Hillary Clinton’s remarkable skill trading cattle futures. I suppose great politicians must also be great at reading the market. Incredible talent.
- lotsofpulp 5y ago
  Warren Buffet has not had much luck since the Goldman Sachs investment in 2008. If anything, he's had a few investments flop (IBM, Kraft Heinz) and missed out on a ton of growth from not being in tech. I assume BRK is keeping up with the market due to its significant AAPL holdings.
  - renewiltord 5y ago
    So much for value investing, eh? Looks like tech stocks are where it's at.
    - lotsofpulp 5y ago
      Tech stocks delivering stellar profits and profit margins, increasing quarter after quarter for years, is value investing to me.
      - renewiltord 5y ago
        But not to the BRK boys, who underweight tech.
udev 5y ago
Isn't this just saying that Pelosi has a good financial advisor?
- lupire 5y ago
  Of course. Classified intelligence reports and draft legislation negotiations are a great advisor.
  - tootie 5y ago
    It looks like she bought apple, amazon and nvidia. Not exactly obscure bets.
    - throwawayboise 5y ago
      It's the timing, not that they are popular stocks.
    - swalsh 5y ago
      She also doesn't seem to be in a hurry to legislate them either.
- MeinBlutIstBlau 5y ago
  Boy this contract for Boeing looks like it's gonna go through. Better invest! Uh oh looks like Lockheed isn't getting any this year. Better divest!
- vmception 5y ago
  aka Nancy Pelosi is a good financial advisor to Paul Pelosi
whoopdedo 5y ago
Perhaps someone could create an index fund that tracks trades by members of Congress. Though on second thought it might not be very useful since there can be quite a delay between the transaction and when it's disclosed.
- pjfin123 5y ago
  It looks like they outperform the general market and hedge funds, probably not a bad idea: https://www.barrons.com/articles/SB50001424053111904433604576346981994360302 https://www.barrons.com/articles/SB5000142405311190443360457...
  - tootie 5y ago
    That's way more interesting than hearing that Nancy Pelosi had a good quarter. I'd be curious what the mean and median are. I can easily imagine a few key trades netting huge returns that skew the curve.
- chaostheory 5y ago
  It's not a fund, but hopefully they're still up and running. https://govtrades.org/ https://govtrades.org/
wyldfire 5y ago
Sorry if this is a stupid question - I've only seen options as a compensation mechanism. Can you buy options on the open market just like shares? If not, how do politicians end up with options?
- lotsofpulp 5y ago
  Yes, you can purchase (and sell) options via many brokerage websites. Robinhood became quite popular because it made it very easy via an app for the masses.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- computerex 5y ago
  Of course, they are a huge market. You can do it with most brokers including robinhood. Not only can you buy options, you can also write the contract and sell it on the market.
- akiselev 5y ago
  An "option" is a generic name for a contract that gives you the option of doing something in the future. The stock options employees get as part of their compensation and the options stock traders deal in (a financial instrument) are very specific forms of those kinds of contracts.
- odiroot 5y ago
  This is what "kids" on Robinhood were doing the last year or so.
- vmception 5y ago
  The "options as a compensation mechanism" are primarily due to the tax efficiency of options as a whole. The options contract market is massive, in the public markets they are fungible and actively tradeable. In private equity markets they are mostly limited to compensation mechanisms.
- swalsh 5y ago
  Options are probably the most common mechanism for a person to leverage themselves. An out-of-the-money option will yield far more than simply buying a single share. That said, it's a lot more risky.
subsubzero 5y ago
I am shocked that politicians are even allowed to trade options, I feel like shorting stocks and option trading should be off the table once you are elected to office.
- alistairSH 5y ago
  Her husband is making these trades and he’s a longtime active investor and VC.
  - soheil 5y ago
    Did most "longtime active investor and VC[s]" make so much money?
    - spullara 5y ago
      Last year? Hell yes.
    - minsc__and__boo 5y ago
      Yes? The markets have had ridiculous returns in the reporting period and the spousal investments are not unusual.
    - alistairSH 5y ago
      Some do, some don’t. Either way, attributing Nancy Pelosi’s wealth to Something akin to insider trading, when her worth is largely derived from her husband’s investment firm, is torturing the truth just a little bit.
      - jtbayly 5y ago
        Unless politicians outperform the market in general… Oops. They do.
    - pvarangot 5y ago
      Last year? I think in general yes, very much yes.
redleggedfrog 5y ago
America is a plutocracy. Congress people (or their family) making money from their influence is about American as apple pie and pickup trucks. It takes money to get elected and stay elected, so rich people get elected. While they take advantage of their political power while elected to make money, they also make money after being elected as well, through speaking and other means. The whole point of this process is to make money. Again, American, we like money. So if you don't like all this, you're a socialist and bad person. Shame on you for being so un-American. Instead get some money and join the party!
- rangoon626 5y ago
  She can be capitalist like you describe, she just shouldn't be allowed to serve in public office while she does it.
- the_optimist 5y ago
  If you have people capitalizing on their positions in government, that's not capitalism. That's private ownership of public property, also known as kleptocracy. Insider trading is simply an indirect, historically-unprosecuted way of carrying carrying a suitcase full of cash out the front door.
gigel82 5y ago
I suspect this is actually peanuts compared to trades made by the politicians' friends (aka proxies) that aren't disclosed anywhere.
jeffbee 5y ago
Being up 56% in a year when the SPX went up 36% is hardly "incredible".
- trident5000 5y ago
  You didnt annualize the returns. Its possibly over 1000%. Gotta love financially illiterate HN. He made over 100% on the trade in something like 1 month. 100% * 12 is over 1000%
boulos 5y ago
The article never says this, but her husband, Paul, is a longtime investor / VC [1]. There’s obviously still a huge opportunity for leakage of information that Nancy Pelosi receives, but the trades don’t actually look suspicious nor requiring non-public information. There was some reporting on this issue more broadly when Senator Burr seemed to place trades directly due to coronavirus information, which included Pelosi’s husband’s trades. Edit to add: I would concur with others that we probably need to restrict trading for politicians and their family, the same way we do insiders at corporations. Index funds okay, specific stocks or perceived competition, no. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Pelosi https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Pelosi
- fighterpilot 5y ago
  > the trades don’t actually look suspicious nor requiring non-public information. The purchase was made 1 month before this story[1] broke, which was a significantly market moving announcement. There's plausible deniability, of course. [1] https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/25/biden-plans-to-replace-government-fleet-with-electric-vehicles.html https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/25/biden-plans-to-replace-gover...
  - KerrickStaley 5y ago
    Which purchase?
  - boulos 5y ago
    Sorry, which trade are you referring to? The Dec 22 TSLA options? Assuming yes, the disclosure report [1] says it was 25 calls with a strike price of $500 with expiration of 3/18/22 (so another long dated option). Tesla's share price that day was ~$650 [2] and the value of the 500 call went up (from ~$200 to $400) but has come right back down to ~$200 [3]. They have not exercised / sold the options (visit [4] and search for Pelosi in Filing Year 2021). [1] https://disclosures-clerk.house.gov/public_disc/ptr-pdfs/2021/20018011.pdf https://disclosures-clerk.house.gov/public_disc/ptr-pdfs/202... [2] https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/TSLA/history/ https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/TSLA/history/ [3] https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/TSLA220318C00500000?p=TSLA220318C00500000 https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/TSLA220318C00500000?p=TSLA22... [4] https://disclosures-clerk.house.gov/PublicDisclosure/FinancialDisclosure https://disclosures-clerk.house.gov/PublicDisclosure/Financi...
legitster 5y ago
Nancy Pelosi's husband is CEO of a investment firm. It shouldn't be that surprising that she tops the list for investments. As others online have pointed out, despite an above average year, her portfolio is still underperforming an S&P 500 index fund with the dividends reinvested. Should politicians be forced to put their assets in a blind trust while in office? Yeah, probably. But I don't think I will indict Pelosi's slightly above average year of investments as evidence of anything in particular.
- pgwhalen 5y ago
  > her portfolio is still underperforming an S&P 500 index fund with the dividends reinvested Can you expand on this? The article indicates her one year returns were considerably higher than the S&P 500 last year.
  - spullara 5y ago
    Their returns all time in office are worse.
  - mullen 5y ago
    One year does not mean anything. If she is beating S&P 500 over 20 or 30 years, then there is a problem.
- moralestapia 5y ago
  >Nancy Pelosi's husband is CEO of a investment firm. It shouldn't be that surprising that she tops the list for investments. I don't know if you're using this as an argument to favor Pelosi, because this, if anything, is only another conflict of interest on top of where she's currently at. The disclosure and use of insider information from public companies can get you in big trouble, even if you're married to the people involved. There's a reason why CEOs (and the like) take HUGE caution measures when liquidating stock and try to involve family as least as possible.
- KETpXDDzR 5y ago
  "80% of US Fund Managers Underperform S&P 500 Over 5 years" http://www.ginsglobal.com/articles/80-of-us-fund-managers-underperform-sp-500-over-5-years/ http://www.ginsglobal.com/articles/80-of-us-fund-managers-un...
robbrown451 5y ago
Shouldn't HN steer clear of things like this with a political slant? She is a very divisive figure and I don't see how this sort of article makes HN better.
- eternalban 5y ago
  Information is valuable. Crazy idea: have no-comment threads.
- chrisan 5y ago
  This could be viewed as activism against all parties > In the House and the Senate reports Mr. Whale showed that both parties, no matter their allegiance, seem to be trading and often legislating to benefit their own positions.
- brodouevencode 5y ago
  That ship sailed a long time ago.
- dcassett 5y ago
  The political climate has piqued my interest in the workings of the US government. I appreciate helpful HN commenters that provide information that I don't have time to research.
grillvogel 5y ago
Interesting that DelBene is also so high on the list but not really mentioned at all "Her husband, Kurt DelBene, is Chief Digital Officer and EVP of Corporate Strategy, Core Services Engineering and Operations at Microsoft Corporation,[33] and led the effort to fix the Healthcare.gov website at the request of President Barack Obama.[34]" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suzan_DelBene#Personal_life https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suzan_DelBene#Personal_life
swalsh 5y ago
Is there an ETF where I can invest in the same things politicians are investing in?
- soheil 5y ago
  No because if there was and it did outperform the market, the returns would quickly evaporate as more and more people rushed in to invest in that ETF.
  - somebodythere 5y ago
    And yet strategy ETFs still exist
metabagel 5y ago
This is mostly her husband's trading, which probably constitutes somewhat of a loophole in the legislation controlling stock purchases by members of congress. Still, the transactions were reported as required, and trading based on insider knowledge is illegal, so he would be subject to prosecution if that's what he was doing. The optics are bad, for sure. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-07-10/pelosi-husband-s-tech-stock-spotlights-law-on-lawmaker-trades https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-07-10/pelosi-hu...
- ipaddr 5y ago
  "he would be subject to prosecution if that's what he was doing" You would, so would I but history has shown he won't have to worry about that.
bagacrap 5y ago
"This is pretty incredible, for an average return of her stocks and options is 56.15%. The S&P, with its raucous best performing year, is only up 36% from last June" Strange to compare against sp500 when her holdings are more aligned with NASDAQ, up ~50% from last June.
- wil421 5y ago
  Hey man they are trying to make news and get clicks. Doing a favorable comparison isn’t going to get traffic.
  - jedimind 5y ago
    The most common symbol of comparison is the s&p500, you'll usually find it as first suggested symbol among the most popular charting software (tradingview for instance)
whywhywhywhy 5y ago
I'd be fine with politicians being paid more if it was completely illegal (with prison time) for them or their partners to do this. Seems like the system is built in a way that encourages them to insider trade and throw kickbacks around to maximize their wealth while in power and after.
boulos 5y ago
Oh and looking more closely, this methodology is super poor (though I’m sympathetic to the challenge with the disclosure format). Basically, by assuming that all the trades were the maximum of the range (and per trade), it’s overweighting the PayPal and Crowdstrike performance and downweighting the MSFT and GOOG “under performance” (they bought GOOG near the top?). I don’t follow why most of the Feb 20 options aren’t being valued either. Those were the “scandalous” trades. And they were all (IIRC), 1-year out LEAPs or something. Seemed a reasonable thing at the time! (“People are panicking, buy now and assume it’s back to normal in a year”). Has someone done a more careful analysis? (At the very least, I strongly doubt that the positions would be the same between the crowd strike and MSFT shares, and that the MSFT shares were purchased alongside the MSFT options as a hedge). Edit: And umm, all the options trades are listed explicitly as the number of contracts purchased. So people can easily look up the VWAP or similar for the purchase date and get a real number...
misiti3780 5y ago
I wouldnt be against members of congress trading stocks as long as the trades were published at the end of every day after market close.
trident5000 5y ago
All comments critical of Nancy and the corruption getting downvoted in this thread. Democrat party censor contractor in full force.
dukeofdoom 5y ago
This has been debunked over and over starting in 2012. Nanci Pelosi is not part of a crime family. Stop trying to claim otherwise. Snopes debunked this okay like 2 years ago. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/nancy-pelosi-crime-family/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/nancy-pelosi-crime-family/
- slackfan 5y ago
  Snopes "This is not true because we twisted the english language into a pretzel to an extent that a Pravda writer would be proud", that snopes?
- zyemuzu 5y ago
  Ah yes, the fact checkers have spoken.
- the_optimist 5y ago
  This is not a credible response.
- DevKoala 5y ago
  Thank you fact checkers. Imagine how society would be without them? We’d be drowning in wrong-think.
- mardifoufs 5y ago
  I'm pretty sure your comment is tongue in cheek but wow this is a pretty bad look for snopes: >Was Nancy Pelosi’s brother, Franklin D. Roosevelt D’Alesandro, charged with lying during a rape trial? Status: MIXTURE The Facts: Nancy Pelosi’s brother, Franklin D. Roosevelt D’Alesandro, was charged with perjury during a rape trial in the 1950s. However, he was eventually acquitted of those charges How is that a mixture? The poster claims he has been charged, not convicted, Snopes confirms he was charged but... Ends up labelling this as mixed? That's pure damage control from Snopes at this point
sam0x17 5y ago
Is there a place where you can get info on her/her husband's trades in real time? Cuz I kinda want to write a bot now ;)
- kinghajj 5y ago
  No, the reporting delay between when trades are made and then made public is something like ~1 month, IIRC.
  - mensetmanusman 5y ago
    That would be a great time barrier to remove.
analog31 5y ago
I wonder if politicians should be required to share their portfolios in real time. Then the rest of us could buy index funds based on their trading habits.
- calebm 5y ago
  PelosiBot
calebm 5y ago
The best way to predict the future is to make it.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
robbmorganf 5y ago
Just an observation: IF we take it as GIVEN that policymakers are going to find a way to earn some fixed amount X which is greater than their salary (this is a big assumption and probably not true, but just for a thought experiment) THEN maybe making money from stock options is actually better than taking money from lobbyists? Lawmakers can make money from both hurting and helping companies, so it doesn't create a particular incentive to go out and help PARTICULAR companies (that said, there is an incentive to create volatility, which isn't great). Meanwhile, lobbying tends to advantage some of the least ethical companies (e.g. Opiods, fossil fuels) because the only incentive is to HELP the company at the expense of customers. To be clear, I don't think it's right for lawmakers to make any more by virtue of their position than the salaries set forth by the law. I'm just saying that of the several unethical ways they can make money, stock options have incentives least misaligned with the public good.
- Clubber 5y ago
  >I'm just saying that of the several unethical ways they can make money, stock options have incentives least misaligned with the public good. You are assuming that said laws are for the public good and not the good of lobbyists. I would guess this happens more often than not: politicians pass a law that is for lobbyists and against the public good, then make money buying stock against the reaction of said law. "Never trust a politician," is probably as old as civilization, why do we think ours are any better? Oh, and when the system finally crumbles from under all the rot, guess who suffers and who doesn't. I'll give a hint, the people who control the police and criminal justice system won't be the ones suffering.
- jdoliner 5y ago
  Making money through insider trading is very maligned with the public good. One it is essentially using the stock market as a mechanism to transfer wealth from unknowing public traders to insider traders, if they're making money they're making it off of someone. Two, because of this, it creates the existential risk of a lose of trust in the public markets which can lead to their collapse. It's a real case of who watches the watchmen though because insider trading laws were, of course, created by congress itself.
sentinel 5y ago
Disgusting.
anonymouse008 5y ago
This is honestly the only hope I have that Congress won't mess with with Capital Gains taxes... they win too much from it.
cgb223 5y ago
In the same way that CEOs trades are planned months in advance and happen regardless of the market, we should make Congress people should have to do the same
TrispusAttucks 5y ago
Writing regulation policy is one hell of a way to perform insider trading. Why is this legal? "Most of Pelosi's gains are quite interesting, given the timing of her plays. For example, she was able to get into TSLA, DIS around stimulus news, NVDA before American Semiconductor funding was announced, among a long list of interesting picks. Mr. Whale leaves it to the reader to check her transactions and the news around her purchases (all available for free on the platform). She also timed the NFLX buys on June 18th perfectly. It was released on July 14th that NFLX is entering the videogame space, causing the stock to rally significantly."
DevKoala 5y ago
Studying Pelosi’s portfolio is one of the key strategies every trader should know by now. I have made a lot of money following her trades, particularly when she jumped in on Crowdstrike right before the government security hacks. This lady can tell the future. /s
c7DJTLrn 5y ago
Why are all of the members of Congress extremely wealthy? Doesn't seem particularly representative of the general population. Members of the UK Parliament are generally upper-class, but they're not all extremely wealthy.
- throwawayboise 5y ago
  They aren't all extremely wealthy. The powerful committee leaders, majority and minority leaders, etc. generally are because they are the ones who choose which issues will make it to general debate and vote, so they are the ones who have the ability to influence markets. Some random young representative from the middle of nowhere has almost no influence in congress. It takes years and powerful backers to develop that. Part of the argument for term limits is to prevent people from making a career out of being a representative or senator, which is what you need to do accumulate power.
dpierce9 5y ago
They sold Amazon calls going into COVID. A call is a right to buy so selling a call means you have an obligation to sell the stock to the buyer at the strike price on or before the expiry (assuming American option). Can’t see the strike price or expiry but there is no way they didn’t lose money on that trade since Amazon was up up up and away every month after that and it would have had to be way out of the money not to trigger. In other words, not a particularly heads up trade.
the_optimist 5y ago
1) Nancy Pelosi is ethical and an upstanding citizen, a true hero-person among ordinary people. 2) There are no prospective conflicts of interest in having your significant other trade on your behalf. If there were any such conflicts, they're acceptable anyway. 3) There's nothing unusual around these trades. Many lawmakers underperform the market anyway. Also some people under-perform and over-perform. Nothing to see here nor question. 4) Legislating around the companies you buy and sell is an acceptable, both in governance structure and in economic opportunism 5) There is no way to mitigate these conflicts of interest anyway, so there is no point in paying attention to them.
jb775 5y ago
Elected & appointed govt workers and their immediate families shouldn't be permitted to buy/sell any stock while in office or 5 years following. And they shouldn't be allowed to take jobs/money (including "speaking fees", a.k.a. bribes) from publicly owned corporations for 15 years after leaving public office.
abeppu 5y ago
Far beyond limiting what members of congress or other high office holders can invest in while in office, I think the ideal should be that public office holders must play a Rawlsian gamble: when they leave office, we select a random citizen, and their level of wealth is wiped to match that citizen. Excess goes to a fund for public campaign financing. Not only should politicians not be incentivized to select policies which benefit them specifically, but they should be incentivized to select policies which materially benefit the population overall.
sceew 5y ago
Not sure why the % returns really matter here. Even if you lose money, insider trading is still insider trading. Congress + senators 100% receive insider information. Even if its not near-term merger announcements or big federal contracts - they still have an extremely advantaged position and access to information that the general public doesn't have. Its ridiculous that they can trade individual stocks, yet alone options. They should be restricted from buying individual stocks, and should only be allowed to buy mutual funds and ETFs at a minimum. Pretty much any employee on Wall Street (even if "back-office") has similar restrictions. I don't even know why this is a question - the optics of short-term levered bets from elected officials (or family of) is terrible. Completely ruins any resemblance of "public service." Even with this, it might not be enough. Elected officials could still buy the TQQQ ETF (3x leverage on NASDAQ) prior to a stimulus bill passing. It would be too onerous to not allow any stock exposure, but maybe they should be required to disclose trades in real-time vs. at the end of every quarter.
jessaustin 5y ago
An honest public servant can’t become rich in politics. He can only attain greatness and satisfaction by service. -- Harry Truman

311 points by amin 5y ago

Sounds like smart insider trading. I know some forums only accessible via the TOR network that trade insider info. Your first post is for verification, the ones after for either selling them or trading with others. If you trade your company's quarterly numbers with numbers from another company it's nearly impossible to proof that you used insider information. IMHO the whole system needs a reformation. You should only be allowed to invest long-term, at least one month, probably years. Day trading and option contracts enable illegal insider trading.

mullingitover 5y ago

> Her one year returns for her stocks is 45.59%, and her option returns are 66.7%. I mean, any other year and that'd be extraordinary, but I'm just some schmuck who put my 401k mostly in a high growth index fund and I got over 70% last year. I wasn't even trying.

vidoc 5y ago

Many years ago, 60 minutes interviewed her about these kind of dealings: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ReZ7DdT5ZoI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ReZ7DdT5ZoI

samstave 5y ago

Pelosi et al are fucking criminals. They should be in prison... I dont think its my responsibility to tell you why, and how... If you have not been paying attention to the corruption that is all abound between tech and politics, or even if you havent even had a glimpse/perception of it or a gut feeling for it, then nobody can help you on that path. She is scum, there are so many that are scum. She needs to have AGE limits and EARNING limits applied to her seat in congress.... Get the fuck out. She attempted to place her god-son (Newsome) as the next presidential candidate and he fucked up so badly in CA that they went with her next best minion, the prison person: Kamala Harris.... You remember her? The Coked out girlfrien of Willy Brown? The one who created a secret Masonic Police in the state of california, the one who wanted to jail parents if their kids missed school. The one who wanted to keep people in for profit prisons beyond their release dates so the prisons got more tax payer money? Yeah - I am not doing the research for you... go look it up if youre ignorant to what pieces of shit these people are....

kmonad 5y ago

+56% vs the S&P's +36%. This does not look "suspicious", from a purely statistical point of view.

La1n 5y ago
Especially considering this is a multiple testing issue. When checking a lot of politicians there is likely going to be someone who is doing really well, even if it's just by chance. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_comparisons_problem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_comparisons_problem
stonemetal12 5y ago
As a single data point I agree, I wonder if there is a long term view. Especially something that tracks before office, during office, after office.

UncleOxidant 5y ago

I'll have what she's having.

txsoftwaredev 5y ago

Nancy Pelosi is as dirty as they come. Of course she will use any advantage she can to gain wealth and power. Why this is allowed is beyond me. Martha Stewart spent time in prison for doing much less.

takeda 5y ago

Instead of fixating that Pelosi made more than others I think right question is, why someone who actually can impact stock options and also has information not available to the public is allowed to trade?

curtis3389 5y ago
Because they are also the person that would write the rule that they aren't allowed to trade.
kcdev 5y ago
The STOCK Act is supposed to prevent this. But the same politicians who passed the law and had the media cover it as much as possible, then later quietly passed another that the law would not be enforced.
- eganist 5y ago
  Do you have a reference to the specific legal code which includes the amendment? Thanks for coming through on this ask. I'm having a hard time finding it, and it's a point of contention I plan on raising with Virginia legislators if any of them voted in favor.
  - atatatat 5y ago
    These same cunts are shareholders in the media, 'course it's not all around.
  - at-fates-hands 5y ago
    Here you go. Happened in 2013 under Obama: But on Monday, when the president signed a bill reversing big pieces of the law, the emailed announcement was one sentence long. There was no fanfare last week either, when the Senate and then the House passed the bill in largely empty chambers using a fast-track procedure known as unanimous consent. https://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics/2013/04/16/177496734/how-congress-quietly-overhauled-its-insider-trading-law https://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics/2013/04/16/17749...

underseacables 5y ago

Congress has some of the richest people in America. I’ve always been intrigued by that.

syshum 5y ago
Yes but they are the virtuous rich.. The evil rich are in the private sector... We have to remember that at all times /s
atatatat 5y ago
"Intrigued"? You mean suspicious?
- underseacables 5y ago
  Yes, deeply suspicious, I was trying to split the difference and not get political. I think it’s terrible. Members of Congress should not be allowed to own, trade, or have anything to do with the stock market. I always heard a rumor that members of Congress are always richer when they leave than when they entered. That should really piss Americans off, but it doesn’t depending on which party is in power, and which party that person subscribes to. Edit: Grammar and Spelling
  - trident5000 5y ago
    I have no issue with them owning a handful of broad ETF's like the SPY. Other than that they shouldnt be placing bets on specific parts of the economy they clearly have influence over.
  - sokoloff 5y ago
    I do think there's dirty play here, but I think you can't realistically prevent the ownership of equity instruments by politicians. You could demand they be held in blind trusts; you could demand they be able to be long-only on broad-based mutual funds; you could make demands that they announce their trades 3 trading days before enacting them. I think you can't realistically (and shouldn't) block them from owning equities entirely though. You don't need to block them having anything to do with the stock market; you just need to eliminate the presence and appearance of dirty play.

renewiltord 5y ago

She does as well as Rentech’s Medallion fund. Looks like Warren Buffett has a competitor. Reminds me of Hillary Clinton’s remarkable skill trading cattle futures. I suppose great politicians must also be great at reading the market. Incredible talent.

lotsofpulp 5y ago
Warren Buffet has not had much luck since the Goldman Sachs investment in 2008. If anything, he's had a few investments flop (IBM, Kraft Heinz) and missed out on a ton of growth from not being in tech. I assume BRK is keeping up with the market due to its significant AAPL holdings.
- renewiltord 5y ago
  So much for value investing, eh? Looks like tech stocks are where it's at.
  - lotsofpulp 5y ago
    Tech stocks delivering stellar profits and profit margins, increasing quarter after quarter for years, is value investing to me.
    - renewiltord 5y ago
      But not to the BRK boys, who underweight tech.

udev 5y ago

Isn't this just saying that Pelosi has a good financial advisor?

lupire 5y ago
Of course. Classified intelligence reports and draft legislation negotiations are a great advisor.
- tootie 5y ago
  It looks like she bought apple, amazon and nvidia. Not exactly obscure bets.
  - throwawayboise 5y ago
    It's the timing, not that they are popular stocks.
  - swalsh 5y ago
    She also doesn't seem to be in a hurry to legislate them either.
MeinBlutIstBlau 5y ago
Boy this contract for Boeing looks like it's gonna go through. Better invest! Uh oh looks like Lockheed isn't getting any this year. Better divest!
vmception 5y ago
aka Nancy Pelosi is a good financial advisor to Paul Pelosi

whoopdedo 5y ago

Perhaps someone could create an index fund that tracks trades by members of Congress. Though on second thought it might not be very useful since there can be quite a delay between the transaction and when it's disclosed.

pjfin123 5y ago
It looks like they outperform the general market and hedge funds, probably not a bad idea: https://www.barrons.com/articles/SB50001424053111904433604576346981994360302 https://www.barrons.com/articles/SB5000142405311190443360457...
- tootie 5y ago
  That's way more interesting than hearing that Nancy Pelosi had a good quarter. I'd be curious what the mean and median are. I can easily imagine a few key trades netting huge returns that skew the curve.
chaostheory 5y ago
It's not a fund, but hopefully they're still up and running. https://govtrades.org/ https://govtrades.org/

wyldfire 5y ago

Sorry if this is a stupid question - I've only seen options as a compensation mechanism. Can you buy options on the open market just like shares? If not, how do politicians end up with options?

lotsofpulp 5y ago
Yes, you can purchase (and sell) options via many brokerage websites. Robinhood became quite popular because it made it very easy via an app for the masses.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
computerex 5y ago
Of course, they are a huge market. You can do it with most brokers including robinhood. Not only can you buy options, you can also write the contract and sell it on the market.
akiselev 5y ago
An "option" is a generic name for a contract that gives you the option of doing something in the future. The stock options employees get as part of their compensation and the options stock traders deal in (a financial instrument) are very specific forms of those kinds of contracts.
odiroot 5y ago
This is what "kids" on Robinhood were doing the last year or so.
vmception 5y ago
The "options as a compensation mechanism" are primarily due to the tax efficiency of options as a whole. The options contract market is massive, in the public markets they are fungible and actively tradeable. In private equity markets they are mostly limited to compensation mechanisms.
swalsh 5y ago
Options are probably the most common mechanism for a person to leverage themselves. An out-of-the-money option will yield far more than simply buying a single share. That said, it's a lot more risky.

subsubzero 5y ago

I am shocked that politicians are even allowed to trade options, I feel like shorting stocks and option trading should be off the table once you are elected to office.

alistairSH 5y ago
Her husband is making these trades and he’s a longtime active investor and VC.
- soheil 5y ago
  Did most "longtime active investor and VC[s]" make so much money?
  - spullara 5y ago
    Last year? Hell yes.
  - minsc__and__boo 5y ago
    Yes? The markets have had ridiculous returns in the reporting period and the spousal investments are not unusual.
  - alistairSH 5y ago
    Some do, some don’t. Either way, attributing Nancy Pelosi’s wealth to Something akin to insider trading, when her worth is largely derived from her husband’s investment firm, is torturing the truth just a little bit.
    - jtbayly 5y ago
      Unless politicians outperform the market in general… Oops. They do.
  - pvarangot 5y ago
    Last year? I think in general yes, very much yes.

redleggedfrog 5y ago

America is a plutocracy. Congress people (or their family) making money from their influence is about American as apple pie and pickup trucks. It takes money to get elected and stay elected, so rich people get elected. While they take advantage of their political power while elected to make money, they also make money after being elected as well, through speaking and other means. The whole point of this process is to make money. Again, American, we like money. So if you don't like all this, you're a socialist and bad person. Shame on you for being so un-American. Instead get some money and join the party!

rangoon626 5y ago
She can be capitalist like you describe, she just shouldn't be allowed to serve in public office while she does it.
the_optimist 5y ago
If you have people capitalizing on their positions in government, that's not capitalism. That's private ownership of public property, also known as kleptocracy. Insider trading is simply an indirect, historically-unprosecuted way of carrying carrying a suitcase full of cash out the front door.

gigel82 5y ago

I suspect this is actually peanuts compared to trades made by the politicians' friends (aka proxies) that aren't disclosed anywhere.

jeffbee 5y ago

Being up 56% in a year when the SPX went up 36% is hardly "incredible".

trident5000 5y ago
You didnt annualize the returns. Its possibly over 1000%. Gotta love financially illiterate HN. He made over 100% on the trade in something like 1 month. 100% * 12 is over 1000%

boulos 5y ago

The article never says this, but her husband, Paul, is a longtime investor / VC [1]. There’s obviously still a huge opportunity for leakage of information that Nancy Pelosi receives, but the trades don’t actually look suspicious nor requiring non-public information. There was some reporting on this issue more broadly when Senator Burr seemed to place trades directly due to coronavirus information, which included Pelosi’s husband’s trades. Edit to add: I would concur with others that we probably need to restrict trading for politicians and their family, the same way we do insiders at corporations. Index funds okay, specific stocks or perceived competition, no. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Pelosi https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Pelosi

fighterpilot 5y ago
> the trades don’t actually look suspicious nor requiring non-public information. The purchase was made 1 month before this story[1] broke, which was a significantly market moving announcement. There's plausible deniability, of course. [1] https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/25/biden-plans-to-replace-government-fleet-with-electric-vehicles.html https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/25/biden-plans-to-replace-gover...
- KerrickStaley 5y ago
  Which purchase?
- boulos 5y ago
  Sorry, which trade are you referring to? The Dec 22 TSLA options? Assuming yes, the disclosure report [1] says it was 25 calls with a strike price of $500 with expiration of 3/18/22 (so another long dated option). Tesla's share price that day was ~$650 [2] and the value of the 500 call went up (from ~$200 to $400) but has come right back down to ~$200 [3]. They have not exercised / sold the options (visit [4] and search for Pelosi in Filing Year 2021). [1] https://disclosures-clerk.house.gov/public_disc/ptr-pdfs/2021/20018011.pdf https://disclosures-clerk.house.gov/public_disc/ptr-pdfs/202... [2] https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/TSLA/history/ https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/TSLA/history/ [3] https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/TSLA220318C00500000?p=TSLA220318C00500000 https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/TSLA220318C00500000?p=TSLA22... [4] https://disclosures-clerk.house.gov/PublicDisclosure/FinancialDisclosure https://disclosures-clerk.house.gov/PublicDisclosure/Financi...

legitster 5y ago

Nancy Pelosi's husband is CEO of a investment firm. It shouldn't be that surprising that she tops the list for investments. As others online have pointed out, despite an above average year, her portfolio is still underperforming an S&P 500 index fund with the dividends reinvested. Should politicians be forced to put their assets in a blind trust while in office? Yeah, probably. But I don't think I will indict Pelosi's slightly above average year of investments as evidence of anything in particular.

pgwhalen 5y ago
> her portfolio is still underperforming an S&P 500 index fund with the dividends reinvested Can you expand on this? The article indicates her one year returns were considerably higher than the S&P 500 last year.
- spullara 5y ago
  Their returns all time in office are worse.
- mullen 5y ago
  One year does not mean anything. If she is beating S&P 500 over 20 or 30 years, then there is a problem.
moralestapia 5y ago
>Nancy Pelosi's husband is CEO of a investment firm. It shouldn't be that surprising that she tops the list for investments. I don't know if you're using this as an argument to favor Pelosi, because this, if anything, is only another conflict of interest on top of where she's currently at. The disclosure and use of insider information from public companies can get you in big trouble, even if you're married to the people involved. There's a reason why CEOs (and the like) take HUGE caution measures when liquidating stock and try to involve family as least as possible.
KETpXDDzR 5y ago
"80% of US Fund Managers Underperform S&P 500 Over 5 years" http://www.ginsglobal.com/articles/80-of-us-fund-managers-underperform-sp-500-over-5-years/ http://www.ginsglobal.com/articles/80-of-us-fund-managers-un...

robbrown451 5y ago

Shouldn't HN steer clear of things like this with a political slant? She is a very divisive figure and I don't see how this sort of article makes HN better.

eternalban 5y ago
Information is valuable. Crazy idea: have no-comment threads.
chrisan 5y ago
This could be viewed as activism against all parties > In the House and the Senate reports Mr. Whale showed that both parties, no matter their allegiance, seem to be trading and often legislating to benefit their own positions.
brodouevencode 5y ago
That ship sailed a long time ago.
dcassett 5y ago
The political climate has piqued my interest in the workings of the US government. I appreciate helpful HN commenters that provide information that I don't have time to research.

grillvogel 5y ago

Interesting that DelBene is also so high on the list but not really mentioned at all "Her husband, Kurt DelBene, is Chief Digital Officer and EVP of Corporate Strategy, Core Services Engineering and Operations at Microsoft Corporation,[33] and led the effort to fix the Healthcare.gov website at the request of President Barack Obama.[34]" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suzan_DelBene#Personal_life https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suzan_DelBene#Personal_life

swalsh 5y ago

Is there an ETF where I can invest in the same things politicians are investing in?

soheil 5y ago
No because if there was and it did outperform the market, the returns would quickly evaporate as more and more people rushed in to invest in that ETF.
- somebodythere 5y ago
  And yet strategy ETFs still exist

metabagel 5y ago

This is mostly her husband's trading, which probably constitutes somewhat of a loophole in the legislation controlling stock purchases by members of congress. Still, the transactions were reported as required, and trading based on insider knowledge is illegal, so he would be subject to prosecution if that's what he was doing. The optics are bad, for sure. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-07-10/pelosi-husband-s-tech-stock-spotlights-law-on-lawmaker-trades https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-07-10/pelosi-hu...

ipaddr 5y ago
"he would be subject to prosecution if that's what he was doing" You would, so would I but history has shown he won't have to worry about that.

bagacrap 5y ago

"This is pretty incredible, for an average return of her stocks and options is 56.15%. The S&P, with its raucous best performing year, is only up 36% from last June" Strange to compare against sp500 when her holdings are more aligned with NASDAQ, up ~50% from last June.

wil421 5y ago
Hey man they are trying to make news and get clicks. Doing a favorable comparison isn’t going to get traffic.
- jedimind 5y ago
  The most common symbol of comparison is the s&p500, you'll usually find it as first suggested symbol among the most popular charting software (tradingview for instance)

whywhywhywhy 5y ago

I'd be fine with politicians being paid more if it was completely illegal (with prison time) for them or their partners to do this. Seems like the system is built in a way that encourages them to insider trade and throw kickbacks around to maximize their wealth while in power and after.

boulos 5y ago

Oh and looking more closely, this methodology is super poor (though I’m sympathetic to the challenge with the disclosure format). Basically, by assuming that all the trades were the maximum of the range (and per trade), it’s overweighting the PayPal and Crowdstrike performance and downweighting the MSFT and GOOG “under performance” (they bought GOOG near the top?). I don’t follow why most of the Feb 20 options aren’t being valued either. Those were the “scandalous” trades. And they were all (IIRC), 1-year out LEAPs or something. Seemed a reasonable thing at the time! (“People are panicking, buy now and assume it’s back to normal in a year”). Has someone done a more careful analysis? (At the very least, I strongly doubt that the positions would be the same between the crowd strike and MSFT shares, and that the MSFT shares were purchased alongside the MSFT options as a hedge). Edit: And umm, all the options trades are listed explicitly as the number of contracts purchased. So people can easily look up the VWAP or similar for the purchase date and get a real number...

misiti3780 5y ago

I wouldnt be against members of congress trading stocks as long as the trades were published at the end of every day after market close.

trident5000 5y ago

All comments critical of Nancy and the corruption getting downvoted in this thread. Democrat party censor contractor in full force.

dukeofdoom 5y ago

This has been debunked over and over starting in 2012. Nanci Pelosi is not part of a crime family. Stop trying to claim otherwise. Snopes debunked this okay like 2 years ago. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/nancy-pelosi-crime-family/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/nancy-pelosi-crime-family/

slackfan 5y ago
Snopes "This is not true because we twisted the english language into a pretzel to an extent that a Pravda writer would be proud", that snopes?
zyemuzu 5y ago
Ah yes, the fact checkers have spoken.
the_optimist 5y ago
This is not a credible response.
DevKoala 5y ago
Thank you fact checkers. Imagine how society would be without them? We’d be drowning in wrong-think.
mardifoufs 5y ago
I'm pretty sure your comment is tongue in cheek but wow this is a pretty bad look for snopes: >Was Nancy Pelosi’s brother, Franklin D. Roosevelt D’Alesandro, charged with lying during a rape trial? Status: MIXTURE The Facts: Nancy Pelosi’s brother, Franklin D. Roosevelt D’Alesandro, was charged with perjury during a rape trial in the 1950s. However, he was eventually acquitted of those charges How is that a mixture? The poster claims he has been charged, not convicted, Snopes confirms he was charged but... Ends up labelling this as mixed? That's pure damage control from Snopes at this point

sam0x17 5y ago

Is there a place where you can get info on her/her husband's trades in real time? Cuz I kinda want to write a bot now ;)

kinghajj 5y ago
No, the reporting delay between when trades are made and then made public is something like ~1 month, IIRC.
- mensetmanusman 5y ago
  That would be a great time barrier to remove.

analog31 5y ago

I wonder if politicians should be required to share their portfolios in real time. Then the rest of us could buy index funds based on their trading habits.

calebm 5y ago
PelosiBot

calebm 5y ago

The best way to predict the future is to make it.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

robbmorganf 5y ago

Just an observation: IF we take it as GIVEN that policymakers are going to find a way to earn some fixed amount X which is greater than their salary (this is a big assumption and probably not true, but just for a thought experiment) THEN maybe making money from stock options is actually better than taking money from lobbyists? Lawmakers can make money from both hurting and helping companies, so it doesn't create a particular incentive to go out and help PARTICULAR companies (that said, there is an incentive to create volatility, which isn't great). Meanwhile, lobbying tends to advantage some of the least ethical companies (e.g. Opiods, fossil fuels) because the only incentive is to HELP the company at the expense of customers. To be clear, I don't think it's right for lawmakers to make any more by virtue of their position than the salaries set forth by the law. I'm just saying that of the several unethical ways they can make money, stock options have incentives least misaligned with the public good.

Clubber 5y ago
>I'm just saying that of the several unethical ways they can make money, stock options have incentives least misaligned with the public good. You are assuming that said laws are for the public good and not the good of lobbyists. I would guess this happens more often than not: politicians pass a law that is for lobbyists and against the public good, then make money buying stock against the reaction of said law. "Never trust a politician," is probably as old as civilization, why do we think ours are any better? Oh, and when the system finally crumbles from under all the rot, guess who suffers and who doesn't. I'll give a hint, the people who control the police and criminal justice system won't be the ones suffering.
jdoliner 5y ago
Making money through insider trading is very maligned with the public good. One it is essentially using the stock market as a mechanism to transfer wealth from unknowing public traders to insider traders, if they're making money they're making it off of someone. Two, because of this, it creates the existential risk of a lose of trust in the public markets which can lead to their collapse. It's a real case of who watches the watchmen though because insider trading laws were, of course, created by congress itself.

sentinel 5y ago

Disgusting.

anonymouse008 5y ago

This is honestly the only hope I have that Congress won't mess with with Capital Gains taxes... they win too much from it.

cgb223 5y ago

In the same way that CEOs trades are planned months in advance and happen regardless of the market, we should make Congress people should have to do the same

TrispusAttucks 5y ago

Writing regulation policy is one hell of a way to perform insider trading. Why is this legal? "Most of Pelosi's gains are quite interesting, given the timing of her plays. For example, she was able to get into TSLA, DIS around stimulus news, NVDA before American Semiconductor funding was announced, among a long list of interesting picks. Mr. Whale leaves it to the reader to check her transactions and the news around her purchases (all available for free on the platform). She also timed the NFLX buys on June 18th perfectly. It was released on July 14th that NFLX is entering the videogame space, causing the stock to rally significantly."

DevKoala 5y ago

Studying Pelosi’s portfolio is one of the key strategies every trader should know by now. I have made a lot of money following her trades, particularly when she jumped in on Crowdstrike right before the government security hacks. This lady can tell the future. /s

c7DJTLrn 5y ago

Why are all of the members of Congress extremely wealthy? Doesn't seem particularly representative of the general population. Members of the UK Parliament are generally upper-class, but they're not all extremely wealthy.

throwawayboise 5y ago
They aren't all extremely wealthy. The powerful committee leaders, majority and minority leaders, etc. generally are because they are the ones who choose which issues will make it to general debate and vote, so they are the ones who have the ability to influence markets. Some random young representative from the middle of nowhere has almost no influence in congress. It takes years and powerful backers to develop that. Part of the argument for term limits is to prevent people from making a career out of being a representative or senator, which is what you need to do accumulate power.

dpierce9 5y ago

They sold Amazon calls going into COVID. A call is a right to buy so selling a call means you have an obligation to sell the stock to the buyer at the strike price on or before the expiry (assuming American option). Can’t see the strike price or expiry but there is no way they didn’t lose money on that trade since Amazon was up up up and away every month after that and it would have had to be way out of the money not to trigger. In other words, not a particularly heads up trade.

the_optimist 5y ago

1) Nancy Pelosi is ethical and an upstanding citizen, a true hero-person among ordinary people. 2) There are no prospective conflicts of interest in having your significant other trade on your behalf. If there were any such conflicts, they're acceptable anyway. 3) There's nothing unusual around these trades. Many lawmakers underperform the market anyway. Also some people under-perform and over-perform. Nothing to see here nor question. 4) Legislating around the companies you buy and sell is an acceptable, both in governance structure and in economic opportunism 5) There is no way to mitigate these conflicts of interest anyway, so there is no point in paying attention to them.

jb775 5y ago

Elected & appointed govt workers and their immediate families shouldn't be permitted to buy/sell any stock while in office or 5 years following. And they shouldn't be allowed to take jobs/money (including "speaking fees", a.k.a. bribes) from publicly owned corporations for 15 years after leaving public office.

abeppu 5y ago

Far beyond limiting what members of congress or other high office holders can invest in while in office, I think the ideal should be that public office holders must play a Rawlsian gamble: when they leave office, we select a random citizen, and their level of wealth is wiped to match that citizen. Excess goes to a fund for public campaign financing. Not only should politicians not be incentivized to select policies which benefit them specifically, but they should be incentivized to select policies which materially benefit the population overall.

sceew 5y ago

Not sure why the % returns really matter here. Even if you lose money, insider trading is still insider trading. Congress + senators 100% receive insider information. Even if its not near-term merger announcements or big federal contracts - they still have an extremely advantaged position and access to information that the general public doesn't have. Its ridiculous that they can trade individual stocks, yet alone options. They should be restricted from buying individual stocks, and should only be allowed to buy mutual funds and ETFs at a minimum. Pretty much any employee on Wall Street (even if "back-office") has similar restrictions. I don't even know why this is a question - the optics of short-term levered bets from elected officials (or family of) is terrible. Completely ruins any resemblance of "public service." Even with this, it might not be enough. Elected officials could still buy the TQQQ ETF (3x leverage on NASDAQ) prior to a stimulus bill passing. It would be too onerous to not allow any stock exposure, but maybe they should be required to disclose trades in real-time vs. at the end of every quarter.

jessaustin 5y ago

An honest public servant can’t become rich in politics. He can only attain greatness and satisfaction by service. -- Harry Truman