Donald Trump owns stock in the Tomahawk missiles he used in Syria
Donald Trump’s financial entanglements have been the focus of consistent controversy since he took office. He claimed he was putting his assets in a “blind trust” which was later revealed not to be one (source: Chicago Tribune). He’s also been accused of using his office to enrich his hotels. But we’ve now reached the phase where Trump has ordered military action which has given direct financial benefit to a company that he owns stock in.
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Last night Donald Trump fired fifty-nine Tomahawk missiles at a Syrian air base. But according to the Washington Post (link), they were a poor choice of weaponry under the circumstances, because Russia has S-400 surface to air defense technology in place in Syria which could easily have shot them down. In addition, Reuters is reporting that the Syrian air base was barely harmed (link), and is already back to operational capacity today, because the Tomahawks were aimed at the least important targets on the base.
This means that Trump went with the wrong weaponry when he ordered the Tomahawk attack (his military advisers would have explained this to him), and he used the missiles merely put on a show for TV viewers at home, rather than doing any real damage. In other words Trump just set a bunch of Tomahawk missiles on fire which, according to a recent Defense Department report (link), may have been worth as much as $93.8 million in total. Why would he do this? Well, he does own shares of stock in the company that makes the Tomahawks.
Tomahawk missiles are manufactured by Raytheon Inc., and according to this report from Business Insider (link), Donald Trump owned stock in Raytheon up through at least the start of the presidential election cycle. There is no record that he subsequently sold that stock. The Tomahawks that Trump just burned up will have to be replaced, meaning he just handed a nearly hundred million dollar payday to a company he owns stock in. Not surprisingly, shares of Raytheon spiked today (link), meaning he’s directly profiting from his Syria attack. And again, it appears the Tomahawks were not the ideal choice of weaponry for the Syria attack. Contribute to Palmer Report
