The Truth Is Out There (My Visit to Mar-a-Lago)

“Jim, how would you like to come to Mar-a-Lago and meet President Trump?”

That’s what a wired-in colleague of mine asked me recently, and knowing this man as I do, he was not asking in jest. Now, I must say that my initial reaction to the possibility of meeting Mr. Trump was a mixture of excitement, anticipation and ambivalence.

Excitement at meeting one of the most influential humans living today, because love him or loathe him, his impact cannot be denied. Anticipation at the prospect of hearing directly from the horse’s mouth the answer to a few hard questions already brewing in my mind. Ambivalence, because as a thinking entity, I have mixed opinions on the Trump presidency, the way it ended, the events of January 6th and other matters of critical import.

Probing a little further into my colleague’s inquiry, I was told that the proposed meeting at Mar-a-Lago was at the invitation of executives from Trump Media & Technology Group Corp. (NASDAQ: DJT). Trump Media is the parent company of online platform Truth Social, and the executive team wanted an opportunity to tell me about their plans to grow the business and to make DJT a leading company that delivers value for shareholders.

Of course, I said yes to the invitation (who wouldn’t?), and about a fortnight after that initial colleague call, I was on a plane headed to Palm Beach, Florida.

In preparation for this meeting with Trump Media, I did fair amount of research on the current state and future prospects for DJT. I mean, I had heard about DJT shares as we all did, but what we heard from the mainstream press and the financial press wasn’t flattering. The claim was that it was just another “meme” stock that had been financially engineered via a “SPAC” (special purpose acquisition company) to bring the investing public to Truth Social and to essentially enrich the former president, who owns a reported 115 million shares worth about $5.6 billion.

After conducting my own objective due diligence on DJT, there were a lot of open questions on the table. For example, what is the company’s plan to generate revenue and to become profitable? What is the vision for the company and its expanded operations going forward? What is the unique value proposition for Truth Social users? When should investors see progress on these fronts?

Unfortunately, asking Mr. Trump about these issues wasn’t possible. As you might have heard, he was immersed in a little legal proceeding in New York that took place at the time of the Trump Media presentation I attended. Fortunately, I did get to speak with former Congressman Devin Nunes, who, in addition to being one of the best representatives we’ve had (especially from my home state of California), is now the CEO of Trump Media & Technology Group.

Over the years, I had seen Nunes operate in Congress, and I liked his work as he was frequently on the side of free markets and protecting America’s interests abroad. But now the question was, would I like what he had to say about his new private sector venture?

Your editor discussing Truth Social and the future of DJT with CEO Devin Nunes.

“I always tell people, Trump didn’t need a new company and I didn’t need a new job. But out of necessity, we had to create a home for people that were canceled.”

That was what Nunes told me, during our interview, was the real impetus behind the creation of Truth Social, as he and Mr. Trump see the company as the social media alternative to the uber-woke behemoths in the space. These behemoths have proven themselves to be less-than-candid when it comes to canceling, demonetizing, shadow banning and otherwise throttling dissenting voices in the online square.

Now, I am all about any company’s right to conduct business the way it wants, i.e., I think that if social media entities want to be woke, liberal and anti-Trump, they have a right to do so. We, as consumers, have the right not to patronize them if we don’t like it. And I don’t consider the woke actions of these companies “censorship,” as censorship in the technical sense can only be conducted via government.

I do, however, know that the only solution to bad ideas is good ideas, and the only solution to a social media platform you don’t like is a social media platform you do like.

Creating that social media platform is what the originators of Truth Social see as not only a critical alternative to the current offerings out there, but also as a vehicle to create shareholder value.

You can watch my entire interview with Devin Nunes here at our YouTube Channel, which I highly recommend, because I think you’ll definitely gain a new sense of appreciation for the company’s mission, as well as its ambitious plans going forward.

Here, Nunes told me that he sees Truth Social as a “beachhead against Big Tech, and from there we are going to grow everything else.”

That “everything else” includes plans to continue growing Truth Social’s user base, continue capturing revenue from advertisers who see the value in a targeted and devoted audience, and perhaps most importantly, build out a social media infrastructure that includes an online streaming network similar to companies such as Pluto TV and even Netflix.

Trump Media also has its sights set on building an e-commerce platform complete with payment processing services similar to those offered by PayPal and Venmo. Not content to stop at those aspirations, Trump Media also has plans to offer web services (think cloud computing) such as those akin to what Amazon offers through its AWS segment.

Ambitious, you say? Yes, I agree. A vision that will take time, money and good fortune? Yes, I also agree. Impossible to implement? No, on that I do not agree.

I say that because time and again, people have underestimated the appeal of all things Donald Trump. I find this underestimation curious because, even if you are decidedly not a Trump fan, you have to admit that what he has done has been remarkable.

Indeed, Mr. Trump continues to defy all convention, leading the race for president in the latest 538 average of opinion polls, by an albeit slim margin of 41.0% to 39.8% over President Biden. Still, as of this writing, and despite impeachments, multiple legal issues pending and now 34 felony convictions, Mr. Trump continues to retain his amazing appeal with the American public.

So, will that amazing appeal, along with the execution of an ambitious business plan by Devin Nunes and the Trump Media team translate into greater value for DJT shareholders? Well, that truth is out there, but it’s still too early to say with any modicum of confidence.

That said, I do think the market for an alternative social media services company, one that is positioned in opposition to its woke counterparts, has potential to flourish. And if it flourishes, i.e., if it begins to make a profit (the only metric of flourishing I consider valid), then that will drive the share price higher. When that happens, it would go a very long way to persuading an investor like me to establish an equity stake in DJT, and to recommend such a stake to my newsletter advisory subscribers.

That’s the truth here, and as I suspect you’ve learned if you’ve read The Deep Woods for any length of time, truth is the only thing from me you’ll ever get.

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No Evil Thoughts

“There are no evil thoughts except one; the refusal to think.”

–Ayn Rand, “Atlas Shrugged”

This past weekend, I finished listening to the unabridged audiobook version of the greatest novel ever, Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged.” This was my second listening of the complete audio version, but I originally read the novel as a freshman in college in 1984, and I’ve read it multiple times since. And while I may be guilty of cliché abuse here, I must say that the novel literally changed my life.

I say that, because Rand’s view of “man the hero” and her conception of “the ideal man” is something that resonates deeply with me. It’s also something I had never before seen presented and have seen only partially in literature ever since. That vision, that ideal, is what I try to achieve with every action I take, so when I say it literally changed my life, I mean it.

If you have yet to read this novel, or if you haven’t read it in a long time (or even better, if you haven’t listened to the audio version narrated by the great Scott Brick) then I highly recommend doing so right now. Start today. When you finish the nearly 63-hour adventure, I will gladly accept all forms of thanks — because trading value for value is how ideal men interact with the world.

Wisdom about money, investing and life can be found anywhere. If you have a good quote that you’d like me to share with your fellow readers, send it to me, along with any comments, questions and suggestions you have about my newsletters, seminars or anything else. Click here to ask Jim.

In the name of the best within us,

Jim Woods