Insider Trading, in Plain Sight

Yesterday, Donald Trump used the presidency to move markets — and then reversed the move after the closing bell.

At approximately 2:00 pm, Trump publicly attacked Lockheed Martin, singling out defense contractors during market hours. The result was immediate and measurable: LMT shares dropped.

At 4:00 pm, after markets closed, Trump posted again — this time calling for a 50% increase in U.S. defense spending, a policy position that directly benefits the very companies he had just damaged hours earlier.

That is insider trading.

This was not policy debate. This was not messaging discipline gone wrong. This was market manipulation executed through presidential speech, timed precisely to occur before and after the market close.

The sequence matters:

1. Name and attack a specific defense contractor while markets are open

2. Allow the stock to fall

3. Reassure the entire defense sector after the bell with a massive spending promise

Anyone positioned to trade — family members, donors, political allies, funds tipped off in advance — could profit cleanly from that swing.

The presidency is not a Bloomberg terminal. It is not a pump-and-dump platform. It is not a hedge fund with a nuclear arsenal.

Trump has collapsed the boundary between state power and personal financial advantage. He is using policy signaling as a trading instrument and daring regulators, Congress and the public to stop him.

This is insider trading carried out in public, with impunity, by the head of the U.S. government.

If this behavior is tolerated, markets are no longer markets. They are instruments of regime power.

And that should terrify anyone paying attention.