Shares of Trump Media & Technology Group Corp. (TMTG) trading under the ticker "DJT" closed its first day of trading 16 percent higher after completing its merger with Digital World Acquisition Corp. (DWAC) a day earlier.
At the end of trading on Tuesday, TMTG's stock price increased to $58 a share. At one point on Tuesday, "DJT" rose to as high as $75 per share, according to Google Finance data. Former President Donald Trump owns about 58 percent of the company's shares.
On Monday, DWAC had seen its share price rise, closing the trading day up 35 percent and announced that it was going to start trading at the Nasdaq stock market on Tuesday.
The new entity runs Truth Social, a social media platform created two years ago as an alternative to established players such as Facebook and Twitter, now X.
"We built this company to protect the American people's voices and their freedom," TMTG CEO Devin Nunes said in a statement on Tuesday. "Having transformed into a public company, Truth Social remains committed to maintaining and vehemently defending a digital space for free expression."
Some financial analysts, including Matthew Tuttle, CEO of Tuttle Capital Management, told Newsweek that the stock's price spike when it opened was unsurprising.
"Everyone saw this coming and geared up for it," he said early on Tuesday.
Asked later to explain why the stock appeared to close lower than at the highs it hit during the day, Tuttle said: "Profit taking. Anyone who knows what they are doing sold most or all today."
The stock was briefly paused for volatility, according to Bloomberg, with about 54 million shares switching ownership during the day.
TMTG's main asset, Truth Social, has about 500,000 active users through iOS and Android platforms, according to CNN, which cited Similarweb data. X, formerly Twitter, had 75 million users, while Facebook registered 142 million active users. Truth Social reported revenues of more than $3 million last year, with close to $50 million in losses.
Some analysts suggest that the company may see its stock price struggle going forward, questioning its business fundamentals.
"It is not at all surprising that this stock is initially doing quite well; however, its ability to continue doing well is highly questionable, and in my view, very unlikely," William Hall, political science and business professor at Webster University, told Newsweek earlier on Tuesday.
Newsweek contacted TMTG for comment via email on Tuesday.
Update 03/26/24, 5:25 p.m. ET: This article was updated with comment from Tuttle and more context on the stock price performance.
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