President Donald Trump made nearly 40 times as many trades in July of this year as his Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, a former hedge fund manager, made all of last year.
The president’s unprecedented trading habits continued over the summer. He reported recording 1,156 trades in July, according to his latest report to the Office of Government Ethics, released on Tuesday.
Meanwhile, Bessent released his 2025 annual disclosures on Wednesday, revealing that he made only 29 transactions last year — all sales. Only three of the sales were in individual stocks, and eight were sales of interests in funds run by Key Square Partners, the firm he left to become Treasury Secretary.
As a member of Trump’s cabinet, Bessent was legally required to divest, or make other arrangements, of most of his holdings when he joined the administration. That’s a requirement that the President and Vice President are exempt from.
Trump’s support for a congressional stock trading ban would also not apply to the President or Vice President.
The Trump Organization didn’t respond to a request for comment. It previously told Business Insider that the volume of Trump’s trades is the result of automated trading strategies, which are out of the president’s control.
As Business Insider previously reported, Trump’s trades track direct-indexing strategies, known for allowing investors to track the performance of major indexes while also claiming individual stock losses for tax purposes, thereby reducing tax liability. Therefore, Trump’s trades, which occur substantially more often than any other American politician, are more likely due to portfolio “rebalancing” rather than to him actually exiting a position.
But that doesn’t mean they’re not still well outside the norms for politicians, even those with illustrious business careers and complicated finances.
“The irony of it is that he’s taken a real leadership role in pushing forward regulation on politicians’ trading, and then blew it up himself,” said Dan Weiskopf, a portfolio manager for Tidal Financial Group who runs two ETFs based on politicians’ trades: NANC, as in Nancy Pelosi, for Democrats, and GOP for Republicans.
Bessent’s disclosures
Bessent has been working in finance for over 40 years, first making his name as one of the financiers who led Soros Fund Management’s massive 1992 bet that crashed the British Pound Sterling and netted the fund well over $1 billion.
He’s no stranger to novel financial moves, but his finances since joining the Trump administration have been quite conservative by comparison. In total, he reported at least $228 million in assets, but more than $150 million of that is across just three separate bank accounts.
And even though Bessent only sold three individual stocks, while Trump has made many thousands of individual stock trades as president, Bessent still received a slap on the wrist for failing to disclose his husband’s JPMorgan holdings.
According to a comment from Mark Vetter, the Treasury Department’s Deputy Assistant General Counsel for Ethics, included in the filing, this $100,000 to $250,000 equity holding was accidentally categorized as a bank deposit instead of an equity holding.
“This error was not caught until July 2025; when the Filer realized the issue, his spouse immediately divested,” the disclosure said. Bessent was assessed a $200 fee. The Treasury did not respond to a request for comment.
As for Trump, he’s continuing to buy and sell equities even as the Democratic Party circles. The two largest sales, two July 20th sales of $5 million to $25 million worth of Amazon and Microsoft, make up at least double, and likely much more, than Bessent’s total of $2.3 million to $5.1 million in sales.
Meanwhile, Trump made at least $44.6 million in purchases and $34.5 million in sales in July alone.