This January, some senators attended a classified briefing this spring about the coronavirus. Loeffler was one of them, and her stock trades afterward drew prominent attention. Perdue did not attend that briefing, but he, too, bought stock in businesses that stood to benefit from a pandemic, such as Pfizer. (Sen. Richard Burr [R-N.C.] is still under investigation by the Justice Department for his trades.)
Both Perdue and Loeffler said they didn’t do anything wrong. Loeffler said her trades were made by an investment firm. Perdue said most of his investments were made by an independent adviser, though the Associated Press recently noted he still could have told that adviser what to buy and sell.
The Justice Department closed its look into Perdue’s coronavirus-related stock trades, as it did Loeffler’s. But with Perdue they found something else to review: his sale of more than $1 million in stock in January from an Atlanta financial company for which he previously sat on the board, weeks before that CEO stepped down and the stock price plummeted.
Perdue bought the stock back at a low price, and it has since quadrupled, reports the AP. Shortly before Perdue sold his stock in this company, Cardlytics, the New York Times reports that investigators found an email from the CEO to Perdue that mentioned “the upcoming change’” in the company. When Perdue replied he didn’t know what change he was talking about, the CEO later responded he had sent the email to the wrong David. Perdue still told his financial adviser to sell the stock, the Times reports.
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New reporting after the election, first from the Daily Beast and then confirmed by the Times, found more eyebrow-raising trades from Perdue. In 2019, he became chair of a subcommittee that oversees the Navy. Right before that, he bought stock in a contractor that works with the Navy that ultimately benefited from legislation on which Perdue worked.