Sister channels Fox News Channel and Fox Business Network are usually singing from the same sheet of music when covering the news of the day, in particular as it relates to reporting about their longtime ally and political patron Donald Trump.
Today, however, the two networks deviated markedly during their daytime coverage of the ballooning stock valuation for Trump’s media company, which completed a merger deal last week.
Disgraced former President Donald Trump has enjoyed a financial windfall over the past day. Late Monday morning, a court in New York significantly reduced the bond he owes the state as he appeals a $454 million civil fraud judgment against him, while also extending Trump an additional 10-day grace period to secure a new bond. In response to the news, share prices for Digital World Acquisition Corp., the shell company that just completed its merger with Trump Media & Technology Group (the company that owns Truth Social), surged by the close of trading.
Share prices for Trump’s new company continued climbing Tuesday. At one point, Trump Media shares traded for double what they went for last week, spurring numerous financial publications and business reporters to label the company a “meme stock” — a company whose stock price is driven by viral popularity and thus can be prone to an eventual collapse. Industry experts warned that the stock value is “untethered to its underlying business results” and that there was “no way” the current market price represents “a rational valuation for this company.”
None of these glaring red flags about Trump’s overvalued company were enough to dissuade the cast of characters at Fox News’ Outnumbered from basking in Trump’s good fortune.
After showing critiques of Trump's company that aired on cable rivals CNBC and MSNBC, the Fox team mocked Trump’s critics and celebrated his stock’s performance.
Guest co-host Marc Siegel specifically took umbrage with a description of Trump’s new venture as a “pump and dump” scheme, arguing, “That would mean, by the way, that you deliberately pump up the stock in order to sell a bunch of it off,” but “that’s not what’s happening here.”
According to Siegel, this stock price run-up represents “a real excitement” for “an alternative to the — to one-dimensional media.”