NANCY Pelosi’s husband has made a $5million profit after buying tech stocks in May amid accusations of insider trading.
The House Speaker’s venture capitalist spouse Paul made the move as his wife’s chamber ostensibly works to pass a series of bills to rein in Big Tech.
The antitrust bill was advanced as a push by the government to curb the “unregulated power” of big tech firms Google, Amazon, Apple and Facebook.
But the market reaction to the judiciary panel approving the legislation was muted.
In fact, shares in big tech companies rose after investors found the House proposal to be no real threat to Big Tech.
Meanwhile, a financial disclosure report signed by the House Speaker last Friday, revealed Mr Pelosi exercised 40 call options to acquire 4,000 shares of Alphabet, which is the parent company of Google, at a $1,200 strike price,
Exercising a call option allows investors to purchase a stock at a later date at a predetermined price after an individual speculated the value would be beforehand.
Pelosi’s call options for Alphabet, valued at $1,200 a share, were set to expire the day he sold them, when the company was valued at $2,500 a share.
Mr Pelosi gained $4.8 million as an immediate result of the trade, though his returns have grown since the June 18 transaction to $5.3 million.
The disclosure report also revealed that her husband bought 20 call options for Amazon at a strike price of $3,000 a share, as well as 50 call options for Apple for $100 a share, though he did not report exercising those trades.
Forbes asks: “Did Paul… profit off of insider Beltway scuttlebutt in June to make about $5million on options contracts tied to Alphabet’s stock?”
But according to former Rep. Jill Long Thompson, D-Ind. Mr Pelosi did not violate the STOCK Act unless he acted on nonpublic information, which seems unlikely,
A Pelosi spokesman Drew Hamill has denied any wrongdoing on the speaker’s part, saying she “has no involvement or prior knowledge of these transactions” and “does not own any stock”, reports the New York Post.
Mr Pelosi’s transactions are also not suspected of violating the STOCK Act, which makes it illegal for lawmakers and Capitol Hill staff to engage in insider trading.
Just days after he decided to bet on Big Tech, the House moved to advance five antitrust bills that would rein in Silicon Valley.
The bills, which had bipartisan backing in the House Judiciary Committee, face uphill climbs in both the House and the Senate, where the legislative filibuster requires 60 votes.
But Mrs Pelosi has maintained her support for the bills, saying at a press conference late last month.
She told reporters: “There has been concern on both sides of the aisle about the consolidation of power of the tech companies.
“And these — this legislation is an attempt to address that in the interest of fairness, in the interest of competition, in interest of meeting the needs of people — whose privacy, whose data and all the rest is at the mercy of these tech companies.”
Asked if she had spoken with Apple CEO Tim Cook about Big Tech’s concerns about the legislation, Pelosi said she told the tech executive: “If you have a substantive concern, put it forth as Congress works its will.”
“That’s been my conversation with Tim.
“Congress will work its will. They’ll have the mark-up in committee. We’ll go to [the House] Rules [Committee.”
She added: “If [these companies] have substantive concerns, and… they have members who have voted with them on this, they can put forth what they want to put forth.
“But we’re not going to ignore that consolidation that has happened and the concern that exists on both sides of the aisle.”
