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The arrangement is structured to offer deep-pocketed buyers real, immediate access to the president’s statements.<\/span>Julia Demaree Nikhinson\/AP<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Truth Social announced<\/span> last week that it was selling immediate access\u2014or at least as close as possible\u2014to President Donald Trump\u2019s thoughts. For $100,000 a month, anyone will be able to receive almost instantaneous access to Trump\u2019s Truth Social posts through the platform\u2019s API, a very small but significant advantage over following them via the web. The offer is not, however, like many of his other commercial offerings attempting to capitalize on the presidency\u2014this is no chintzy watch <\/a>or repackaged phone painted gold<\/a>. This is real business, and it\u2019s uniquely structured to ensure that those willing to pay will have real, immediate access to the president\u2019s statements.<\/p>\n There is already a booming business in selling near-immediate access to information\u2014licensed data feeds are offered by other social media companies and media companies like Dow Jones and Bloomberg offer pricey wire services that allow extremely fast access to headlines and key data points. The market for all this is Wall Street firms who do high-speed trading\u2014where access to key market-moving information even milliseconds faster than a competitor can allow profitable trades.<\/p>\n In fact, if anything, it was odd that Truth Social, which has struggled to make much of a profit or expand its active user base much beyond Trump and his immediate family, hadn\u2019t already offered a live data feed.<\/p>\n But the way Truth Social introduced its new product was not subtle. According to its press release<\/a>: <\/p>\n \u201cMarkets already move on Truth Social posts,\u201d said Kevin McGurn, Interim Chief Executive Officer of TMTG. \u201cTruth API delivers a direct, licensed, real-time feed of the platform\u2019s most market-moving Truths while advancing our strategy to monetize proprietary assets through a high-margin, recurring revenue stream. As adoption grows, we expect Truth API to become a meaningful, ongoing source of revenue for the company, creating lasting value for shareholders.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Realistically, only one user\u2019s posts on Truth Social genuinely move markets, and now, according to the company, Trump Media is going to use that fact to make money for shareholders. Notably, Trump is believed to own roughly 42 percent of the company.<\/p>\n The press release claimed that the company had already signed up customers and were expecting more to join before Aug. 1 when the program launches. The Financial Times<\/em> reported this week that the cost will be $100,000 monthly.<\/p>\n That\u2019s a striking cost\u2014according to at least one source<\/a>, it\u2019s more than double what Twitter charges for API-access to its much, much larger galaxy of market-moving accounts, and Meta and LinkedIn negotiate their large-scale deals individually.<\/p>\n Ironically, what makes the Truth Social feed so lucrative is the thing that once seemed like one of the company\u2019s weaknesses\u2014Trump has an exclusivity deal with Trump Media + Technology Group.<\/p>\n Back in 2022, I wrote how Trump Media had signed a deal<\/a> with Trump guaranteeing that he can post content elsewhere, provided he posts it on Truth Social six hours before he posts it anywhere else. The giant caveat on the deal was that Trump can post content related to political messaging, political fundraising, or get-out-the-vote efforts anywhere, at any point.<\/p>\n In 2022, when Trump was not in office and was mainly an out-of-work politician, testing political messages and trying to raise money, that was a hole in the business plan. Of course, Trump still<\/em> is constantly testing political messages and trying to raise money for political groups, but the market-moving content\u2014for instance, his April 9 Truth Social post that he would be suspending most tariffs<\/a> which sent stocks soaring<\/a>\u2014has stayed on Truth Social.<\/p>\n\n