Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has invested up to $5 million in a San Francisco-based company, adding to her successful portfolio of Big Tech. Documents revealed Pelosi’s transaction with privately held Databricks, which is a software company based on AI technology, took place on March 3 and was disclosed on March 21. Databricks is just the latest newcomer to Pelosi’s long list of companies, but there are eight major names that she has invested $16 million in since 2022. While she has not broken any laws by buying and selling stocks, many Americans and other government officials see the investments as conflicts of interest since she has access to confidential intelligence and the power to impact businesses.
Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has invested up to $5 million in a San Francisco-based company, adding to her successful portfolio of Big Tech. Documents revealed Pelosi’s transaction with privately held Databricks, which is a software company based on AI technology, took place on March 3 and was disclosed on March 21. Databricks is just the latest newcomer to Pelosi’s long list of companies, but there are eight major names that she has invested $16 million in since 2022. While she has not broken any laws by buying and selling stocks, many Americans and other government officials see the investments as conflicts of interest since she has access to confidential intelligence and the power to impact businesses.
Databricks, founded in 2013, raised $500 million last year based on a $43 billion valuation. The California company offers cloud-based tools for processing and transforming data – and is used by the likes of Microsoft . While the company is a late-stage startup, it reported $1.6 billion in revenue last year – more than a 50 percent increase from 2022 – and industry experts have speculated the firm is preparing for an initial public offering (IPO). Databricks also announced March 18 a collaboration with Nvidia – another Big Tech company in Pelosi’s portfolio.
However, there has never been any evidence showing Pelosi has conducted insider trader when buying and selling stocks and there are no laws prohibiting government officials from playing from doing so. Pelosi retired stepped away from her role as Speaker of the House in 2022, but still holds a position in Congress . Chris Josephs, co-founder of Autopilot, a service that automates your portfolio by copying top-notch traders in real-time, told Investor.com : ‘From an ethical perspective, I believe it is extremely harmful for politicians to trade individual stocks. ‘There are numerous jobs out there that don’t allow employees from trading, yet our most powerful Americans can.’
Her net worth was estimate to be over $100 million, yet the House of Representatives and Senate ‘s salary is about $$223,500 for the year. Many of the buying and selling of stocks has been claimed to have made by her husband Paul, but law requires spouses of public officials must report financial transactions valued at more than $1,000. However, every released transaction document seen by DailyMail.com has been filed under ‘Nancy Pelosi.’ In 2021, Congress proposed a bill that would ban members from trading stocks under the precedent that it could be considered insider trading – when a person uses their knowledge of a company’s finances and business practices to make money off their stock.
When asked that year if members of Congress should be allowed to trade stocks, Pelosi answered: ‘We are a free-market economy. They should be able to participate in that.’ Walter Shaub, former director of the U.S. Office of Government Ethics, was outspoken against Pelosi’s argument, calling it a ‘ridiculous comment,’ in a now-deleted X post, CNBC reported at the time. He continued: ‘She might as well have said ‘let them eat cake.’ Sure, it’s a free-market economy. ‘But your average schmuck doesn’t get confidential briefings from government experts chock full of nonpublic information directly to the price of stocks.’
Just months after Pelosi voiced her opposition to a bill banning Congress members from stock trading, she reversed her opinion and said she would be pushing to greenlight the Congressional Knowledge Act. The bill didn’t pass, and in the two years since, Pelosi has bought a collective $27.6 million worth of stocks, bringing her total trade volume up to a whopping $123.9 million, according to Quiver Quantitative. But again, she disclosed that many of the investments were made by Paul. Below are the eight Big Tech company’s in Pelosi’s portfolio:
Nvidia: Nvidia is a software company that sells the high-end graphics and video processing chips that are used in AI technology, desktops, and computer servers. In November 2023, the transaction document filed by Pelosi showed an invested amount between $1 million and $5 million in the company. At the time, 50 call options were bought with a strike price of $120. Those same options are now worth about $660 per option contract, suggesting an estimated gain of $1.4 million, Investing.com reported. Call options are essentially contracts that gives the person the right to buy a stock off of the seller, but they don’t have to pay immediately.
If the stock increases, it means the buyer is getting it for less money than if they had waited, but if it goes down, the buyer can back out of the contract without paying and without any repercussions. On June 17, 2022, her husband Paul also purchased 20,000 shares in Nvidia – days before a legislative vote that could hand $52 billion to semiconductor producers. And this year, Nvidia revealed it had partnered with the US government in an AI research program. There’s no suggestion that Paul broke the law – but some have questioned whether he may have additional information as to how the upcoming Senate vote will go. Craig Holman, a government affairs lobbyist for the left-wing think tank Public Citizen, told the Daily Caller News Foundation that ‘it certainly raises the specter that Paul Pelosi could have access to some insider legislative information.’
Apple: Apple is the largest public company in the world and is worth about $2.9 trillion, and in June 2023, Pelosi purchased 50 call options for between $250,000 and $500,000. The California Democrat also disclosed that her husband on May 13 bought Apple call options for between $500,001 and $1 million. On May 24, he bought more Apple call options, in an amount between $250,001 and $500,000, the disclosure showed.
Microsoft: Microsoft is one of the first companies to market artificial intelligence software and has invested roughly $13 billion in ChatGPT maker OpenAI. In June 2022, Pelosi disclosed that her husband bought Microsoft call options for as much as $600,000 – one option between $50,001 and $100,000 and another with a low of $250,001 and $500,000. Paul also paid $1.95 million to buy 15,000 shares of Microsoft at a strike price of $130 in Marcy 2021. Shortly after, share prices hit about $230 to $255 due to the company securing a $22 billion government contract to supply the US Army with augmented reality headsets . Microsoft also joined Nvidia in January 2024 to work with the government on the AI project.
Alphabet: Google ‘s parent company, Alphabet is the leader in online advertising and in September 2022 garnered 200 call options from Paul, amounting to between $1 million and $5 million, according to the transaction information filed by his wife. Since then, the shares have only risen by 12 percent. Paul also sold 30,000 shares of Google sock in December 2023 – a month before the the tech giant was sued by the Department of Defense and eight states over alleged antitrust violations. Tesla: Tesla is the primary EV maker in the US, has a market cap of $742 billion, and in March of last year, Pelosi purchased 2,500 shares. In 2022, she disclosed that her husband had purchased the shares for between $1 million and $5 million. Pelosi’s Tesla investment in December 2020 came only a month before President Joe Biden signed an executive order to transition all federal, state, and local government vehicles to the zero-emission alternative by 2035.
AllianceBernstein Holding LP: AllianceBernstein is an investment management and research firm that works with high net-worth and retail investors. As of March 18, 2024, the company has a net worth of $3.8 billion. The transaction document, filed by Pelosi, showed a purchased 10,000 shares in February 2022 for between $250,000 and $500,000, but since then. Disney: Walt Disney Co. is a media and entertainment company that runs theme parks, cruise lines, movie and television studios as well as streaming services including Hulu, Disney+, and ESPN+. In January 2022, Pelosi bought 100 call options, costing her between $1 million and $5 million.
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By Daily Mail Online, March 25, 2024
