Another timely trade
The DOJ filed a civil antitrust lawsuit against payments giant Visa on Tuesday, Sept. 24, for anticompetitive conduct and monopolizing the debit market.
It claims Visa illegally paid its rivals to keep them out of the market and hinder innovation. As a result, it holds about a 60% share of the debit payments market and earns about $7 billion annually in debit swipe fees, per the DOJ.
“We allege that Visa has unlawfully amassed the power to extract fees that far exceed what it could charge in a competitive market,” said Attorney General Merrick B. Garland in a press release announcing the lawsuit. “Merchants and banks pass along those costs to consumers, either by raising prices or reducing quality or service. As a result, Visa’s unlawful conduct affects not just the price of one thing – but the price of nearly everything.”
Visa stock slumped shortly after the DOJ’s announcement — but unlike some investors, the Pelosis’ came out of that dip without too much pain.
That’s because Paul sold 2,000 Visa shares — worth between $500,001 and $1 million — on July 1, 2024, according to Pelposi’s congressional filing on July 3. The trade was defined as a “partial” sale, meaning he did not unload his entire holding.
There was no public indication at the time of the transaction that the DOJ was preparing to sue Visa.
This case bears some comparison to another well-timed trade Paul made in December 2022, when he sold 30,000 shares of Google (GOOGL) stock just one month before the tech giant was sued over alleged antitrust violations.
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Read MoreBanning lawmakers from trading
There is a growing chorus of Americans who think lawmakers — and their spouses — should be banned from trading because of the unfair advantage they have as well-connected people with the inside track on legislation that might affect a company or industry.
Christopher Josephs, a tech entrepreneur who runs the “Nancy Pelosi Stock Tracker” on X, is firmly in that camp. On X, he highlights politicians’ trades “so we [Americans] can invest alongside” or, even better, “get them banned from trading.”
In a post on Monday, Sept. 23 — one day before the DOJ filed the antitrust lawsuit — he described Pelosi’s timely sale of Visa shares as “wild.” But in a follow-up post, he was quick to state: “No one's proven she trades on insider info.”
In an effort to put an end to the suspicion around the Pelosis’ trades, her spokesperson stated she has “no prior knowledge or subsequent involvement in any transactions.”
Ron Geffner, a former enforcement attorney with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), acknowledged that sometimes politicians’ “conflicts are called into question” when they disclose trades — but he encouraged Pelosi’s critics to consider the context behind her disclosures before jumping to conclusions.
“Before public opinion judges Pelosi unfairly, it is important to determine who engaged in the transaction on her behalf as well as whether it was part of a broader change of her portfolio,” he told the New York Post.
The former speaker did disclose several other trades made by her husband around the same time as the Visa sale — including the sale of 2,500 Tesla (TSLA) shares, worth up to $500,000, and the purchase of 10,000 Nvidia shares (NVDA), worth up to $5 million.
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