Summary Trump Media & Technology Group Corp. has seen severe strategic and executional missteps under former CEO Devin Nunes, with minimal revenue and an enterprise value near $1.3 billion. DJT’s operating business is essentially nonexistent, with Q1 advertising revenue down 25% year-over-year to $617,000 and negligible growth across all segments. Leadership change brings cautious optimism, but the board and interim CEO McGurn lack clear public company and capital allocation expertise. DJT needs real change, but there isn't enough evidence of it yet. Until then, trading hinges on either renewed retail optimism or successful execution of the TAE merger. Trump Media & Technology Group Corp. ( DJT ) is getting a new chief executive officer — and it desperately needs one. Former CEO Devin Nunes spent his four-plus years in charge executing a contradictory and incoherent strategy , promising explosive growth in social media and streaming while at the same time touting his company's refusal to actually spend any capital. TMTG moved into the "digital asset treasury" space pioneered by Strategy ( MSTR ) at exactly the wrong time. It decided to merge with a nuclear fusion play , an explicit bet on the idea that the $3 billion in cash raised in stock and convertible debt was better spent on anything but the company's existing assets. That sentiment was made even clearer when Nunes, in late February, floated the idea of combining the social media and streaming businesses with a SPAC (special purpose acquisition company). Across the board, both strategy and execution under Nunes were abysmal. But an obvious problem at this point is that his decisions have pained TMTG into something of a corner, with much of its capital spoken for and significant steps taken toward significant (and risky) decisions. And so with DJT stock at the lows, there's a case that further downside is ahead. TMTG still has an enterprise value of about $1.3 billion, and no real business. Trailing twelve-month is about $4 million, with basically zero growth. But if the company, somehow, can get a legitimate executive at the top who starts running this like a real business, there perhaps is some hope. The problem right now is that it's hard to see who that executive will be — or how this board will find him. Valuing DJT Stock In terms of the operating business, right now there simply isn't that much to say about TMTG. Revenue is minimal, and per the 10-Q advertising revenue actually declined almost 25% year-over-year in the first quarter to just $617,000. There is a tiny sliver of light in subscription revenue, which neared $200,000 for the quarter, but the much-hyped launch of exchange-traded funds under the Truth-Fi banner brought in just $61,000. These figures are essentially rounding errors against an enterprise value still around $1.3 billion. (Market cap is near $2.5 billion, total financial assets including crypto net of convertible debt is about $1.15 billion.) But looking at TMTG as a "normal" business, for lack of a better term, there is perhaps some reason for optimism on paper. Truth Social and the Truth+ streaming platform have some value. Truth Social seems to have 5 to 6 million users , a fraction of those on X (formerly known as Twitter) or Meta Platforms ( META ) property Facebook. But those businesses have massive valuations; on a per-user basis, one could potentially value Truth Social at something close to $1 billion. For what it's worth, that seems far too high: scale matters in social media, and so almost by definition a Truth Social user is not as valuable as those on X. But the attention field created by President Donald Trump and the early bouts of optimism toward TMTG after its SPAC merger finally closed do suggest the platform might be an outlier. (There's also the possibility of a sale at some point; one imagines that, to use a round number, a $1 billion price tag might be palatable to a buyer who wants the platform for its political reach and/or its proximity to Donald Trump.) Similarly, Truth+ could be attractive for the same reason; might a business like Newsmax ( NMAX ) see the platform as a way to accelerate its own streaming ambitions? The TAE deal could have some upside, given trading in names like Oklo ( OKLO ) and NuScale Power ( SMR ) in fission. (More on this in a moment.) And at the very least, there is obvious room for improvement just across the board. This is a business that has been badly mismanaged; in the fourth quarter of 2019, Twitter delivered average revenue per daily user just under $7 . ($1 billion in revenue across 152 million daily users.) Advertising revenue for Truth Social in Q1, assuming 5 million actives, was in the range of 12 cents. Again, looking at TMTG as a normal business (and, no, it is not a normal business), this looks like a textbook activist play. Better execution, smarter capital allocation, some consideration to reversing past decisions (including the disastrous push into crypto and maybe the TAE deal) could create an actually valuable business here. Right now, to be blunt, that doesn't exist. Is Kevin McGurn The Next CEO of TMTG? In that context, the appointment of Kevin McGurn as interim CEO might suggest reason for cautious optimism. Unlike Nunes (a career politician), McGurn has significant experience leading major teams at legitimate companies. Per the 8-K announcing his hiring, McGurn was an ad executive at both T-Mobile ( TMUS ) and Hulu, where he " helped to launch and scale the company's ad-supported streaming business." In an interview with the Wall Street Journal , McGurn said he would at some point "raise [his] hand as a candidate" for the top job. The WSJ previously reported McGurn was instrumental in driving the TAE deal , a deal he came to in his role as CEO of Yorkville Acquisition ( MCGA ). It wouldn't be surprising if McGurn were named the permanent head. He has more familiarity with the company than most; he has been an adviser to TMTG since 2024. It certainly appears that, for now, the board and the company the committed to the TAE deal McGurn brought him. And McGurn said in his interview that a spin of the legacy assets was still likely. (That, presumably, would lead to a new CEO for that business; the original merger plan with TAE contemplated a co-CEO role between Nunes and TAE head Michl Binderbauer.) Nor does the board of directors seem to have much in the way of business expertise or contacts with potential candidates. (Political considerations and the difficult nature of the job both will eliminate at least a few possible choices as well.) The departure of several directors (Nunes, Eric Swider, who led the SPAC with which TMTG originally merged, and former Trump Administration trade representative Robert Lighthizer) provided an opportunity for fresh views. But TMTG added Meredith O'Rourke, a prolific political fundraiser, and Boris Epshteyn, a highly controversial political adviser who also has no apparent public company experience. Donald Trump Jr. has seemed far more interested in his other projects such as American Bitcoin ( ABTC ) and his role as an adviser to GrabAGun ( PEW ); he only attended two of TMTG's five board meetings in 2024. (The 2025 proxy, somewhat oddly, hasn't been released yet.) Real Challenges A company in such a unique and fraught situation needs more. TMTG isn't necessarily at risk of going bankrupt, but even after raising $3 billion the balance sheet is something of a concern. Convertible debt collateralized by Bitcoin comes due in 2028, but bondholders can force repurchase beginning on November 30 of this year. If TMTG chooses to reverse its crypto strategy, it can basically dump its Bitcoin ( BTC-USD ) and Cronos ( CRO-USD ) holdings, with balance sheet cash covering the remainder. (One imagines bondholders will force a repurchase relatively quickly: the conversion price is near $35, and so the value of the option at this point isn't necessarily worth the downside risk. Right now, those bonds trade at 93.50 , which means selling at par is a good deal.) But TMTG likely can't keep the crypto strategy, fund TAE's losses, and put the necessary cash behind the social media and streaming business. TAE will need quite a bit of cash to launch its first reactor. (As the WSJ reported, the company's need for cash is what led it to TMTG in the first place.) Nunes' plan of promising growth for the media business while also talking up his company's ability to cut costs quite obviously hasn't worked (in part because it was completely illogical; it takes capital to grow in competitive end markets). One concern is that McGurn's history doesn't necessarily suggest he will pursue a more traditional capital allocation strategy. In September, he was named CEO of nano-cap Sono Group NV ( SSM ). Five months later, Sono exited the solar business and launched the same DAT strategy that has failed repeatedly over the past several quarters. A similar focus here on crypto likely doesn't help the bull case. While TMTG has touted, for instance, a move into prediction markets, there's simply not much there. Even the company's 10-Q noted that a product originally called Truth Predict "will primarily entail marketing and promotion collaboration with OG.com," a unit of Crypto.com. To be fair, McGurn's experience in advertising could help in actually generating revenue for the media businesses. Truth Social in particular desperately needs an advertising structure of some kind (currently, those operations are outsourced to Rumble ( RUM )). Legacy TAE management presumably can run that business (which was founded in the late 1990s), but that aside some kind of public company experience in the C-suite and/or on the board would be helpful. TMTG doesn't really have that experience (and neither, really, does McGurn). Again, this is a business that just needs a complete reset. It needs mature, focused leadership that is focused on trying to create some kind of value, rather than pushing "naked shorting" allegations or a token drop to shareholders. McGurn might be someone who can provide that leadership — but both his history and the makeup of the TMTG board suggest the opposite could be true as well. The TAE Deal Even with all those concerns, there are two paths to upside here. The first is a renewal of the optimism that greeted TMTG when the SPAC deal was originally announced, and that finds a way to bounce from time to time. Nunes clearly sought, at least on occasion, to spark interest from retail investors , and a standalone Truth Social / Truth+ business might see some similar optimism. A Stanford Law School professor suggested as much to the WSJ , saying a SPAC with that business could avoid redemptions if Trump supporters showed up to buy the stock ahead of a merger. And such a deal could in theory solve the capital problem for TMTG: SPAC cash could find a viable growth strategy in media, while the current assets backed TAE. TAE of course provides the other path to potential gains. Oddly, it doesn't appear that TMTG has ever disclosed the actual compensation provided in the all-stock deal. (It does not appear in the merger agreement , as far as I can tell, though it's possible I'm missing something.) At the time, TMTG said it would own about half of the combined company, and said that framework suggested a roughly $6 billion valuation for TAE. Assuming the stock consideration is not changing (it's possible TAE looks to rework the deal owing to the lower DJT stock price), TMTG is offering something like $2.5 billion in stock at a roughly $5 billion valuation. It's nearly impossible to know whether that valuation is appropriate. It is concerning that TAE couldn't find another way to raise capital; the Journal reported that the company faced "a cash crunch" last year ahead of capital needs for its expansion. To be fair, TAE investor Michael Schwab (son of Charles) told the paper that it was the price of capital, not availability, that was the problem, saying "people were trying to lowball us". Schwab pointed to comps like Oklo and NuScale as evidence. Of course, in a market where anything that could provide energy for data centers has soared, the fact that investors were negotiating hard on price itself is at least a yellow flag. And there is, of course, the possibility that TAE simply fails in developing a technology that for now does not exist in any kind of scaled form. This is perhaps a (very) long way of saying that even under a new CEO, nothing yet has changed for DJT stock. It's still a trade, a bet on optimism from retail investors and/or Trump supporters. And it likely will be until there is some kind of real business to which fundamental investors can point to as a vehicle to create value. Devin Nunes spent almost four years doing exceptionally little to create that kind of business. It would be helpful (and for the rest of us, quite interesting) to see the company go a different route.
