A.G. Gancarski
A Florida Senator wants a probe into a former House Speaker and her history of prescient stock trades.
Yet despite numerous other members of Congress making similarly clairvoyant trades, U.S. Sen. Rick Scott’s letter to the Government Accountability Office only targets, for reasons his office has yet to disclose, Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi of California.
“For years, former Speaker Pelosi has faced allegations of insider trading as her family’s investments raked in millions at an unusually high return,” Scott’s letter reads.
“This has created a widespread public concern and distrust in members like Pelosi with access to privileged information that can be used for personal gain, creating a clear conflict of interest and allowing corruption to breed in Washington,” he added, conceding that the issue of informed transactions extends beyond Pelosi, even as she is arguably the most high-profile member to make these kinds of trades.
As Quiver Quantitative notes, Pelosi’s portfolio has increased in value by more than 750% since 2014, with husband Paul Pelosi instrumental in a strategy that goes beyond simple share purchases to puts and calls. Her trade volume exceeds $164 million.
Unsurprisingly, given that she is from tech-heavy San Francisco and there has been a bull market in the sector in recent years, her portfolio has been heavily concentrated in information technology.
However, other members of Congress, including prominent Floridians, have made smart trades as well, per the same platform.
U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, a South Florida Democrat on the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Military Construction, invested in Viasat in November 2024, when the stock hovered around $10 a share. Her buy has been savvy, as the security is valued at more than $25 at this writing.
Her 2024 investment in New Gold has more than tripled in value as well.
More recently, she bought Stratasys, an American-Israeli 3-D printing company that she bought into this week, soon after a disappointing earnings report, and just after it secured its latest government contract: a sole-source deal with the FBI.
U.S. Rep. Jared Moskowitz, another South Florida Democrat, has also been a savvy investor with $4.2 million in equity markets. Reportedly, he made $156,000 in the market in a single month after the April dip in valuations after President Donald Trump’s “Liberation Day” beginning of the tariff war.
Scott said he would like to ban stock trading by members of Congress. While he himself is one of the most financially well-off elected officials, his investments tend toward bonds, particularly governmental securities.
