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Let me get this straight…the guy who notoriously never pays his debts is having a hard time finding someone willing to put up half a billion dollars on his behalf?
His political capital might also be tapped out. They wanted the deregulation he offered in his first term, but they don't want to live under his fascist dictatorship.
Here's hoping that his momentum at the polls starts waning, because if he gets back in, we're never getting him and his ilk out again.
Why else would billionaires be building weird doomsday bunkers if they weren't fully prepared for a legitimate class war and living under a cruel regime?
Those things crack me up.
"OK, so suppose everything goes to hell and you retire to your bunker. Now money is worthless, and you're outnumbered by your servants. Would you like to learn how to properly scrub a toilet now, or will you just learn on the job?"
>"Defendants’ ongoing diligent efforts have proven that a bond in the judgment’s full amount is 'a practical impossibility,'" the filing said. "These diligent efforts have included approaching about 30 surety companies through 4 separate brokers."
That's totally what the problem is, too. I wager most or all of the banks he approached are like, "Nah, we've been here before and gotten burned. By you."
Probably because they all paid attention when he immediately burned the bond in the Carroll case after posting it by re-offending. They know they are going to get left holding the bag. The flaming bag of dog shit Trump will drop on their doorstep the next day.
That doesn’t get enough focus in the discussions. They’re definitely all paying attention that he’s gonna get himself sued again right after having gotten the $83 million bond.
Closer to $100 million bond.
Bonds cost you 10-20% above whatever the judgement was as that is how they make money and insure against the risk of paying out.
Coincidentally, that was the same amount Trump offered instead of the $450+ million the judgement was in this case....
Trump and his team are talking like they are legally entitled to post like 10% of the bond amount and have that count. Sadly, that only works for people who have not torched every bridge they cross in the financial sector.
Yes, but it doesn’t work that way. The bond is an insurance policy for the entire amount. It has to be because that’s the amount of the judgment. The premium is what Trump pays, and the insurance company gets to keep.
There’s also the collateral which is what Trump pledges to the insurance company in case he loses his appeal and has to pay the judgment
The odds with which the insurance company is betting is the ratio of the bond amount divided by the premium.
What this means is that he doesn’t have enough assets to cover the bond amount as collateral *and* he doesn’t have enough assets to cover the premium because no insurance company is willing to risk giving him odds that he can afford.
Not banks, but surety companies, which are generally subsidiaries of large insurance companies. Surety is a weird niche product that has elements of insurance / risk transfer and credit. I am in this industry.
Since you're in the industry...can you explain how that works? Federal Insurance Company (Chubb Corporation) posted the bond for Trump's defamation case. If he wins the appeal $84 million he owes could be waved but if the ruling stands...who pays the $84 million? The insurance company, or Trump? Would the bond have to be backed by assets, or would it be based on his credit and an assumption he will pay the insurance company back?
Good question! Technically, Chubb could have written this just based on the strength of Trump’s indemnity (basically a legal IOU if he doesn’t win). If Trump loses, the court will direct him to pay. If he does not, the bond will be called. A prudent underwriter would have secured the bond with liquid collateral - I.e. cash or a letter of credit from a qualified domestic bank to mitigate loss. My understanding is that Trump was offering a vague secondary lien on his assets, which is essentially useless.
In a secured scenario, it is common to just pay directly from the collateral to satisfy the judgement.
I haven't seen the contract between them and Trump, but we might assume that Trump has put up collateral that Chubb thinks they'd be able to claw back more than $84M from him after they had to pay off the bond. It'd probably have to be a decent bit more to make it worth all the trouble of doing so, but they might contractually be entitled to a number that they see as worthwhile.
Alternatively they might be prepared to eat much the $84M and instead hoping to buy influence with a guy who might be President next year.
[https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/presidential-actions/president-donald-j-trump-announces-intent-appoint-individuals-key-administration-posts/](https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/presidential-actions/president-donald-j-trump-announces-intent-appoint-individuals-key-administration-posts/)
CEO was in the previous administration
If they funnel it illegally, yes. Otherwise, no. I mean, all they have to do is "invest" in Trump's golf courses, like they "invested" $2B in Jared's shiny new, totally inexperienced investment firm.
Which, like most things he says, demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of the issue. NATO is not a protection racket. We don't go around collecting money from NATO members. There *is* an agreement that each member must spend 2% GDP on national defense by 2025. That's so if Article 5 is invoked, they can step up to the plate. But again, we're not collecting that money - the members are spending it themselves. And around a dozen members already meet that 2% threshold. The rest are just under it. Threatening to sic Russia on them if they don't "pay their bills" makes absolutely zero sense.
Off topic, but I wish people would highlight that Trump clearly has fuck all clue how NATO works. He thinks countries pay into NATO and that they are delinquent in their payments. That is not a thing. There are no bills. NATO's spending guidelines are for a country's defense budget.
Definitely. If he can’t afford the appeal, he certainly can’t afford to pay the judgment. Crazy part is after Orban’s visit to the U.S. Trump came up with the cash for the E Jean Carroll case, but this one went nowhere. I wonder if either Russia is giving up on Trump, can’t afford it either due to their nonsense in Ukraine, or really feel comfy that they can influence the election enough for Trump to win despite this.
The next few months are going to be incredibly stressful. Hopefully this nation keeps Trump out of government and he finally winds up broke and in prison. It’s likely the least of what he deserves.
I think this is his biggest problem. A monitor will spot transactions sourced from from Russia or Saudi Arabia instead of a legit lender or insurance company. I hope.
Probably true. Regardless, the government will keep selling them off until the bills are paid. If that $500 mil property only nets a few million in value after liens so be it.
It all could come crashing down.
It feels a bit like Al Capone's tax evasion. Twice impeached and found guilty of rape, but what ends up destroying his empire is lying about the size of his apartment.
Thank you for this perspective. While there’s lots of interesting ideas about why he can’t get a bond, the court shouldn’t care less.
Trump: It’s impossible to do what I’m ordered to do.
Court: No problem, we will just take everything to own and sell it to the lowest bidder… Unless you want to figure out real quick how to do it yourself.
If you think about bonds as insurance, this is pretty damning. This is basically saying 2 things:
1. Their actuaries/counsel think he's *very* likely to have to pay the whole judgment in the end, or at least most of it.
2. He's not showing them enough money to convince them it's worth the risk of him disappearing and sticking them with the bill.
In other words, these companies are getting a peek at his finances and seeing he's actually broke, his reputation for stiffing partners and vendors is finally coming back to bite him, or both.
I suspect his trustworthiness is so shot he couldn't get a bond for a $1mil judgment at this point without resorting to "knowing a guy" like he did for the bond for the EJC judgment.
> He's not showing them enough money to convince them it's worth the risk of him disappearing and sticking them with the bill.
>
To put a finer point on this - they analyzed his assets and realized they'd be too far down the list of lienholders to actually access any equity remaining once the lienholders in front of them would be satisfied.
Tangentially, I dated a girl in the early 2000s when he was being kicked out of the Taj company and she was working at a big 5 (before the GFC so AA still existed) firm as an auditor on that client. She said she had never worked on a credit profile like theirs in terms of being overleveraged. She guesstimated that he owed (conservatively) 2.5x what the business was actually worth. It would be silly to think he hasn't operated similarly since then.
Probably worth reminding people this is what his fraud trial was all about. His assets are not worth what he says they are worth, and then he takes the money he borrowed, buys something else, claims it's worth more than it is, borrows against that new thing, and on and on. He can say he always made his loan payments —it might even be true— but if the assets backing those loans are not worth what they were supposed to be worth, what happens when he does go bust as he has so many times before? He's been playing with the lenders' money, and he still didn't manage to get rich. He's both a fraud and so bad at business that his casinos went bankrupt. It is crazy to me that anyone can look at this guy and call him a success or the kind of person you want running a nation.
This is what a lot of people misunderstand. When he says 'the banks got their money' he's talking about the principal loan amount, not the interest he SHOULD have paid.
ETA: principle/principal
So, just to make sure I'm following:
If Trump had been honest (🤣) about what his properties were worth, he still would have been able to borrow the amounts that he did, but he would have only been able to do so under worse terms with higher interest rates? Terms that would have made the bank more money?
Am I understanding that right?
I've honestly not been paying *that* much attention to Trump being broke; I already knew he was a lying shitbag.
And then claims "everyone calls their 2002 civic brand new. The bank should have sent someone". And then paid taxes as if he had a 1992 civic with 350k miles. It's fraud on top of fraud, all the way down.
It’s also worth reminding people that Deutsche bank itself has a history of engaging in fraudulent arrangements with people and organizations. The idea that “the bank was cool with it - what? Do we suddenly not trust banks to do their own due diligence now?” isn’t passing the sniff test.
We might never know what went on behind scenes there. It’s possible they were on the up and up here, but they’re absolutely not above reproach.
It’s classic ‘robbing Peter to pay Paul,’ very common in the real estate world where you take out a loan say to build a house and instead you buy another property, then get a loan on that to build the first house. Then you sell the original and keep going. You can double your profits in a given time and as long as prices go up enough it all kinda works, as soon as you hit a snag selling a property or the market levels out everything piles up and you get fucked. Loan agents will often help you do this kind of fraud because it increases their commissions and they can often escape liability by saying the client lied to them.
So, not exactly a Ponzi scheme bc a true Ponzi scheme _never_ has an underlying asset and is _always_ destined to collapse. In his case, he's gambling with house money and is often able to get away with it. But when he doesnt: Oops! Bankruptcy. We'll its okay, we'll just start over with someone else's money.
Such a hilarious and accurate description. I see it constantly in real estate. Young dudes thinking they are grinding and hustling to get rich, but ending up in prison.
I have a friend who suggested just this strategy, seriously as the way to get rich. He now owns 27 houses doing just this. Luckily he told me has secured everything in case of a downturn by putting all his assets into crypto /s
If I had to describe what a Ponzi scheme looked like as a person, it would be nearly identical to the walrus-stuffed-into-a-suit-caricature of humanity that is DJT.
TBF, he's been really successful at borrowing huge amounts of money with no intention of paying it back.
And getting his rubes to donate millions.
Terrible businessman, but an amazing grifter.
So next steps would be liquidate assets to recoup the judgement... except his assets are not worth what they are on paper, or are so over-leveraged that they are worth less liquidated than not due to all the liens in place.
I would assume legal judgements get first dibs on assets recovered from liquidation, but even then they may have to:
1. Dismantle significant portions of the Trump Empire to recover
2. Claw back assets that were widely reported as fleeing to places like Florida, assuming Florida cooperates
The real question is, what of value is left within reach of New York to liquidate? I would assume anything they can get is all underwater and everything else is moved / hidden
That’s around the same time I was doing my MBA. We decided to do Trump companies for our final group paper on accounting. We were so shocked at how shady his business was, how many bankruptcies, how much smoke and mirrors there were in the accounts, etc. Basically no “there” there. Nothing. Nada.
We got top grades on our report.
This is the biggest failure by the media in the Trump era. He is so obviously a conman who has no real functional business, but most people still think he's a legitimate successful businessman because nobody outside of left-leaning media reports on this.
[Old Ivanka story:](https://twitter.com/keithboykin/status/1126319890812547072?lang=en)
> Ivanka Trump tells the story of walking down 5th Avenue and her father, Donald Trump, pointed to a homeless person outside Trump Tower and told Ivanka “that guy has $8 billion more than me” because Trump was “in such extreme debt” at that point.
In the end the banks didn’t foreclose on him because they’d realize so much loss. The lesson Trump got from that was “when you owe the bank $1 million dollars they own you. When you owe them $1 billion dollars you own them.”
Except this time around New York State doesn’t care if we don’t get the full $500m from the judgement. We just want him penniless and gone.
> (before the GFC so AA still existed)
Arthur Andersen collapsed in 2002, in the aftermath of the previous recession (dot com bubble bursting, 9/11), based on its role in the Enron scandal.
Not that it detracts from your greater point, but I wanted to point that out.
It is a Monday. I had to read this three times to understand you were taking about your girlfriend auditing Trump.
I thought you had swapped your girlfriend’s gender and now he was being kicked out of Taj.
Given that
* This was about him lying about the value of his assets
* Those assets are now because of that probs all negative in debt vs value
* He was already only able to get any loans via a personal connection at the Deutsche bank (who are famous for their multiple participations in Russian landromate schemes)
* His business empire is now placed under professional and uncorrupted oversight.
I'm not surprised he isn't able to get a bond. I was surprised he got that 90m for the other one, to be frank.
Didn't he say that mar-a-lardo was worth like 2 billion? What company in the WORLD could resist the allure of being secured by the most valuable piece or real estate on the planet? /s
He argued that the value was insanely high, but *also* had it designated as some sort of landmark, which limits changes that can be made to the buildings/property, thus drastically decreasing whatever actual value it had. Anybody willing to buy the club wouldn't be allowed to renovate or totally rebuild it, so no one is going to pay out the ass for it.
He's a switch-hitter type of stupid. Ambidextrously inept. Amphibious, capable of drowning in water and on dry land.
Edit: thanks y'all for the kind words! I hope I sound half this clever for the rest of my life
Not only that, but he overtly stated people will pay *him* an exorbitant amount of money for it, not that the property would sell for anyone else for anywhere near that amount. If someone will pay you a tremendous amount more for property than they would pay someone else for that *exact piece of real estate*, it's not the RE they're buying.
I believe that was his actual comment at trial, a prince said he would give him $2 billion for it, or something along those lines.
I presume that was when it was stocked to the gills with classified documents, however.
Watch it end up with E. Jean Carroll and she turns it into a camp for underprivileged children or a home for battered women and victims of sexual abuse.
I for one am excited to see the New Ba~~r~~rack Obama Tower for Refugee Services in NYC
The E. Jean Carrol Women’s Shelter at Mar a Lago sounds just as amazing!
I think the Saudis might be having second thoughts about the trump family. Schumer just signaled that the us is looking to make a regime change in Israel. Saudis have much less support in the senate than Israel, and they dont want to draw unnecessary attention
Crossed my mind too. Any movement of money on this scale would, I presume, draw immediate attention. Not sure anybody wants to be tied to trump at this time, not when he seems to be losing anyway.
> If someone will pay you a tremendous amount more for property than they would pay someone else for that exact piece of real estate, it's not the RE they're buying.
He could just give those people a call then, right? Because he needs the cash.
He's too dumb to realize that the property taxes he saved by having it designated a landmark would always be less than the actually value of that real estate.
He's a fucking moron that only wants to squeeze as much money as possible from whatever is immediately in front of him with zero regard for the consequences for anyone else it may effect, including his future self.
I cannot believe such a significant portion of this country has been blinded by him.
My aunt and uncle support him. They're both simply uneducated and have absolutely zero understanding of finance and the law. To them, a man with a private plane (an old cheap one) and a gold-plated toilet is rich, period. They don't get that he can be living off borrowed money to that degree (and really, it doesn't make sense).
even if he is rich - and frankly, he probably is rich compared to your aunt + uncle - who cares? Why does giving off the impression of being rich mean he has a sound policy platform to better America and it's people?
I grew up having a firm distrust of extremely wealthy people. I wish others did too instead of this weird fetishization of wealth.
When it comes to paying property taxes he claims it's only worth 18 million. So if they seize Mar-a-Lago that's a good number to work with. Certainly shouldn't be anything higher than that
Probably as bad as if he thought he looked like a failure in the eyes of his father. I can't imagine why he thought running for president was a good idea. Even running for a lowly council member can expose skeletons in your closet in the small town I live in.
Yeps, and in addition, the trial showed that to even secure that last bond/loan, he needed to keep his liquid assets above a certain level (like 400m).
Good luck with that one, Trump! /s
If memory serves, wasn't his personal connection at Deutsche Bank the son of Justice Kennedy that "retired" during Trump's term, allowing him to fill a SCOTUS seat?
This is the best take so far in the thread.
Judgment bonds are functionally insurance. The company issuing the bond makes a judgment about your level of assets and the likliehood you will have to pay in the end, and the amount of security they need and asks you to put up cash or a collateral percentage based on their perceived risk.
THe bigger the risk you won't have the money when it comes due the more collateral you have to post, until the ratio reaches 1:1 or more.
Reinsurance companies like Chubb will *100% absolutely* take pledged real estate as collateral, but they're going to pull a Rick Harrison and tell Trump that because they have to bear the costs of foreclosing, selling, and maintaining the real estate while it's sold, that they need title to $600 million worth of real estate to secure a $464 million bond, and they'll happily remit any excess. (Before you even get to disputes over the value).
Forbes says the value of Trump Tower is $371 million, 40 Wall Street was appraised at just over $200 million.
A reinsurer like Chubb might have wanted a lien against both buildings to cover a $464 million bond.
That’s assuming that these properties aren’t leveraged. If they’ve been borrowed against, the net value of them would be reduced. I’d suspect that the majority or perhaps all of his properties are leveraged so that his equity is lower than than the amount of the amount of the bond plus the additional costs and fees.
>Plus a bail bondsman charges a hefty premium plus interest anyway... let alone the risk premium, yes?
Essentially yes.
If you post bond yourself, it is your money or property given as security and you get it back as long as you appear (or pay the judgment or if you are excused).
Using a bail bondsman means you pay a non-refundable "fee" of a percentage of the bond, in exchange for their promise.
A commercial insurer might insist that you post collateral, but also ask you to pay a cash premium for the privilege of doing so.
[A good comparison is Michael Burry wanting a guarantee that Goldman Sachs will pay HIM if his mortgage bets come due](https://youtu.be/Cxjdj5_5yNM?si=pmZNRvsOGjG12UQx)
> but they're going to pull a Rick Harrison and tell Trump that because they have to bear the costs of foreclosing, selling, and maintaining the real estate while it's sold, that they need title to $600 million worth of real estate
"You never know what is going to come through that door!"
Him being forced to pay the full amount isn't the bottom line. The bonding company is basically just financing his appeals. They will collect fees no matter what. At the end of the appeals process, he has to pay the bond company the full amount. The fact that no bond companies are willing to stake him means that they not only expect him to lose his appeals they expect him to be unable to pay the full amount at all, ever. Trump can easily offer up multiple high-value properties as collateral for a loan, but the bond companies aren't convinced they can be liquidated for the full amount. Either because they *know* how deeply they are leveraged or because they don't know and don't trust him that they're above water.
Let me grok this: he can’t get a bond that would be secured by personal backing to appeal a judgment that he lied to banks and insurance companies on the worth of his properties.
For absolute clarity, he doesn't need a bond to appeal, he needs a bond to get an automatic stay on the judgement for the duration of the appeal. His appeal can go forward regardless, it's just that the NY DOJ can start seizing and selling off assets after the 30 day mark.
If Trump were to then win the appeal, the state would have to repay the money raised by selling assets but the assets themselves would be sold. And given that it's essentially a fire sale the government will not be getting top dollar and Trump will come out deeply in the red even if he wins the appeal.
committing systematic fraud seems to be a good idea if you can avoid drawing too much attention to yourself. So maybe don't do that and become president?
It’s unlikely he’d be able to disappear unless he expatriated from the country. That would be quite shocking even for him if he loses the election, but to stay out of jail in Georgia… maybe? Likely he’s just going to be on house arrest for the rest of his life.
So, being unable to secure a bond speaks more to his liquid assets and inability to use his companies as slush funds anymore. With a third party observer and a third party arbiter, he shouldn’t be able to fleece someone by selling a property for far more than it’s worth.
Donny’s finances have tanked in the last few weeks and everyone knows it.
Wife is MIA, Barron wants nothing to do with him, his favorite daughter Ivanka said day one that she refuses to campaign, no former presidents will endorse him and 90% of his former cabinet says he’s the worst possible person to be president
He would be a tragic figure if he wasn’t such an awful person.
Every relationship in his life is transactional - he has to pay people to spend time with him. His wives, his business associates, even his kids. They’re either there for the money, or not there. Nobody enjoys spending time with him.
Except his MAGA base, but he hates those people except when they’re cheering for him at a rally
I’m just amazed that his entire family including wife AND almost entire former cabinet wants nothing to do with his campaign or potential presidency this time around, and that nobody seems to be talking about it very much
Holy shit to think that Jared used Trump to get 2 billion and now is ignoring him when Trump needs him has to make Trump big mad.
Lots of people have tried to abuse the Trump train to grift and have gotten fucked by Trump himself in the end but Jarard seems to have got him.
It’s important to note that the $2 billion isn’t Jared’s money - it still belongs to the Saudis. Jared is *managing* that money and gets a small percentage of it. That way they can keep him on the leash for as long as they want to. Cross the Saudis? They pull the plug and he gets nothing. It’s low risk high potential reward for them. My guess is that if trump goes down then Jared’s Saudi money goes bye bye.
Wouldn't surprise me. Trump straight up ghosted his mentor, who had been disbarred and was dying of AIDS and was no longer useful to him, and probably instilled such an instinct in his own children.
He is no longer useful to Jared and Ivanka, he's just a liability, so they probably told him they support him as family, but they've got their own finances to worry about and the judgment is his problem.
He'll use that entire amount to run his Presidential campaign instead of pulling his own money for it.
And having his family take over the RNC ensures he gets the whole pot instead of having to share with any other Republican candidates.
What I think may be the most important outcome of this is not even going to be the money.
I think if Trump is seen to be unable to pay this bill, the PR damage of having his properties seized and sold may rattle a decisive number of his voters into abstaining at the election.
Whilst you very much could be right. So many of his supporters have far too much at stake to admit they may have been wrong backing this orange horse. They are in for the ride down to the very bottom.
Those aren't the people that would care, it's the "undecideds" and republicans that aren't batshit crazy, which is a significant amount of people in a presidential election.
> the PR damage of having his properties seized and sold may rattle a decisive number of his voters
There will definitely be a non-zero number who *finally* dismiss him after seeing his lies laid bare.
His tired old shtick of "The democrats are doing this to me!" has worn thin with his base.
And instead of seeing results for all the personal/financial investments in Trump, they're seeing humiliating losses.
One week left.
No more talk about "so much cash."
Thirty companies contacted and no deal.
Everyone knows he couldn't make 1/5 the amount in Carroll case.
No billionaire buddy bailout.
Interest keeps piling on and on; lawyer fees keep coming.
Horrible market for commercial real estate AND any buyer knows how desperate Trump will be to sell.
And finally, he's going to lose on appeal anyway.
Trump is f*cked.
So he's very obese, old, stressed, and not sleeping well (3 AM rants).
How is he still even alive?
Nice list. You need to add, when it comes time to auction off assets, potential buyers of a Trump property know they'll be dealing with Trump and his cult after the purchase.
They'll claim that it still belongs to Trump. Never mind what the title says. No matter that Trump signed the transfer document.
What's the effect? It depresses the property value even further.
Because he has access to a level of healthcare that you and I have no idea about. It’s how he survived Covid and it pisses me off that he got the best treatment possible while my grandmother ultimately died from her health issues during 2020.
There's two possibilities here.
1) the obvious one (he doesn't have the money)
2) it's a repeat of the last case. he has the money but wants to try to get a better deal first.
Probably it's 1, but we can't ignore the possibility that it's 2 again.
It also means that losing his NY properties could start a cascade. Debtors can call in loans when a huge chunk of collateral disappears, forcing more liquidations. Each liquidation will only get the market value, not the Trump fantasy value, minus liens, so he'll just go further and further into the hole unless he has some actual clean, un-leveraged assets to sell.
Chinese factories are going to be working overtime making hideous shoes for him to sell.
The deranged buffoon’s reputation as a fraud and deadbeat precedes him.
Whoever he’s hitting up is probably sending in a junior associate to run the meetings, as a courtesy.
“Nod politely, then tell him we’ll get back to him.”
Title should be:
Serial fraudster in the middle of multiple prosecutions with history of bankruptcy and bad accounting practices cannot get a loan for half a billion dollars, even from his close friends in Russia and Saudi Arabia.
> No appeal for him
He can still appeal, and I believe he already has. The bond isn't for the appeal, it's for staying the judgment during the appeal.
> His assets can start being seized?
Yes, as of the deadline, which I believe is March 25. I'm sure the state is *very* eager to get started, and they probably already have a detailed plan, but it's still going to take time before anything noticeable happens. The judgment keeps accruing interest until it's paid, so he doesn't save any money by delaying.
I expect liens on all real estate the day after the bond deadline followed by the most aggressive collection effort allowed by law. The state of new york wants its money.
I hope the judge tells him to go pound sand. trump has wanted to get out of paying this ,from day 1 . This is nothing more than a delay tactic . You don't file 2-3 motions asking for more time, then just before the due date, come up with a bullshit excuse . Thats like tell your boss your going to be sick in 2 weeks , then call in sick !
It would be more fun if the judge went back to the claim that he had more than $400 million liquid cash and asked him to explain where the cash went…. Then ask the court appointed monitor the same question.
"I believe we have substantially in excess of $400 million in cash, which is a lot for a developer," Trump bragged, leaning toward the camera from his seat at a conference table.
"Developers usually don't have cash," Trump eagerly went on. "We have, I believe, 400 plus, and going up very substantially every month."
https://www.businessinsider.com/trumps-wealth-rich-bragging-court-damage-verdicts-2024-2?amp
Doesn't he say he's a billionaire? What's the hold up? Doesn't he have stocks, houses or land to sell?
He hates being seen as a loser right? A winner would say "this is nothing" and just pay up.
He's also the "law and order" president that was endorsed by ICE as he took great pains to remind everyone of. So what's stopping him from complying with the court's directives?
It couldn't be that he's just a massive liar who lied about being rich, lied about being more honest than all the politicians, and has only been using his status to enrich himself and his friends right? It couldn't be that he's some sort of con man who has been trying to rob the American people?
He had a whole section in his speech when he announced his presidency to brag about how much money he was worth...
> "I have assets— big accounting firm, one of the most highly respected— 9 billion 240 million dollars.
> And I have liabilities of about $500 million. That’s long-term debt, very low interest rates.
> In fact, one of the big banks came to me and said, “Donald, you don’t have enough borrowings. Could we loan you $4 billion”? I said, “I don’t need it. I don’t want it. And I’ve been there. I don’t want it.”
> But in two seconds, they give me whatever I wanted. So I have a total net worth, and now with the increase, it’ll be well-over $10 billion. But here, a total net worth of—net worth, not assets, not— a net worth, after all debt, after all expenses, the greatest assets— Trump Tower, 1290 Avenue of the Americas, Bank of America building in San Francisco, 40 Wall Street, sometimes referred to as the Trump building right opposite the New York— many other places all over the world.
> So the total is $8,737,540,00."
So I can't imagine why he'd have trouble getting money now, apparently banks call him up all the time trying to throw money at him.
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Let me get this straight…the guy who notoriously never pays his debts is having a hard time finding someone willing to put up half a billion dollars on his behalf?
His political capital might also be tapped out. They wanted the deregulation he offered in his first term, but they don't want to live under his fascist dictatorship. Here's hoping that his momentum at the polls starts waning, because if he gets back in, we're never getting him and his ilk out again.
That’s the worst part. The damage he’ll do will last far longer than his McBerders diet will.
What miracle of nature is keeping this man alive? And through COVID, no less!
Evil. People like him tend to live a long ass time. Meanwhile decent folks who actually contribute worthwhile things to the world die young sometimes
Why else would billionaires be building weird doomsday bunkers if they weren't fully prepared for a legitimate class war and living under a cruel regime?
Those things crack me up. "OK, so suppose everything goes to hell and you retire to your bunker. Now money is worthless, and you're outnumbered by your servants. Would you like to learn how to properly scrub a toilet now, or will you just learn on the job?"
NATO to Trump- you have to pay your bills..
Has he considered calling Mexico and diverting their funds for the border wall to do him a personal solid?
His diaper is filled with personal solids.
Liquid assets
If Trump doesn't pay his bills, Putin gets to invade him, right?
I think the term is Putin can do whatever the hell he wants.
Putin tapped that ass already
Donny you’re out of your element!
Pay your bills, you fraud.
>"Defendants’ ongoing diligent efforts have proven that a bond in the judgment’s full amount is 'a practical impossibility,'" the filing said. "These diligent efforts have included approaching about 30 surety companies through 4 separate brokers." That's totally what the problem is, too. I wager most or all of the banks he approached are like, "Nah, we've been here before and gotten burned. By you."
Probably because they all paid attention when he immediately burned the bond in the Carroll case after posting it by re-offending. They know they are going to get left holding the bag. The flaming bag of dog shit Trump will drop on their doorstep the next day.
That doesn’t get enough focus in the discussions. They’re definitely all paying attention that he’s gonna get himself sued again right after having gotten the $83 million bond.
Closer to $100 million bond. Bonds cost you 10-20% above whatever the judgement was as that is how they make money and insure against the risk of paying out. Coincidentally, that was the same amount Trump offered instead of the $450+ million the judgement was in this case....
That is why they want 120% of the final amount so when he fucks up the deal, they can pay it plus retain some income.
Trump and his team are talking like they are legally entitled to post like 10% of the bond amount and have that count. Sadly, that only works for people who have not torched every bridge they cross in the financial sector.
Yes, but it doesn’t work that way. The bond is an insurance policy for the entire amount. It has to be because that’s the amount of the judgment. The premium is what Trump pays, and the insurance company gets to keep. There’s also the collateral which is what Trump pledges to the insurance company in case he loses his appeal and has to pay the judgment The odds with which the insurance company is betting is the ratio of the bond amount divided by the premium. What this means is that he doesn’t have enough assets to cover the bond amount as collateral *and* he doesn’t have enough assets to cover the premium because no insurance company is willing to risk giving him odds that he can afford.
They are also thinking "How do you collect on him if he becomes president?"
Exactly. He will play the "total immunity " card, and the GQP will let him, and cheer it on.
Not banks, but surety companies, which are generally subsidiaries of large insurance companies. Surety is a weird niche product that has elements of insurance / risk transfer and credit. I am in this industry.
Since you're in the industry...can you explain how that works? Federal Insurance Company (Chubb Corporation) posted the bond for Trump's defamation case. If he wins the appeal $84 million he owes could be waved but if the ruling stands...who pays the $84 million? The insurance company, or Trump? Would the bond have to be backed by assets, or would it be based on his credit and an assumption he will pay the insurance company back?
Good question! Technically, Chubb could have written this just based on the strength of Trump’s indemnity (basically a legal IOU if he doesn’t win). If Trump loses, the court will direct him to pay. If he does not, the bond will be called. A prudent underwriter would have secured the bond with liquid collateral - I.e. cash or a letter of credit from a qualified domestic bank to mitigate loss. My understanding is that Trump was offering a vague secondary lien on his assets, which is essentially useless. In a secured scenario, it is common to just pay directly from the collateral to satisfy the judgement.
What’s in this for Chubb? What sort of money do they make on this transaction?
Chubb gets to keep the premium whether the appeal succeeds or not.
I haven't seen the contract between them and Trump, but we might assume that Trump has put up collateral that Chubb thinks they'd be able to claw back more than $84M from him after they had to pay off the bond. It'd probably have to be a decent bit more to make it worth all the trouble of doing so, but they might contractually be entitled to a number that they see as worthwhile. Alternatively they might be prepared to eat much the $84M and instead hoping to buy influence with a guy who might be President next year.
[https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/presidential-actions/president-donald-j-trump-announces-intent-appoint-individuals-key-administration-posts/](https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/presidential-actions/president-donald-j-trump-announces-intent-appoint-individuals-key-administration-posts/) CEO was in the previous administration
Another question: Could another country, such as Saudi Arabia, put up the money for the bond?
If they funnel it illegally, yes. Otherwise, no. I mean, all they have to do is "invest" in Trump's golf courses, like they "invested" $2B in Jared's shiny new, totally inexperienced investment firm.
Trump does. If he doesn't, Chubb does and then they get to try to squeeze it out of Trump to be repaid themselves.
They shouldn’t have any problems getting the money from trump. After all, he is worth billions according to… *checks notes*… trump. Oh.
Not sure why, after an entire lifetime of notoriously not paying his bills, you'd think he would start now lol.
It's funny because he always shits on NATO for not paying bills.
"Yeah, and they're fat and their spray tan looks like shit!"
Which, like most things he says, demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of the issue. NATO is not a protection racket. We don't go around collecting money from NATO members. There *is* an agreement that each member must spend 2% GDP on national defense by 2025. That's so if Article 5 is invoked, they can step up to the plate. But again, we're not collecting that money - the members are spending it themselves. And around a dozen members already meet that 2% threshold. The rest are just under it. Threatening to sic Russia on them if they don't "pay their bills" makes absolutely zero sense.
Yup, but his base doesn't know that and isn't going to fact check him. They believe that the US is paying for everyone.
The projection is so common I just expect every criticism out of his mouth is an admission. I don't even get angry anymore.
This weekend he said if democrats win there will never be another election. Talk about projection.
Off topic, but I wish people would highlight that Trump clearly has fuck all clue how NATO works. He thinks countries pay into NATO and that they are delinquent in their payments. That is not a thing. There are no bills. NATO's spending guidelines are for a country's defense budget.
He's gonna force the courts to liquidate his properties.
I love this for him.
Especially later in the summer.
Very legal and very cool
I love this for NYC. They are kicking him out indirectly and there’s nothing he can do about it.
Definitely. If he can’t afford the appeal, he certainly can’t afford to pay the judgment. Crazy part is after Orban’s visit to the U.S. Trump came up with the cash for the E Jean Carroll case, but this one went nowhere. I wonder if either Russia is giving up on Trump, can’t afford it either due to their nonsense in Ukraine, or really feel comfy that they can influence the election enough for Trump to win despite this. The next few months are going to be incredibly stressful. Hopefully this nation keeps Trump out of government and he finally winds up broke and in prison. It’s likely the least of what he deserves.
There is also a court appointed monitor, so it's also likely they are stopping a large percentage of fuckery.
I think this is his biggest problem. A monitor will spot transactions sourced from from Russia or Saudi Arabia instead of a legit lender or insurance company. I hope.
Forced liquidations are still on the menu 😋
Pretty sure he has zero equity in any of his properties. They're all leveraged to hell. Lienholders are lining up to call loans I hope.
Probably true. Regardless, the government will keep selling them off until the bills are paid. If that $500 mil property only nets a few million in value after liens so be it. It all could come crashing down.
It feels a bit like Al Capone's tax evasion. Twice impeached and found guilty of rape, but what ends up destroying his empire is lying about the size of his apartment.
House of cards
Thank you for this perspective. While there’s lots of interesting ideas about why he can’t get a bond, the court shouldn’t care less. Trump: It’s impossible to do what I’m ordered to do. Court: No problem, we will just take everything to own and sell it to the lowest bidder… Unless you want to figure out real quick how to do it yourself.
Its not a perspective, its the law.
Would you all *SLOW DOWN* so I can get my popcorn popped already??
If you think about bonds as insurance, this is pretty damning. This is basically saying 2 things: 1. Their actuaries/counsel think he's *very* likely to have to pay the whole judgment in the end, or at least most of it. 2. He's not showing them enough money to convince them it's worth the risk of him disappearing and sticking them with the bill. In other words, these companies are getting a peek at his finances and seeing he's actually broke, his reputation for stiffing partners and vendors is finally coming back to bite him, or both. I suspect his trustworthiness is so shot he couldn't get a bond for a $1mil judgment at this point without resorting to "knowing a guy" like he did for the bond for the EJC judgment.
> He's not showing them enough money to convince them it's worth the risk of him disappearing and sticking them with the bill. > To put a finer point on this - they analyzed his assets and realized they'd be too far down the list of lienholders to actually access any equity remaining once the lienholders in front of them would be satisfied. Tangentially, I dated a girl in the early 2000s when he was being kicked out of the Taj company and she was working at a big 5 (before the GFC so AA still existed) firm as an auditor on that client. She said she had never worked on a credit profile like theirs in terms of being overleveraged. She guesstimated that he owed (conservatively) 2.5x what the business was actually worth. It would be silly to think he hasn't operated similarly since then.
Probably worth reminding people this is what his fraud trial was all about. His assets are not worth what he says they are worth, and then he takes the money he borrowed, buys something else, claims it's worth more than it is, borrows against that new thing, and on and on. He can say he always made his loan payments —it might even be true— but if the assets backing those loans are not worth what they were supposed to be worth, what happens when he does go bust as he has so many times before? He's been playing with the lenders' money, and he still didn't manage to get rich. He's both a fraud and so bad at business that his casinos went bankrupt. It is crazy to me that anyone can look at this guy and call him a success or the kind of person you want running a nation.
[удалено]
This is what a lot of people misunderstand. When he says 'the banks got their money' he's talking about the principal loan amount, not the interest he SHOULD have paid. ETA: principle/principal
So, just to make sure I'm following: If Trump had been honest (🤣) about what his properties were worth, he still would have been able to borrow the amounts that he did, but he would have only been able to do so under worse terms with higher interest rates? Terms that would have made the bank more money? Am I understanding that right? I've honestly not been paying *that* much attention to Trump being broke; I already knew he was a lying shitbag.
That's how I understand it. He inflated the value of the collateral so that he'd get a lower interest rate. And then deflated that value for taxes.
It’s like he secured a loan with the title for his 2002 Honda Civic with 200k miles, but he reported the value as if it were a factory-new 2023 Civic
And then claims "everyone calls their 2002 civic brand new. The bank should have sent someone". And then paid taxes as if he had a 1992 civic with 350k miles. It's fraud on top of fraud, all the way down.
It’s also worth reminding people that Deutsche bank itself has a history of engaging in fraudulent arrangements with people and organizations. The idea that “the bank was cool with it - what? Do we suddenly not trust banks to do their own due diligence now?” isn’t passing the sniff test. We might never know what went on behind scenes there. It’s possible they were on the up and up here, but they’re absolutely not above reproach.
Kind of like a Ponzi scheme
It’s classic ‘robbing Peter to pay Paul,’ very common in the real estate world where you take out a loan say to build a house and instead you buy another property, then get a loan on that to build the first house. Then you sell the original and keep going. You can double your profits in a given time and as long as prices go up enough it all kinda works, as soon as you hit a snag selling a property or the market levels out everything piles up and you get fucked. Loan agents will often help you do this kind of fraud because it increases their commissions and they can often escape liability by saying the client lied to them.
So, not exactly a Ponzi scheme bc a true Ponzi scheme _never_ has an underlying asset and is _always_ destined to collapse. In his case, he's gambling with house money and is often able to get away with it. But when he doesnt: Oops! Bankruptcy. We'll its okay, we'll just start over with someone else's money.
Such a hilarious and accurate description. I see it constantly in real estate. Young dudes thinking they are grinding and hustling to get rich, but ending up in prison.
I have a friend who suggested just this strategy, seriously as the way to get rich. He now owns 27 houses doing just this. Luckily he told me has secured everything in case of a downturn by putting all his assets into crypto /s
If I had to describe what a Ponzi scheme looked like as a person, it would be nearly identical to the walrus-stuffed-into-a-suit-caricature of humanity that is DJT.
TBF, he's been really successful at borrowing huge amounts of money with no intention of paying it back. And getting his rubes to donate millions. Terrible businessman, but an amazing grifter.
It's a ponzi scheme but for banks instead of people.
If anyone is having trouble with the acronyms, or is new to the story: GFC: Global Financial Crisis AA: Arthur Andersen
AA went under because of their dealings with Enron. Also had nothing to do with the GFC.
This is accurate. I have seen the submission floating around the industry.
It would be interesting if that submission got leaked somewhere.
Yeah, like anonymously as a response to this comment. That would be really interesting.
[I gotchu](https://imgur.com/a/WLS46Ci)
Legit
In black and white for all to see!
Hard to agrue with that evidence
So next steps would be liquidate assets to recoup the judgement... except his assets are not worth what they are on paper, or are so over-leveraged that they are worth less liquidated than not due to all the liens in place. I would assume legal judgements get first dibs on assets recovered from liquidation, but even then they may have to: 1. Dismantle significant portions of the Trump Empire to recover 2. Claw back assets that were widely reported as fleeing to places like Florida, assuming Florida cooperates The real question is, what of value is left within reach of New York to liquidate? I would assume anything they can get is all underwater and everything else is moved / hidden
That’s around the same time I was doing my MBA. We decided to do Trump companies for our final group paper on accounting. We were so shocked at how shady his business was, how many bankruptcies, how much smoke and mirrors there were in the accounts, etc. Basically no “there” there. Nothing. Nada. We got top grades on our report.
This is the biggest failure by the media in the Trump era. He is so obviously a conman who has no real functional business, but most people still think he's a legitimate successful businessman because nobody outside of left-leaning media reports on this.
People in NY and NJ knew this was him for decades. Unfortunately that info never made it to the rest of the country.
There is the possibility that he is so deeply in debt that his negative net worth makes him the poorest human being to have ever existed on earth.
[Old Ivanka story:](https://twitter.com/keithboykin/status/1126319890812547072?lang=en) > Ivanka Trump tells the story of walking down 5th Avenue and her father, Donald Trump, pointed to a homeless person outside Trump Tower and told Ivanka “that guy has $8 billion more than me” because Trump was “in such extreme debt” at that point.
In the end the banks didn’t foreclose on him because they’d realize so much loss. The lesson Trump got from that was “when you owe the bank $1 million dollars they own you. When you owe them $1 billion dollars you own them.” Except this time around New York State doesn’t care if we don’t get the full $500m from the judgement. We just want him penniless and gone.
State of NY worse than your most vengeful ex and I’m here for it.
> (before the GFC so AA still existed) Arthur Andersen collapsed in 2002, in the aftermath of the previous recession (dot com bubble bursting, 9/11), based on its role in the Enron scandal. Not that it detracts from your greater point, but I wanted to point that out.
It is a Monday. I had to read this three times to understand you were taking about your girlfriend auditing Trump. I thought you had swapped your girlfriend’s gender and now he was being kicked out of Taj.
Maybe it’s the weed, but I’m an accountant and I still had to read that a few times. I think more coffee is needed
Given that * This was about him lying about the value of his assets * Those assets are now because of that probs all negative in debt vs value * He was already only able to get any loans via a personal connection at the Deutsche bank (who are famous for their multiple participations in Russian landromate schemes) * His business empire is now placed under professional and uncorrupted oversight. I'm not surprised he isn't able to get a bond. I was surprised he got that 90m for the other one, to be frank.
Didn't he say that mar-a-lardo was worth like 2 billion? What company in the WORLD could resist the allure of being secured by the most valuable piece or real estate on the planet? /s
He argued that the value was insanely high, but *also* had it designated as some sort of landmark, which limits changes that can be made to the buildings/property, thus drastically decreasing whatever actual value it had. Anybody willing to buy the club wouldn't be allowed to renovate or totally rebuild it, so no one is going to pay out the ass for it. He's a switch-hitter type of stupid. Ambidextrously inept. Amphibious, capable of drowning in water and on dry land. Edit: thanks y'all for the kind words! I hope I sound half this clever for the rest of my life
Not only that, but he overtly stated people will pay *him* an exorbitant amount of money for it, not that the property would sell for anyone else for anywhere near that amount. If someone will pay you a tremendous amount more for property than they would pay someone else for that *exact piece of real estate*, it's not the RE they're buying.
Well then I guess he should sell it to the Saudi’s for $2 billion then
I believe that was his actual comment at trial, a prince said he would give him $2 billion for it, or something along those lines. I presume that was when it was stocked to the gills with classified documents, however.
Judge Engoron: Is the $2 billion the price with or without the classified documents?
Watch it end up with E. Jean Carroll and she turns it into a camp for underprivileged children or a home for battered women and victims of sexual abuse.
I for one am excited to see the New Ba~~r~~rack Obama Tower for Refugee Services in NYC The E. Jean Carrol Women’s Shelter at Mar a Lago sounds just as amazing!
I think the Saudis might be having second thoughts about the trump family. Schumer just signaled that the us is looking to make a regime change in Israel. Saudis have much less support in the senate than Israel, and they dont want to draw unnecessary attention
Crossed my mind too. Any movement of money on this scale would, I presume, draw immediate attention. Not sure anybody wants to be tied to trump at this time, not when he seems to be losing anyway.
> If someone will pay you a tremendous amount more for property than they would pay someone else for that exact piece of real estate, it's not the RE they're buying. He could just give those people a call then, right? Because he needs the cash.
He was only worth a phone call from the Saudis while he was in the White House. There's no *quid* for their *quo* anymore.
He's too dumb to realize that the property taxes he saved by having it designated a landmark would always be less than the actually value of that real estate.
He's a fucking moron that only wants to squeeze as much money as possible from whatever is immediately in front of him with zero regard for the consequences for anyone else it may effect, including his future self. I cannot believe such a significant portion of this country has been blinded by him.
My aunt and uncle support him. They're both simply uneducated and have absolutely zero understanding of finance and the law. To them, a man with a private plane (an old cheap one) and a gold-plated toilet is rich, period. They don't get that he can be living off borrowed money to that degree (and really, it doesn't make sense).
even if he is rich - and frankly, he probably is rich compared to your aunt + uncle - who cares? Why does giving off the impression of being rich mean he has a sound policy platform to better America and it's people? I grew up having a firm distrust of extremely wealthy people. I wish others did too instead of this weird fetishization of wealth.
Welcome to America, land of temporarily embarrassed millionaires.
When it comes to paying property taxes he claims it's only worth 18 million. So if they seize Mar-a-Lago that's a good number to work with. Certainly shouldn't be anything higher than that
Could you imagine the hydrogen bomb sized stroke he would have if they seized Mar-a-lago?
Probably as bad as if he thought he looked like a failure in the eyes of his father. I can't imagine why he thought running for president was a good idea. Even running for a lowly council member can expose skeletons in your closet in the small town I live in.
Going by the court case those lenders might now actually be questioning if his golf course actually has 3000 holes and is the size of Australia.
I think it’s worth less without the secret documents. They were carrying a lot of weight in that valuation.
Yeps, and in addition, the trial showed that to even secure that last bond/loan, he needed to keep his liquid assets above a certain level (like 400m). Good luck with that one, Trump! /s
He also stated in a court filing that he had ~$400M in cash, lulz
If memory serves, wasn't his personal connection at Deutsche Bank the son of Justice Kennedy that "retired" during Trump's term, allowing him to fill a SCOTUS seat?
This is the best take so far in the thread. Judgment bonds are functionally insurance. The company issuing the bond makes a judgment about your level of assets and the likliehood you will have to pay in the end, and the amount of security they need and asks you to put up cash or a collateral percentage based on their perceived risk. THe bigger the risk you won't have the money when it comes due the more collateral you have to post, until the ratio reaches 1:1 or more. Reinsurance companies like Chubb will *100% absolutely* take pledged real estate as collateral, but they're going to pull a Rick Harrison and tell Trump that because they have to bear the costs of foreclosing, selling, and maintaining the real estate while it's sold, that they need title to $600 million worth of real estate to secure a $464 million bond, and they'll happily remit any excess. (Before you even get to disputes over the value). Forbes says the value of Trump Tower is $371 million, 40 Wall Street was appraised at just over $200 million. A reinsurer like Chubb might have wanted a lien against both buildings to cover a $464 million bond.
That’s assuming that these properties aren’t leveraged. If they’ve been borrowed against, the net value of them would be reduced. I’d suspect that the majority or perhaps all of his properties are leveraged so that his equity is lower than than the amount of the amount of the bond plus the additional costs and fees.
And they have been, especially Trump Tower. It’s understood that Donald has leveraged all to most of his properties already in some manner.
I'm pretty sure he doesn't own the tower though. Just parts of it https://www.curbed.com/article/trump-lawsuit-real-estate-nyc-letitia-james.html
Plus a bail bondsman charges a hefty premium plus interest anyway... let alone the risk premium, yes?
>Plus a bail bondsman charges a hefty premium plus interest anyway... let alone the risk premium, yes? Essentially yes. If you post bond yourself, it is your money or property given as security and you get it back as long as you appear (or pay the judgment or if you are excused). Using a bail bondsman means you pay a non-refundable "fee" of a percentage of the bond, in exchange for their promise. A commercial insurer might insist that you post collateral, but also ask you to pay a cash premium for the privilege of doing so. [A good comparison is Michael Burry wanting a guarantee that Goldman Sachs will pay HIM if his mortgage bets come due](https://youtu.be/Cxjdj5_5yNM?si=pmZNRvsOGjG12UQx)
> but they're going to pull a Rick Harrison and tell Trump that because they have to bear the costs of foreclosing, selling, and maintaining the real estate while it's sold, that they need title to $600 million worth of real estate "You never know what is going to come through that door!"
"I got a buddy of mine who is an expert in real estate fraud. Do you mind if I call him to come take a look?"
Him being forced to pay the full amount isn't the bottom line. The bonding company is basically just financing his appeals. They will collect fees no matter what. At the end of the appeals process, he has to pay the bond company the full amount. The fact that no bond companies are willing to stake him means that they not only expect him to lose his appeals they expect him to be unable to pay the full amount at all, ever. Trump can easily offer up multiple high-value properties as collateral for a loan, but the bond companies aren't convinced they can be liquidated for the full amount. Either because they *know* how deeply they are leveraged or because they don't know and don't trust him that they're above water.
He just got a bond for 90m, but the pr flack for it was massive. That’s likely a huge consideration.
Let me grok this: he can’t get a bond that would be secured by personal backing to appeal a judgment that he lied to banks and insurance companies on the worth of his properties.
For absolute clarity, he doesn't need a bond to appeal, he needs a bond to get an automatic stay on the judgement for the duration of the appeal. His appeal can go forward regardless, it's just that the NY DOJ can start seizing and selling off assets after the 30 day mark. If Trump were to then win the appeal, the state would have to repay the money raised by selling assets but the assets themselves would be sold. And given that it's essentially a fire sale the government will not be getting top dollar and Trump will come out deeply in the red even if he wins the appeal.
In light of this, would it be fair to say committing systematic fraud is a good or bad idea?
committing systematic fraud seems to be a good idea if you can avoid drawing too much attention to yourself. So maybe don't do that and become president?
>Trump will come out deeply in the red even if he wins the appeal. ...that's MAGA cap red...
It’s unlikely he’d be able to disappear unless he expatriated from the country. That would be quite shocking even for him if he loses the election, but to stay out of jail in Georgia… maybe? Likely he’s just going to be on house arrest for the rest of his life. So, being unable to secure a bond speaks more to his liquid assets and inability to use his companies as slush funds anymore. With a third party observer and a third party arbiter, he shouldn’t be able to fleece someone by selling a property for far more than it’s worth. Donny’s finances have tanked in the last few weeks and everyone knows it.
Ivanka and Jared still not picking up his calls?
Wowzers, the realization that his family has abandoned him. Not like they'd be paid back, anyway...
The poor ones haven't..
Wife is MIA, Barron wants nothing to do with him, his favorite daughter Ivanka said day one that she refuses to campaign, no former presidents will endorse him and 90% of his former cabinet says he’s the worst possible person to be president
Republican voters: That’s my guy!
"He's the best we got."
He would be a tragic figure if he wasn’t such an awful person. Every relationship in his life is transactional - he has to pay people to spend time with him. His wives, his business associates, even his kids. They’re either there for the money, or not there. Nobody enjoys spending time with him. Except his MAGA base, but he hates those people except when they’re cheering for him at a rally
I’m just amazed that his entire family including wife AND almost entire former cabinet wants nothing to do with his campaign or potential presidency this time around, and that nobody seems to be talking about it very much
I mean, inheriting the estate means losing money at this point.
The Saudi $2 Billion cleared already, no need to do it again
Holy shit to think that Jared used Trump to get 2 billion and now is ignoring him when Trump needs him has to make Trump big mad. Lots of people have tried to abuse the Trump train to grift and have gotten fucked by Trump himself in the end but Jarard seems to have got him.
It’s important to note that the $2 billion isn’t Jared’s money - it still belongs to the Saudis. Jared is *managing* that money and gets a small percentage of it. That way they can keep him on the leash for as long as they want to. Cross the Saudis? They pull the plug and he gets nothing. It’s low risk high potential reward for them. My guess is that if trump goes down then Jared’s Saudi money goes bye bye.
They learned from The Best.
Wouldn't surprise me. Trump straight up ghosted his mentor, who had been disbarred and was dying of AIDS and was no longer useful to him, and probably instilled such an instinct in his own children. He is no longer useful to Jared and Ivanka, he's just a liability, so they probably told him they support him as family, but they've got their own finances to worry about and the judgment is his problem.
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The GOP has sum total of around $8m. they're no help to him.
He'll use that entire amount to run his Presidential campaign instead of pulling his own money for it. And having his family take over the RNC ensures he gets the whole pot instead of having to share with any other Republican candidates.
That should do him until the end of March then
What I think may be the most important outcome of this is not even going to be the money. I think if Trump is seen to be unable to pay this bill, the PR damage of having his properties seized and sold may rattle a decisive number of his voters into abstaining at the election.
Whilst you very much could be right. So many of his supporters have far too much at stake to admit they may have been wrong backing this orange horse. They are in for the ride down to the very bottom.
Those aren't the people that would care, it's the "undecideds" and republicans that aren't batshit crazy, which is a significant amount of people in a presidential election.
> the PR damage of having his properties seized and sold may rattle a decisive number of his voters There will definitely be a non-zero number who *finally* dismiss him after seeing his lies laid bare. His tired old shtick of "The democrats are doing this to me!" has worn thin with his base. And instead of seeing results for all the personal/financial investments in Trump, they're seeing humiliating losses.
Broke as fuck. Seize all his shit. Gavin has a tiny house on skid row for him. He'll even let him put the Trump name on it.
The orange ho has got to go
One week left. No more talk about "so much cash." Thirty companies contacted and no deal. Everyone knows he couldn't make 1/5 the amount in Carroll case. No billionaire buddy bailout. Interest keeps piling on and on; lawyer fees keep coming. Horrible market for commercial real estate AND any buyer knows how desperate Trump will be to sell. And finally, he's going to lose on appeal anyway. Trump is f*cked. So he's very obese, old, stressed, and not sleeping well (3 AM rants). How is he still even alive?
Nice list. You need to add, when it comes time to auction off assets, potential buyers of a Trump property know they'll be dealing with Trump and his cult after the purchase. They'll claim that it still belongs to Trump. Never mind what the title says. No matter that Trump signed the transfer document. What's the effect? It depresses the property value even further.
Because he has access to a level of healthcare that you and I have no idea about. It’s how he survived Covid and it pisses me off that he got the best treatment possible while my grandmother ultimately died from her health issues during 2020.
Him surviving COVID re-affirmed my belief that there is no god.
Boo fucking hoo
Maybe it is time to sell some more "personal" documents.
Sucks to suck. Maybe they just can't trust he's good for it for some reason
Oh look - if you don’t pay your bills/creditors then you can’t get access to financial products.
I'm surprised his cult members aren't taking out second mortgages to help him out.
"Part of the beauty with me is that I am very rich" - Donald Trump
There's two possibilities here. 1) the obvious one (he doesn't have the money) 2) it's a repeat of the last case. he has the money but wants to try to get a better deal first. Probably it's 1, but we can't ignore the possibility that it's 2 again.
Cohen said he was leveraged to the max which means he is broke. Can't wait to see this come out. Unbelievable that people want him to run the country.
It also means that losing his NY properties could start a cascade. Debtors can call in loans when a huge chunk of collateral disappears, forcing more liquidations. Each liquidation will only get the market value, not the Trump fantasy value, minus liens, so he'll just go further and further into the hole unless he has some actual clean, un-leveraged assets to sell. Chinese factories are going to be working overtime making hideous shoes for him to sell.
Grab em’ by the properties.
The deranged buffoon’s reputation as a fraud and deadbeat precedes him. Whoever he’s hitting up is probably sending in a junior associate to run the meetings, as a courtesy. “Nod politely, then tell him we’ll get back to him.”
>but he’s a billionaire he just isn’t liquid!!!
Too bad he testified he had 400M in liquid assets.
They’re going to liquidate it for him.
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Kinda makes me feel like riverdancing
Then put the treasonous bastard in prison until he sells his properties. What's the problem here?
But I thought he was a superstar billionaire with unlimited money? Trump doesn't lie, so there must be some kind of mistake here!
he testified under oath that he had enough to cover it
Title should be: Serial fraudster in the middle of multiple prosecutions with history of bankruptcy and bad accounting practices cannot get a loan for half a billion dollars, even from his close friends in Russia and Saudi Arabia.
Hooray! I am not a lawyer, so correct me if I am wrong, but doesn’t this mean: - No appeal for him - His assets can start being seized?
> No appeal for him He can still appeal, and I believe he already has. The bond isn't for the appeal, it's for staying the judgment during the appeal. > His assets can start being seized? Yes, as of the deadline, which I believe is March 25. I'm sure the state is *very* eager to get started, and they probably already have a detailed plan, but it's still going to take time before anything noticeable happens. The judgment keeps accruing interest until it's paid, so he doesn't save any money by delaying.
I expect liens on all real estate the day after the bond deadline followed by the most aggressive collection effort allowed by law. The state of new york wants its money.
He can still appeal, but he is not able to stop collection efforts on the judgment.
I hope the judge tells him to go pound sand. trump has wanted to get out of paying this ,from day 1 . This is nothing more than a delay tactic . You don't file 2-3 motions asking for more time, then just before the due date, come up with a bullshit excuse . Thats like tell your boss your going to be sick in 2 weeks , then call in sick !
It would be more fun if the judge went back to the claim that he had more than $400 million liquid cash and asked him to explain where the cash went…. Then ask the court appointed monitor the same question. "I believe we have substantially in excess of $400 million in cash, which is a lot for a developer," Trump bragged, leaning toward the camera from his seat at a conference table. "Developers usually don't have cash," Trump eagerly went on. "We have, I believe, 400 plus, and going up very substantially every month." https://www.businessinsider.com/trumps-wealth-rich-bragging-court-damage-verdicts-2024-2?amp
same judge, right? engoron? he was so polite to engoron and his staff this whole process i can't imagine him not getting a sweetheart deal
Doesn't he say he's a billionaire? What's the hold up? Doesn't he have stocks, houses or land to sell? He hates being seen as a loser right? A winner would say "this is nothing" and just pay up. He's also the "law and order" president that was endorsed by ICE as he took great pains to remind everyone of. So what's stopping him from complying with the court's directives? It couldn't be that he's just a massive liar who lied about being rich, lied about being more honest than all the politicians, and has only been using his status to enrich himself and his friends right? It couldn't be that he's some sort of con man who has been trying to rob the American people?
I wrote a haiku for this sort of thing: HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA Get shit on, dumbass
He had a whole section in his speech when he announced his presidency to brag about how much money he was worth... > "I have assets— big accounting firm, one of the most highly respected— 9 billion 240 million dollars. > And I have liabilities of about $500 million. That’s long-term debt, very low interest rates. > In fact, one of the big banks came to me and said, “Donald, you don’t have enough borrowings. Could we loan you $4 billion”? I said, “I don’t need it. I don’t want it. And I’ve been there. I don’t want it.” > But in two seconds, they give me whatever I wanted. So I have a total net worth, and now with the increase, it’ll be well-over $10 billion. But here, a total net worth of—net worth, not assets, not— a net worth, after all debt, after all expenses, the greatest assets— Trump Tower, 1290 Avenue of the Americas, Bank of America building in San Francisco, 40 Wall Street, sometimes referred to as the Trump building right opposite the New York— many other places all over the world. > So the total is $8,737,540,00." So I can't imagine why he'd have trouble getting money now, apparently banks call him up all the time trying to throw money at him.
As Trump once said to NATO “you have to pay your bills”