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President Donald Trump’s latest financial disclosure, released Tuesday, shows his money managers made 1,152 trades on his behalf in July alone. That works out to roughly 50 trades every day. (1)
According to a Bloomberg analysis cited by CNN, Trump’s accounts have logged more than 28,000 trades since January 2025 — more than every member of the House and Senate combined. Presidents Biden and Obama didn’t trade individual stocks at all; they stuck mostly with mutual funds and Treasuries. (1)
CNBC tallied the July activity at somewhere between $79 million and $270 million in purchases and sales, including sales of Microsoft and Amazon. (2)
I was a stockbroker during the 1987 crash, I’ve been a CPA since 1981, and I’ve been trading stocks for 45 years. So when I see a number like 1,152, my first question isn’t political. It’s this: What does all that trading do to the tax bill?
The White House says the portfolio is run by independent managers using computer-based model portfolios that automatically replicate indexes such as the Schwab 1000, and that Trump has no say in the trades. (1) Ethics watchdogs aren’t satisfied, and the president has declined to use a blind trust. (1)
That debate is for voters. My lane is the money. And the White House’s description sounds a lot like a tax strategy wealthy investors use every day — one that could backfire badly if you tried to copy the trading without the strategy. Here are five things 1,152 trades in a month can teach you.
1. A ‘robot’ portfolio can trade 50 times a day on purpose
There’s a technique called direct indexing. Instead of buying one index fund, you own the individual stocks inside the index. When some of those stocks fall, software sells them to lock in a loss, then buys something similar. (3)
Those harvested losses can offset gains elsewhere, which lowers your tax bill. More stocks means more chances to harvest, so a portfolio tracking the 1,000 biggest U.S. companies can generate a mountain of trades. (3)
To be clear, a disclosure form lists trades, not strategy, so I can’t tell you that’s exactly what’s happening here. One financial advisor told CNN the turnover looks high even for a manager actively timing the market — but that volume alone doesn’t prove anything improper. (1)
2. The same trades would cost you plenty
Here’s the part most people miss. Under IRS rules, if you sell a stock you’ve owned for a year or less, any profit is a short-term gain, taxed at your ordinary income rate. Hold it longer than a year, and a lower long-term rate generally applies. (4)
Let’s run the math on a $10,000 profit for someone in the 24% bracket. Sell too soon, and you could owe about $2,400. Wait past the one-year mark, and at the common 15% long-term rate, that drops to about $1,500.
That’s $900 lost on a single trade — just for being impatient. Now imagine doing it 50 times a day. A tax-harvesting robot is trying to generate losses. A regular investor who trades a lot usually generates taxable gains.
Quick aside — most internet financial advice comes from people who weren’t alive during the last recession. I’ve been writing about money for more than 35 years. Want rock-solid advice? Sign up for the free Money Talks Newsletter. Takes 10 seconds. No fluff. No spam.
3. Frequent traders usually lose to the market
Taxes aren’t the only drag. In a landmark study of 66,465 households at a discount broker, economists Brad Barber and Terrance Odean found the most active traders earned 11.4% a year while the market returned 17.9%. (5)
Their conclusion was blunt: Trading is hazardous to your wealth. Overconfidence, they found, is what drives people to trade too much. (5)
Back when I was a broker, we earned a commission on every trade. That tells you who frequent trading was built to benefit — and it usually wasn’t the customer.
4. You can get the tax benefit without the frenzy
The good news: The basic idea behind direct indexing is available to regular people, and you don’t need 50 trades a day to use it.
Keep low-turnover index funds in your taxable brokerage account, where selling creates a tax bill. Do any buying and selling inside an IRA or 401(k), where trades don’t trigger taxes. And once a year, in taxable accounts, look for losers you can sell to offset gains.
If you’re just getting started, keep it simple and cheap. SoFi® Active Invest lets you get started with as little as $5, with no account minimums. You can trade stocks and ETFs with no commissions — or start with a collection SoFi has already put together and spread your money across a mix of companies.
Bonus: If you fund your account with at least $50, you can get a stock award worth $5 to $1,000. Open an account today.
INVESTMENTS ARE NOT FDIC INSURED • ARE NOT BANK GUARANTEED • MAY LOSE VALUEBrokerage and Active investing products offered through SoFi Securities LLC, member FINRA(www.finra.org)/SIPC(www.sipc.org).
5. Know when the tax stakes justify a pro
Once your taxable account gets big — or you’re sitting on large gains in a few stocks — the difference between smart and sloppy selling can run into thousands of dollars a year.
That’s exactly the kind of work a good advisor earns their fee on. One way to find one: services like SmartAsset match you free with up to three fiduciary advisors — pros legally required to put your interests first. They can spot tax savings you’d never see alone. If you've got $100,000 or more invested, get matched with a fiduciary advisor free.
The bottom line
Whether a sitting president should be trading stocks at all is a fair question, and people of good faith land in different places on it. That’s not my call to make for you.
What I can tell you is what 1,152 trades a month means for your money. For a huge account running a tax-harvesting program, heavy trading can be a feature. For almost everyone else, it’s a slow leak — in taxes, in costs and in returns.
The market rewards you for owning good businesses over time, not for keeping your finger on the sell button. Let the robots trade. You hold.
Sources: 1. CNN; 2. CNBC; 3. CNBC; 4. IRS; 5. University of California, Berkeley;
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