Forbes: Trump’s Cash Holdings of $93 Million Much Less Than His Earlier Claims
Courtesy: Nikkei Asia
Former US President Donald Trump has long been under investigation on suspicions of tax evasion. The New York Attorney General’s Office suspects a company that controls Trump’s real estate and assets of fraud and provides false information to obtain tax breaks and secure loans.
Donald Trump had $93 million last year in liquid assets, far less than the sums he had revealed earlier, according to a Forbes analysis based on recently released data by the office of NY Attorney General Letitia James.
Apart from property, shares, bonds, and other “tough-to-value” holdings, Trump had $114 million in 2016, when he was running for the US presidency, with his assents later plummeting to $76 million in 2018 before rising to $87 million in 2019.
In 2015, the Trump Organization declared $302 million in cash and marketable securities as of June 2014, when Trump claimed his net worth was nearly $9 billion. At the same time, the figure dropped between $78 million and $232 million as of mid-2015, when the former president provided a financial disclosure to the federal government.
“As of today, I’m at $793 million,” he reportedly said, explaining that the near tripling of his wealth was prompted by his decision to “sell stuff.” During Trump’s last year in office, his company sought to sell part of his hotel business, which had been badly affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.
“His lone example: the Miss Universe pageant, recently sold for less than $30 million. ‘Here’s your cash number here—or market value: 793,’ he said,” according to Forbes, whose experts “held steady at about $300 million.”
The Trump Organization has been investigated jointly by the New York Attorney General’s Office and the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office since 2019 when the former president refused to disclose his tax returns. Prosecutors have suspected Trump of fraudulently overstating the value of his assets to secure bank loans and underestimating them in other cases to reduce taxes.
Trump stepped down as CEO of the Trump Organization in 2017 after taking office, passing the business on to his sons Donald Jr. and Eric, as well as longtime Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg.
Trump said that the investigation against the company was launched for political reasons and was promoted by the Democratic Party. In an attempt to strike back, Trump filed a lawsuit against James and accused her of “political animus and a desire to harass, intimidate, and retaliate against a private citizen who she views as a political opponent.”
Meanwhile, James earlier announced that her office “has collected significant additional evidence indicating that the Trump Organization used fraudulent or misleading asset valuations to obtain a host of economic benefits, including loans, insurance coverage, and tax deductions,” and took legal action last week to force Trump’s children, Donald Jr., and Ivanka Trump, to testify in the case.
