U.S. politicians have developed a reputation for being exceptionally savvy traders in no small part thanks to the immensely successful and widely publicized stock market activity of Nancy Pelosi and the incredibly successful portfolio of Brian Higgs.
Nonetheless, Congressional trading is both a bipartisan activity and not one that always leads to success, as exemplified by a very poorly-timed investment made in late June by Marjorie Taylor Greene.
Indeed, on June 27, the Representative reported a purchase of CrowdStrike (NASDAQ: CRWD) stock that she made three days earlier.
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Given that CRWD shares have declined as much as 38.18% since the investment was made and that Marjorie Taylor Greene reported the acquisition as worth between $1,001 and $15,000, she lost anywhere between $381.80 and $5,727 in just over one month.
How did Marjorie Taylor Greene lose money on the CRWD stock investment?
CrowdStrike’s massive decline – a decline that saw the stock lose 39.91% of its value in the last 30 days and land its press time price of $235.66 – was largely triggered by a major global computer outage stemming from a faulty update unleashed by the cybersecurity company.
While the outage affected numerous organizations running on Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) devices across the world, the significant air travel delays were the most widely publicized facet of the incident.
Interestingly, Southwest Airlines (NYSE: LUV), which could otherwise be criticized for being lax with security and not updating their Windows operating system, was allegedly spared the outage precisely due to the outdated software.
Marjorie Taylor Greene makes more controversial investments.
Despite the losses Marjorie Taylor Greene took due to the unforeseen calamity triggered by CrowdStrike, the IT company is far from her only investment.
In the penultimate week of July, the representative came under fire as reports of a significant – worth up to $600,000 – investment in bonds and stocks, including Applied Materials (NASDAQ: AMAT), Corning (NYSE: GLW), Dell Technologies (NYSE: DELL), Duke Energy (NYSE: DUK), JPMorgan (NYSE: JPM), and United Parcel Service (NYSE: UPS), came out.
The trades were and remain somewhat controversial, given that Marjorie Taylor Greene has been vocal about banning trading for elected officials while they are in office.
Still, along with the losses incurred, the CrowdStrike investment could itself be seen as problematic as the company is helping the Department of Defense manage its cybersecurity operations.
Purchasing stocks from a cybersecurity company could potentially cause a conflict of interest due to Greene’s position on the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability’s Subcommittee on Cybersecurity, Information Technology and Government Innovation.
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