Members of Congress — whether in the House or Senate, tend to secure much greater returns than their constituents.
Lawmakers have access to potentially market-moving information before the general public does. To boot, committee assignments can give politicians an even greater informational edge.
Unsurprisingly, this is often seen as a conflict between oaths of office and private interest. There have been some efforts to curtail the practice — but regulations aimed at doing so are disregarded regularly.
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You don’t have to look far or particularly hard to find suspicious trades made by politicians, no matter what Dan Crenshaw says. In addition, disclosure rules are set up in a way to obscure the exact amounts that public servants are investing in financial markets.
Up to this point, U.S. politicians have generally invested in traditional assets — exchange-traded funds (ETFs), fixed-income assets like bonds, or most commonly, stocks. The trading of cryptocurrencies on Capitol Hill is still a nascent phenomenon — but one lawmaker is apparently ahead of the curve.
A U.S. politician has made an unusual, suspicious trade — by investing in meme coins, as revealed by Finbold’s congressional trading radar.
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Mike Collins ushers in era of political meme coin trading
Michael Collins, the representative for Georgia’s 10th congressional district, has been investing in crypto for some time. His first investments in digital assets — or at least the first ones he’s had to disclose, date back to October 2023. However, these were established cryptocurrencies — primarily Ethereum (ETH).
On December 1 and December 2, the congressman made three transactions — two of which were Ski Mask Dog (SKI) purchases, as revealed in a period transaction report that was made public on December 2. Each of the SKI purchases was worth between $1,001 and $15,000 — in total, Collins invested between $2,002 and $30,000 in the meme coin.
Ski Mask Dog has a market cap of just $232.24 million as of press time, and the project has only been active since April. The filing also includes a $1,001 to $15,000 investment in Aerodrome Finance (AERO), another small-cap token — one that he had previously invested in.
What’s most notable, however, is that Collins commented on the purchase — at least indirectly. On December 3, the representative posted an image of Pepe the Fog as a response to an X post made by unusual_whales documenting the trade.
Is the public due for Congressional pump and dump schemes?
SKI was trading at prices between $0.1067 and $0.1184 on December 2, the day of the purchase. The meme coin’s price has since increased to $0.2071 — a 74.91% surge from the upper end of the December 2 range.
Over the course of the last seven days, Ski Mask Dog has rallied by 445.07% — and monthly returns are even more impressive, at 11,158.38%, as per CoinMarketCap data retrieved by Finbold.
While it might appear unusual at first glance, it should not come as a surprise that some members of Congress do have the risk appetite (or money to spare) to invest in meme coins. Going forward, actions like Collins’ X comment could serve to ignite moves to the upside — providing lawmakers with yet another avenue for dubiously ethical trading practices.
Featured image via Shutterstock
