united-states finance securities sec insider-trading
Can Trump legally sell stocks on Friday, tweet about imposing tariffs on Sunday and then buy more of the stocks back on Monday?
<p>Trump could have made a lot of money by selling stocks before tweeting about imposing tariffs on China and then buying more of them back when the price of the stocks has dropped. Would this fall under the ban on insider trading, or does insider trading only apply to confidential information about companies?</p>

<p>There is no statutory definition of insider trading, and the question of who is included is answered by <a href="https://www.investor.gov/additional-resources/general-resources/glossary/insider-trading" rel="noreferrer">the SEC</a>. It includes "Government employees who traded based on confidential information they learned because of their employment with the government". Under <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/5/2105" rel="noreferrer">5 USC 2105</a>, POTUS is an "employee", though that is w.r.t. Title 5 and insider trading laws are under Title 15. But as it happens, the <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/78u-1#h_2_A_i" rel="noreferrer">Title 15 definition</a> of "executive branch employee" assigns the Title 5 definition of "employee" to "executive branch employee" and explicitly lists POTUS.</p>

<p><a href="https://www.congress.gov/112/plaws/publ105/PLAW-112publ105.pdf" rel="noreferrer">Pub. L. No. 112-105, §§ 9(b)(1)</a> explicitly says</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>Executive   branch   employees,  judicial  officers,  and  judicial 
  employees  are  not  exempt  from  the  insider  trading  prohibitions
  arising  under  the  securities  laws,  including  section  10(b)  of 
  the  Securities  Exchange Act of 1934 and Rule 10b–5 thereunder.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>Insider trading laws are not limited to "information about company X", they are framed in terms of non-public information, which could include information about a country: "no executive branch employee may use nonpublic information derived from such person’s position as an executive branch employee  or  gained  from  the  performance  of  such  person’s  official  responsibilities  as  a  means  for  making  a  private  profit".</p>
