WASHINGTON (TND) — A new report from Unusual Whales found that members of Congress beat the market yet again in 2023.
For context, Congress filed around 11,000 financial transactions in 2023, costing over $1 billion.
The report analyzed the public financial disclosure forms that members of Congress and their families must make any time they make a trade and out of 100 members, 33% beat the SPY, which itself was up 24% in 2023.
Members from both sides of the aisle had a successful trading year, but when broken down by party, Democrats outperformed Republicans, earning an average of roughly 31% on their trades. Republicans, on the other hand, earned around 18%.
The report explains that Democrats did better than Republicans because they invested more in technology stocks, which were very successful in 2023, meanwhile, Republicans invested more heavily in oil, commodities and financials which had a tougher year.
The top ten members with the biggest returns are:
- Rep. Brian Higgins, D-N.Y.: 238.9%
- Rep. Mark Green, R-Tenn.: 122.2%
- Rep. Garret Graves, R-La.: 107.6%
- Rep. David Rouzer, R-N.C.: 105.6%
- Rep. Seth Moulton, D-Mass.: 80%
- Rep. Ron Wyden, D-Ore.: 78.5%
- Rep. John Rutherford, R-Fla.: 69.1%
- Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn.: 68.1%
- Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.: 65.5%
- Rep. Pete Sessions, R-Texas: 63.3%
The Stock Act of 2012 bans members from trading with non-public information they received from their jobs, and there are a few other proposals out there to change up the rules.
For example, in July, Sens. Gillibrand and Hawley introduced the bipartisan Ban Stock Trading for Government Officials Act, which would include the executive branch and their families as well.
In September, Sens. Ossoff and Kelly introduced the Ban Congressional Stock Trading Act.
Most recently, last month Rep. Porter and Sen. Gillibrand introduced the STOCK Act 2.0, which would restrict and expose financial conflicts of interest in all three branches of government.
For context, Sen. Gillibrand also wrote the original STOCK Act.
There were at least three other proposals introduced last year in the Senate, and at least six in the House.
Americans seem to have a pretty clear opinion on the matter.
A poll from Morning Consult/Politico found 68% of registered voters support banning stock trading for members of Congress.
Another poll from the University of Maryland found 86% favor banning members of Congress from stock trading in individual companies; that number is even higher for the President, Vice President and Supreme Court Justices at 87%.
