Republican Rep. Tim Moore is betting big against President Donald Trump’s economy.
Moore, a North Carolina freshman who’s lauded Trump for his economic leadership, has poured up to $245,000 of his own cash into an exotic investment fund that earns him money when a key stock market index falters, according to congressional financial disclosures reviewed by NOTUS.
Known as the Direxion Daily Small Cap Bear 3X Shares fund, the fund “will lose money when the value of the [Russell 2000] index rises because of the fund’s inverse or short exposure — this result is the opposite from a traditional index fund,” according to a fund prospectus submitted to the Securities and Exchange Commission.
“The fund’s assets will increase in value when the index’s value falls. The fund’s assets will decrease in value when the index’s value increases,” the fund prospectus states.
Between late June and late August, Moore has made six Direxion Daily Small Cap Bear 3X Shares fund purchases, congressional disclosures indicate.
The two most recent occurred on Aug. 25, when Moore invested between $50,001 and $100,000 in the fund, and on Aug. 28, when he invested between $15,001 and $50,000, records show. (Lawmakers are only required to disclose trade values in broad ranges.)
Moore’s congressional office did not respond to NOTUS’ requests for comment this week by phone and email.
“Given uncertainty around tariffs and the general volatility of the White House, I can’t say I blame anyone for predicting economic troubles ahead,” said Dylan Hedtler-Gaudette, acting vice president of policy and government affairs nonpartisan watchdog group Project on Government Oversight.
Moore has publicly offered a sunny assessment of Trump’s economic strategies.
The congressman has, for example, supported Trump’s tariff declarations and said last month that Trump’s tax-cut policies are “going to spur the economy, which, by the way, we are already seeing happen already” — a signal that “America is back.”
But Moore’s bearish stock plays represent an apparent shift in his personal investment strategy: From early this year until mid-July, Moore was betting on a strong economy, moving hundreds of thousands of dollars into the Direxion Daily Small Cap Bull 3X Shares fund — the inverse of the bear-market fund — which made him money when the Russell 2000 index performed well. Moore has not invested in the bull-market fund since, according to congressional disclosure records.
The Russell 2000 is a broad index that generally tracks the performance of small-cap stocks.
Moore has quickly established himself as one of Congress’ more active stock traders while serving as the vice chairman of the House’s Financial Services Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations.
In June, Moore violated the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act’s disclosure provisions by failing to properly report hundreds of thousands of dollars in personal stock purchases he made immediately before or after Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariff declaration on April 2, Fortune reported.
A bipartisan coalition in Congress is pushing legislation that would ban federal lawmakers and their immediate family members from buying, selling and potentially owning individual stocks — a proposal government watchdog groups have long pushed.
Among the coalition’s reasons: Some lawmakers, including Moore, have failed to abide by the stock-trading rules enshrined in the current STOCK Act, which they deride as too weak.
“Members of Congress shouldn’t be trading stocks and other similar assets in the first place, full stop. This is true whether they’re betting against the economy, for it, or on the fortunes of individual firms and sectors,” Hedtler-Gaudette said.
This year alone, the existing STOCK Act has tripped up several lawmakers, including Republican Sen. Markwayne Mullin and Reps. Dan Meuser, Lisa McClain, Austin Scott, Neal Dunn, Scott Franklin, Brandon Gill and Moore.
Democratic Reps. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Dwight Evans, Jamie Raskin, Chellie Pingree, Shri Thanedar, George Whitesides, Ritchie Torres and Jonathan Jackson have also violated the act’s disclosure provisions.
Dozens of others violated the STOCK Act in recent years.
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This story was produced as part of a partnership between NOTUS and The Assembly.