Courtesy of Pam Martens.
Donald Trump, Republican Presidential Candidate
As with the current occupant of the White House, the narrative of fierce independence from Wall Street during the campaign season typically fails under deeper scrutiny. In 2008 we pulled back the curtain on Obama’s claim that he wasn’t taking money from Wall Street lobbyists and found quite a different set of facts. Today, the claim that Donald Trump is not connected to Wall Street and is actually frightening the mega banks is also totally dislodged from the facts on the ground.
Five days ago, the Washington Post ran an article that was headlined “Why the rise of Donald Trump has even Wall Street worried.” It quoted an anonymous source who stated that “I can’t find connective tissue between the financial sector and Trump.”
Similarly, eight days ago the Wall Street Journal reported that Trump’s creditors “mostly are small firms, from New Jersey-based Amboy Bank to specialized real-estate firm Ladder Capital Finance LLC.” The article noted that Deutsche Bank, a German bank, “is the only bank with a big Wall Street presence that continues to lend to him.”
On July 15 of last year, Donald Trump filed a 92-page financial disclosure report with the Federal Election Commission. (He has thus far refused to disclose his IRS tax returns, stating that he is being audited.) On page 47 of his disclosure document, Trumps lists to whom his businesses owe money. Ladder Capital is listed as holding a mortgage of more than $50 million. With no dollar range shown, as is typical, it could be $50 million or $250 million for all we know. Ladder Capital is also listed as holding an additional mortgage on another property in the range of $5 million to $25 million.
The opportunity to find out what Ladder Capital is all about came on February 6, 2014 when the company began trading publicly on the New York Stock Exchange after raising $225 million in an Initial Public Offering (IPO). An IPO requires the public filing of a detailed prospectus with the SEC, which can shed a great deal of light into otherwise dark corners.
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