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Billionaire GOP Donor Owned Shares in Trump Media Merger Partner: NYT

Billionaire Jeff Yass’ firm is a big investor in ByteDance.

A billionaire GOP megadonor who is a significant investor in TikTok’s parent company was also the biggest institutional shareholder of the shell company that merged with Donald Trump’s social media business, according to a report. Jeff Yass’ Susquehanna International Group (SIG) owned about 2 percent of Digital World Acquisition Corp., the company that merged with Trump Media & Technology Group on Friday, a December regulatory filing shows, The New York Times reports. It’s not clear if SIG—a big investor in ByteDance, the Chinese company that owns TikTok—still owns the shares in Digital World. “Susquehanna is a market maker and has zero economic interest in Trump Media,” the company told the Times. “The firm’s long position is offset by short positions of the same size.” A source close to Trump’s presidential campaign said Yass is expected to make a big donation to a group backing the former president’s re-election effort, while Yass told the newspaper through a spokesperson that he’s never donated to Trump and has no plans to do so.