Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Paul Pelosi, sold his stock in NVIDIA on Tuesday before Congress passed the “CHIPS-plus” bill.
Paul sold $5 million worth of NVIDIA stock, or 25,000 shares, according to a congressional financial disclosure filed by the speaker. The disclosure states that Paul incurred a total loss of $341,365 by selling the shares.
The financial loss disclosure is noteworthy because Nancy, a Democrat from California, rarely discloses detailed information about her husband’s stock option trades. Members of Congress are only obligated to report the values of their trades in broad ranges.
The “questionable” trade was made one day before Congress passed the $54 billion bill. The CHIPS-plus bill or Chips and Science Act is aimed to boost US chip manufacturing and encourage competition with China.
“Mr. Pelosi bought options to buy stock in this company more than a year ago and exercised them on June 17, 2022,” Drew Hammill, deputy chief of staff for the House speaker told the media.
“As always, he does not discuss these matters with the Speaker until trades have been made and required disclosures must be prepared and filed,” he added.
“Mr. Pelosi decided to sell the shares at a loss rather than allow the misinformation in the press regarding this trade to continue,” said Hammill.
The couple has formerly faced significant criticism from the right about the timing of Paul’s NVIDIA investments.
It was previously reported that Paul exercised 200 call options, or 20,000 shares, of NVIDIA worth between $1 million and $5 million on June 17, 2022, at a strike price of $100.
NVIDIA, a producer of graphics processing units and developer of integrated circuits, was one of many companies to sign an open letter in June asking leaders of Congress to pass the bill.
Last week, Nancy denied that her venture capitalist husband traded stocks using the information she provided.
The insights about the trades also arise at a time when Congress is debating whether its members and their spouses should be allowed to buy, sell, and hold individual stocks at all.
Pelosi herself originally opposed the idea, saying: “We are a free market economy. They should be able to participate in that.”
She ultimately backtracked from her statement after backlash from members of Congress on both sides of the aisle and the general public, allowing bipartisan groups of lawmakers to draft bills and hold a public hearing.
