(Reuters) – Shares of Digital World Acquisition Corp, the blank-check company behind former U.S. President Donald Trump’s new social media venture, Truth Social, surged nearly 30% in premarket trading on Tuesday as the app climbed the charts after its debut on Apple’s App Store.
Truth Social was launched on Sunday, potentially marking Trump’s return to social media after he was banned from Twitter Inc, Facebook and Google following an attack on the U.S. Capitol by his supporters last year.
Truth Social was the top free available app on the App Store on Tuesday.
Digital World’s shares jumped 26% to $106.44 and were on track to open at levels last seen in October, days after Digital World announced a deal to publicly list Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG), the venture behind Truth Social.
Other stocks linked to Trump also advanced. Phunware, hired by Trump’s 2020 Presidential re-election campaign to build a phone app, climbed 17.9%. SPAC CF Acquisition Corp VI, which is taking video platform Rumble Inc public, added 5.4%.
Blank-check firm Benessere Capital, a shell company run by DWAC CEO and former investment banker Patrick Orlando, was up 0.3%.
Digital World was among the most actively traded U.S. stocks before the opening bell, and trended high on investor-focused social media site stocktwits.com, indicating interest from retail traders.
(Reporting by Medha Singh in Bengaluru; Editing by Saumyadeb Chakrabarty)
