Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump gives two thumbs up to the crowd during the evening … [+]
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Even amid registration glitches and a lengthy waitlist, President Trump’s new Truth Social app received 170,000 downloads in its first day available, according to data from AppTopia, a site that tracks the app ecosytem.
The former president’s new company, Trump Media & Technology Group, launched the app late Sunday evening — just ahead of the President’s Day holiday. But it’s unclear whether any users have made it onto the app. Some reported problems registering accounts on Monday and then encountering a notification that they were thousands of places behind in a queue to access the app. For now, it is only available as an Apple app and ranked as high as No. 1 on Apple’s download chart Monday.
The downloads Trump’s app received far outstrip what competing apps see on an average day. TMTG joins a crowded field of other companies hoping to do the same thing: give a new home to conservatives and others angry at existing social networks like Twitter and Facebook. For perspective, Parler has averaged only about 1,500 downloads per day on Apple over the last month, while Rumble (10,600) and Gettr (12,050) have done slightly better, according to AppTopia data.
Interest in Trump’s plans have bled over the public markets. Shares for the publicly traded shell company that Trump intends to turn into TMTG through a SPAC rose sharply in pre-market trading. The stock is up over 20% to 101.32, a level that would mark an all-time high for the shares and a barometer of continued investor interest in the president’s plan to build a social media company to challenge existing ones like Twitter and Facebook.
Trump, of course, used both those platforms adeptly during his presidency before they banned him after the Jan. 6 riots. In October, he announced his intention to start a competiting service and take it public through a SPAC, a new method of listing a public company that has led to volatile results over the last year. TMTG joins a crowded field of other apps hoping to win over conservatives, including Parler, Rumble and Gettr. In December, TMTG said then Rep. Devin Nunes, a longtime Trump supporter, would leave office to become the company’s CEO.
