Scott Besant, the billionaire hedge fund manager who is President-elect Donald J. Trump Elected to his Treasury Secretaryship.Plans to divest dozens of funds, trusts and investments to prepare to become the nation’s top economic policymaker.
Those plans were released on Saturday along with the publication of an ethics agreement and financial disclosures Mr Besant submitted ahead of his Senate confirmation hearing next Thursday.
The documents show the extent of Mr Besant’s wealth, with assets and investments worth more than $700 million. Mr. Besant was Formerly a top investor for billionaire liberal philanthropist George Soros. And recently became a major Republican donor and adviser to Mr. Trump.
If confirmed as Treasury secretary, Mr. Besant, 62, would advance Mr. Trump’s economic agenda of cutting taxes, rolling back regulations and imposing tariffs as he renegotiates trade deals. want He will also play a central role in the Trump administration’s acceptance of cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin.
Although Mr. Trump won the election by appealing to working-class voters worried about high prices, he Wealthy Wall Street investors Like Mr. Besant and Howard Litnick, the billionaire banker he tapped to become Commerce secretary to lead his economic team. Another billionaire, Linda McMahon, has been tapped as secretary of education, and Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, is leading a nongovernmental agency called the Department of Government Efficiency.
In a letter to the Treasury Department’s ethics office, Mr. Besant outlined steps he would take to “avoid any real or apparent conflict of interest.
Mr. Bessent said he would close Key Square Capital Management, the investment firm he founded, and resign from his Bessent-Freeman Family Foundation and Rockefeller University, where he served on the investment committee. Has been the chairman.
Financial disclosure forms, which provide ranges of the value of his assets, show that Mr. Bessant owns up to $25 million in farmland in North Dakota, which generates income from soybean and corn production. . He also owns a property in the Bahamas worth $25 million. Last November, Mr. Besant put up his historic pink mansion in Charleston, S.C. On the market for $22.5 million.
Mr. Besant is selling several investments that could raise potential conflicts of interest, including a bitcoin exchange-traded fund. An account that trades the Chinese currency Renminbi; And his stake in All Seasons, a conservative publisher. It also has a margin loan, or line of credit, with Goldman Sachs of more than $50 million.
As an investor, Mr. Besant has long raced the rising dollar and bet against the renminbi, or “shorted,” according to a person familiar with Mr. Besant’s strategy, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss his portfolio. . Mr. Besant gained notoriety in the 1990s by betting against the British pound and making his firm, Soros Fund Management, $1 billion. It also made a high-profile bet against the Japanese yen.
Mr. Besant, who will oversee the U.S. Treasury market, has more than $100 million in Treasury bills.
Cabinet officials must segregate certain holdings and investments to avoid potential conflicts of interest. While this can be a difficult process, it has some potential tax benefits.
gave The Tax Code contains a provision. which allows securities to be sold and the capital gains tax on such sale is deferred if the entire proceeds are used to purchase treasury securities and certain money market funds. Tax is deferred until the securities or money market funds are sold.
Even when following ethics guidelines, questions about conflicts of interest may still arise.
Mr Trump’s Treasury secretary during his first term, Steven Mnuchin, parted ways with his Hollywood film production company after joining the administration. However, as he negotiates a trade deal with China in 2018 — a key market for the U.S. film industry — ethics watchdogs raised questions about whether there were conflicts between Mr. Mnuchin. Because he sold his interest in the company to his wife.
Mr. Besant was elected to the Treasury after one. Infighting among Mr. Trump’s aides at work. Mr. Lutnick, co-chairman of Mr. Trump’s transition team and chief executive of Cantor Fitzgerald, made a late effort to secure the Treasury secretary role for himself before Mr. Trump chose him as commerce secretary.
During the fight, which became public, Mr. Besant’s critics circulated documents disparaging his performance as a hedge fund manager.
Mr. Besant’s most recent hedge fund, Key Square Capital, Launched in 2016 with much fanfare.It has accumulated $4.5 billion in investor money, including $2 billion from Mr. Soros, but now manages very little. A fund he ran in the early 2000s had similar underperformance.