Trump posts $175 million in bail

The bail is necessary to prevent authorities in New York from seizing the former president’s real estate pending the appeal against the multimillion-dollar verdict in a fraud case.

Donald Trump yesterday posted a $175 million bond at the New York court. This deposit is necessary to prevent New York prosecutor Letitia James from seizing the former president’s assets, such as the Trump Tower skyscraper in New York.

A judge sentenced Trump to a $355 million fine in February for years of fraud in the valuation of his real estate projects. The 92-page ruling by Judge Arthur Engoron also determined that Trump has owed interest since March 4, 2019 – the day James started her investigation. At the time of the verdict, it was almost $100 million.

Normally, after conviction, 120 percent of the amount owed must be posted as bond, pending the appeal. A major problem for the former president, since the majority of Trump’s assets are tied up in his real estate portfolio and therefore cannot be quickly converted into cash. Trump’s majority stake in the Trump Media & Technology holding company

is worth billions on paper – despite minimal turnover and significant losses published yesterday – but cannot be cashed for six months after the IPO last week.

However, an appeals court in New York early last week reduced that amount to $175 million. An amount that was deposited yesterday, in cash. Not by Trump himself, but by Californian billionaire Don Hankey. To this end, he used his company Knight Specialty Insurance, a specialist in providing sureties at a hefty commission.

“I heard they were looking for someone, and this is exactly what Knight does,” Hankey said in a response to the Bloomberg news agency. ‘We have the liquidity and I am happy to make it available.’

Hankey emphasizes that it is purely ‘business’, although he has voted for Trump in the past. The business magazine Forbes describes Hankey as the ‘discreet king of subprime car loans’. Hankey mainly collected his fortune, estimated at more than 7 billion dollars, through Westlake Financial, which provides loans through 30,000 car dealers to customers without (or with a poor) credit score.