By Catherine Dunn

President Donald Trump's investment portfolio actively traded UnitedHealth Group as the stock was whipsawed by a federal policy proposal on Medicare rates earlier this year.

The disclosure, released last week by the U.S. Office of Government Ethics, lists more than 3,600 stock trades spanning a range of companies and industries during the first three months of the year.

Trades by Trump's money managers in UnitedHealth are notable because it's one of the largest providers of Medicare Advantage health plans for seniors, and it's subject to government oversight and rate setting in the federal Medicare program.

The White House referred Barron's to the Trump Organization for comment.

In a statement, the Trump Organization said the president's investment holdings are held exclusively in accounts managed by "independent, third party financial institutions."

The statement added that investments are made through "automated, model-based portfolios and direct indexing strategies," and that "neither President Trump, his family, nor The Trump Organization has any role in selecting, directing, approving, influencing or soliciting specific investments. They receive no advance notice of trades, cannot alter or override the managers' strategies or models, and provide no input regarding investment decisions or portfolio operations."

The structure was designed to maintain a clear separation between President Trump and third-party investment managers, and to "avoid even the appearance of any conflict of interest," the statement added.

The disclosures indicate the president's portfolio sold shares worth up to $5 million of UnitedHealth two weeks after the stock lost 20%, following a Jan. 26 payment proposal from the federal Medicare agency.

Later in February and March, Trump's portfolio made a set of purchases. Those bets would have paid off handsomely as UnitedHealth rallied after federal officials revised the 2027 payment rate higher in April.

The purchases during February and March were in position to gain from UnitedHealth's 9% one-day stock pop that followed April 6 news from the Medicare agency. Federal officials ultimately gave insurers an average payment increase of 2.48% for next year, instead of the 0.09% in the January proposal.

In total, Trump's portfolio sold between $1.03 million and $5.13 million worth of UnitedHealth stock, and purchased between $250,000 and $675,000 worth of the shares from January through March.

Two of the purchases, on Jan. 12 and Jan. 23, worth up to $265,000, would have lost money on the Jan. 26 rate proposal news, when UnitedHealth shares fell 20% in a day.

As UnitedHealth stock continued to trade lower than its January high, Trump's managers made nine buys worth up to $410,000 between Feb. 23 and March 23. The portfolio also sold up to $65,000 worth of shares on March 26 and March 27, the last UNH trades reported in the disclosure.

The president's portfolio traded other health insurance stocks impacted by federal Medicare policy and other regulatory matters.

The portfolio sold up to $330,000 in Humana stock in February, before purchasing up to $130,000 worth of shares in March. That same month, Trump's portfolio also bought up to $15,000 of shares in Aetna parent CVS Health.

Another trade was a sale of shares in Elevance Health, on March 17 and March 18, worth between $265,000 and $550,000. Elevance was notified in February of possible sanctions from the Medicare agency over alleged noncompliance with data submission requirements. The stock subsequently fell more than 8%.

On March 18, Elevance said in a press release that it had received an interim response from the agency, continued to have a "productive dialogue" to address data reporting matters, and "stands firmly behind the compliance" of its Medicare Advantage program.

The level of stock market activity for a sitting president is "extremely unusual," said University of Minnesota law professor Richard Painter, a former chief ethics lawyer for the White House during the George W. Bush administration.

"No president that I know of has ever had this type of extensive trading in securities while he's in office," Painter said. "I've never seen anything like this before."

In contrast to all other members of the executive branch, the federal criminal conflict of interest statute doesn't apply to the president and vice president, nor to members of Congress, Painter said. Painter has advocated for Congress to change that law. In his view, stock trading sets up a potential conflict with official duties.

Trump's son Eric said on X that "all of our assets are invested in a blind trust by the largest financial institutions in broad market indexes. To suggest that individual stocks are being bought or sold, at the discretion of any member of the Trump family, would be a lie and blatantly false."

Painter said that in a "blind trust," the president wouldn't know what securities were being bought or sold on his behalf. In this instance, "It's right there on the form what he owns."

Write to Catherine Dunn at catherine.dunn@dowjones.com

This content was created by Barron's, which is operated by Dow Jones & Co. Barron's is published independently from Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

May 19, 2026 15:50 ET (19:50 GMT)

Copyright (c) 2026 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.