The financial world has a way of seeming rigged for an elite group—i.e., those who walk the halls of power. As regular investors try to make consistent returns, the occasional politician seems to pick stocks with seeming clairvoyance, making huge profits. The only catch is that these politicians can influence the very legislation that impacts markets, giving them an advantage. If you’ve ever wondered how politicians seem to beat the regular investor so often, you’re among them.
This unequal advantage inevitably leads to the question: Is it possible for a typical trader to reproduce their success? That is precisely what we wanted to discover with this experiment.
Instead of sitting around doing nothing, I decided to do something. For 30 days, I copied politician’s trades for a month, no analysis, no second-guessing. Whenever a top-performing politician made a trade, I copied it dollar for dollar. The rules were simple: copy the top politicians, copy their trades verbatim, and see what happens. Would this method result in enormous profits—or was I throwing $10,000 down the drain?
By immersing myself in public revelations, using live trade monitoring software, and employing a very tight filtering approach, I built a system that enabled me to follow a few of the most “successful” political traders. The approach was high-risk, provocative, and maybe genius.
Why Politicians Are Taking Over the Market
Congress members are required by law to report their financial transactions under the STOCK Act. But here’s the catch: they’re not required to report them immediately. To be honest, some of them don’t even report them for up to 45 days and even more in some instances—granting them a massive time advantage over the public.
But the jaw-dropping part isn’t the timing—its raw profitability. For instance, Nancy Pelosi’s well-timed sale of Nvidia prior to a massive government contract announcement returned a 637% profit. Coincidence? Most wouldn’t think so.
It’s this type of inside information that gives politicians an undisputable advantage on the stock market.
My Rules for the Experiment
Since choosing to test the theory, I had clearly set rules:
- Trade with a $10,000 account.
- Monitor only high-performing politicians with high historical winning rates.
- Record entries on exchanges within 30 days from a disclosed reporting.
- No personal judgment. Simply replicate every trade verbatim.
Whether a senator shorted Tesla or a congresswoman bought Nvidia, I did the same.
If they bought a random toaster company, so did I.
Identifying the Best Political Traders
To find out who the politicians actually were consistently beating, I used AI to obtain a list of the top performers in Congress. I ranked them by profitability and win rate over the last 12 months.
The names that came up were not unexpected—politicians who had a track record of having amazing stock-picking skills. This provided me with a solid foundation for tracking and replicating trades from only the top performers in the political investing world.
How I Tracked Their Trades in Real Time
Having created my list of target politicians, I needed a means of tracking their disclosures in near real time. A quick web search led me to a website publishing congressional trades in near real time.
By entering a politician’s name, I could see:
- The company they traded
- The sum invested
- The transaction date
- The filing date
This device was the center of the entire experiment.
The Day-to-Day Lifestyle: Imitating the Elites
Each day, I had the same routine:
- Wake up a little before market open.
- Search for recent talks by the top 10 politicians
- Place them into an Excel document
- Go into each role confidently
I never looked at charts, screened fundamentals, or doubted each step. If a politician made the leap, then I leaped too.
In order to make the trades better quality, I also used a one-month filing filter—only the last 30 days of trades were used. Older ones were not considered to prevent entering too late.
The Largest Challenge: Prolonged Trade
Even with my filtering system, there was one big hurdle: the lag in disclosure. Not all politicians disclose in a timely manner. Some take weeks, allowing them plenty of time to profit from a move before others notice.
This delay had me coming in behind the catalyst—at times at the peak. It’s as if trying to board a train that has already passed halfway to its destination.
Yet, most of the trades reported in a matter of days were remarkably profitable, and this hope was created that the strategy would work.
A Copy Trading Twist
Midway through the experiment, I came across another idea—copy trading platforms. These platforms allow you to automatically copy high win ratio successful traders.
For instance, Hanker Trade provides a straightforward answer: sort by performance, select the best trader, and press copy. When they win, you win.
While not the purpose of this test, it is a great alternative for those who desire a hands-free trading system, especially if role-playing politicians is too time-consuming or outdated.
The Experiment Continues
After the initial month, the results were sufficient to make this a full trading series. I will keep on tracking politicians, refreshing results, and refining the strategy.
To keep it open and allow others to follow along, I even began a free email newsletter. Subscribers receive real-time notifications on every politician trade I copy—no gatekeeping, no hype.
Final Thoughts: Should You Copy Politicians?
Hence, does “I copied politician’s trades for a month” translate to wealth?
Not quite.
While some trades have performed very well, the lag in disclosure remains a huge hurdle that has yet to be overcome. But with good filtering, regular monitoring, and emotional management, you can profit from surfing on the back of political moves—specifically those of top-performing legislators.
The outcomes so far are promising, and the scheme can further be rationalized by:
- Same-week disclosure prioritization
- Avoiding thinly traded stocks
- Mixing trades with technical validation
Conclusion
This experiment started out as a joke—a wild notion to determine whether or not it would be possible to clone politicians. But lo and behold, there is possibly some honest value in the ridiculousness. Even though there are ethical issues with the system in general, ordinary traders may be able to level the playing field by simply watching those in power.
Whether genius or insanity, one thing is certain: replicating politicians may not only be profitable—it might be the future retail trading skill frontier.
Want to see the final results? Catch us next time for the next installment of this ongoing series.