A questionable theory about 'shady' stock trades and Trump reveals how desperate people are for news they want to hear

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A Vanity Fair story alleged to show shady trading in the stock futures market that happened just before major headlines involving President Donald Trump's trade war with China.

By linking supposedly shady trades to Trump, the story gained widespread attention.

But the claims about the trades made in the story make little sense and appear to be typical futures trading activity.

The virality of the story shows how people are willing to believe flimsy claims if they confirm they priors, especially when it comes to Trump.

George Pearkes is the global macro strategist for Bespoke Investment Group.

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This week Vanity Fair readers were treated to a claim that by simply reading the futures tape they could see clear evidence of financial wrongdoing by someone connected to the Trump administration. Those claims are ridiculous and suckered in readers desperate to have their assumptions about wrongdoing by Trump administration officials confirmed.

The claims of 'shady trades' make no sense

In the article, William D. Cohan identifies four distinct instances where late-session futures trades turned out to be very profitable for whoever put them on.See the rest of the story at Business InsiderNOW WATCH: Most hurricanes that hit the US and Caribbean islands come from the same exact spot in the worldSee Also:Companies like Walmart and SoulCycle are facing more boycotts than ever in the Trump era, but many are still clueless in how to respondThese attacks are not wake-up calls. These are signs of the systemic failure of Germany s open society.Impeaching Trump needs to be the first battle in a war against American corruption

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