| In 2024, for example, the S&P 500 turned in a stellar 24.7% gain. Yet more than 20 members of Congress nearly doubled that return - and in some cases, tripled it. Take Rep. David Rouzer (R-NC). His portfolio gained 149%, fueled by large tech bets, especially Nvidia. Or Rep. Brian Higgins (D-NY). His reported return for 2023? A jaw-dropping 238.9%. That's nearly 10X what the S&P delivered that year. (Disclosures suggest some trades were made within days of House hearings on pharmaceutical pricing and approval timelines.) Rep. Morgan McGarvey (D-KY) earned around 100% in 2024. Notable holdings include CrowdStrike, UiPath, and small cap software firms. His trades cluster around dates of House Oversight and Government Reform Committee activity. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL) also doubled her money in 2024. Key moves include aggressive trades in cybersecurity, cloud computing, and green energy names ahead of federal funding announcements. Many of her top trades were made shortly before legislative discussions around energy subsidies and cybersecurity modernization. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) was Chair of the Senate Finance Committee last year. He earned over 90% in 2024. Key trades included Amazon, Apple, Salesforce - all in sectors influenced by tax and regulatory policy (Wyden's proximity to legislative tax policy raises questions about potential informational advantages on corporate tax initiatives.) Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's household investments surged 71% in 2024. Well-timed allocations to names like Palo Alto Networks, Nvidia, and Broadcom helped power those gains. Let's be clear: these are not outliers. They're becoming the norm among the most active members of Congress. While the average retail investor navigates earnings reports, Fed signals, and market volatility, lawmakers - who sit on committees that can move entire sectors - continue to trade individual stocks with astonishing timing and success. According to financial disclosures, fewer than 5% of Congress members abstain from owning stocks altogether. Most are in the market. Some are deeply active. For example, Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) made 526 trades in 2024 alone, totaling more than $91 million in volume. Timing is everything. In April 2025, as President Trump's tariff announcements sent markets into a tailspin, over a dozen House members and their immediate family members executed more than 700 trades. Just days - sometimes hours - before or after key policy announcements. Bottom line: When sitting lawmakers beat the S&P 500 by 3X, 5X, even 10X... it's not just impressive. It's wildly profitable. And while retail investors are encouraged to "do their homework," some in Congress are simply writing the rules - and trading ahead of them. That provides an unfair edge. And investors across the country are taking notice. However, it may surprise you that this is not illegal. Since 2022, bipartisan bills have been introduced to ban individual stock trading by lawmakers. None have made it to the floor. The concern is straightforward: lawmakers have access to non-public information and influence over industries. Combine the two, and you have a structural advantage no private investor can match. Just as corporate insiders have access to material, non-public information that gives them an unfair advantage when they go into the market to trade their own company's shares, political insiders have access to pending legislation that may positively or negatively affect individual companies, certain sectors, or the entire market. Yet individual investors can mirror congressional trades and outperform the market too. All they have to do is follow the filings, piggyback the trades, and ride the wave. Yes, the drumbeat for reform is getting louder. But the window is still open - for now. In The Insider Alert - a successful trading service I've researched and published for more than two decades - I now track stock purchases by political insiders as well as corporate insiders. Find my special presentation on the matter here. Good investing, Alex | 
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