Donald Trump's big short: Is the president profiting off the market chaos he creates?

Unusual times demand unusual measures. Vanity Fair’s William Cohan published a mind-blowing item last week that closely examined several “chaos trades” and the linkage between Trump’s blurts and the movement of the S&P 500. So, when we look at those massive one-day declines, moving on Trump’s unpredictable shrieking, it seems as if short positions, rather than traditional investments such as those immense e-mini orders Cohan described, would be the only investments to make in accordance with bad news from Trump — and the only person who really knows what Trump might say from moment to moment is Trump. Remember: Trump moves like a gangster, and, as we learned in "The Godfather: Part II," the boss has “a lotta buffas.” Or there’s always the possibility that this is a wild coincidence, and that the one honorable thing Trump’s ever done in his life is to ignore his ability to blurt things that move the markets, whether soaring through the roof or collapsing into the basement. Given that he’s been transparently profiting off the presidency by dragging his entire motorcade to his resorts in Bedminster or Sterling or Mar-a-lago on an almost weekly basis; by hosting 500 Saudis at Trump International; by sending Air Force transports to the financially struggling airfield closest to his Turnberry golf resort in Scotland and ordering the airmen to stay overnight at the resort; by announcing that next year’s G7 would he held at Trump Doral in Miami, and all the rest of it, does he really seem like a man who’s loath to profiteer off his presidency?