Which Stocks Are In The Dow 30? Why Trump May Have An Effect On The Market Index

As the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJI) toppled its 20,000-point milestone Wednesday, President Donald Trump’s adviser Kellyanne Conway appeared to attribute the stock market indicator’s rise to the new leader’s many executive orders.

While that claim is difficult to verify, the compositions of the Dow, Trump’s cabinet and the president’s investment portfolio may have something to do with the rise.

Among the 30 stocks that make up the Dow Jones Industrial Average, Trump’s cabinet includes former leaders of two firms, and his choice to head the Federal Communications Commission is a former lawyer for one of the companies.

One company aiding the Dow 30’s surge, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS), has particularly strong representation within Trump’s cabinet.

Steven Mnuchin, who spent 17 years at the firm, completed his Senate Finance Committee hearing Jan. 19 and still awaited confirmation for the position of Treasury Secretary as of Wednesday afternoon. Despite his failure to disclose nearly $100 million in assets to government ethics officials, Mnuchin is largely expected to be confirmed by the majority-Republican committee.

Other Goldman alums include the investment bank’s former president, Gary Cohn, who will chair Trump’s National Economic Council, Anthony Scaramucci, who once served as the bank’s vice president of private wealth management and was named an assistant to Trump in January, and former acquisitions banker Steven Bannon, the White House’s chief strategist, who received heightened attention for leading the white nationalist web site, Breitbart News.

ExxonMobil Corp. (XOM), another stock included in the Dow 30, has a former chief executive officer in the Trump administration. In fact, Rex Tillerson, who retired from his decade-long post as CEO at the end of 2016 and won approval for Secretary of State from the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations Tuesday, has never worked anywhere else in his life.

Trump also chose Ajit Pai, a former lawyer for the Dow 30 company Verizon Communications Inc. (VZ), to lead the FCC Monday.

The ties, however, go beyond his administration. Despite Trump’s September claim on CNBC that he doesn’t invest in the stock market, a May financial disclosure document shows he had stakes in nearly all of the 30 companies, including Goldman and Exxon. While a spokesperson for Trump announced in December that he divested of these shares, a true picture of his wealth has not become available to the public, as Trump has refused to release his tax returns.