What If You Copied Congress?
Pick a member of Congress, a party or everyone. We put the same amount into every stock they reported buying, sell when they sold (or keep it if they still hold it), and compare the result with putting the same money into the S&P 500.
at prices of Oct 2 How we calculate this
Loading trades…
How it works
For every stock purchase a member reported under the STOCK Act, we take the stock's weekly price on the day you would have bought and the price when the member later reported selling it, or the latest weekly price if they have not sold. The S&P 500 (the SPY fund) is measured over exactly the same weeks, so the comparison is fair. Each trade gets the same amount, because the reports only give ranges such as $1,001 to $15,000.
"The day the trade was reported" is the realistic choice: members have up to 45 days to report, and you can only copy a trade once it is public. Dividends, trading costs and taxes are left out, and trades that cross a likely stock split are skipped. Past results do not predict future ones, and this is not advice.
Examples
- In 2020 and 2021, several well-known members bought big technology stocks that kept rising, so copying them on the trade date looks great. Copy them on the report date instead and part of the gain is often already gone.
- Some members trade rarely and badly; with only a handful of trades, one lucky or unlucky stock decides the whole result.
About this page
A free calculator. Everything is worked out in your browser; nothing you type is sent anywhere.
How to read it
- Rate
- The yearly percentage your money grows or costs.
- Compounding
- Earning returns on earlier returns, which makes growth speed up over time.
A real example
$1,000 that grows 7% a year becomes about $7,612 after 30 years, because each year's growth is added before the next year's is counted.
Explain it like I'm 13
If you plant one apple seed and each tree gives you seeds to plant next year, the orchard grows faster every year. A calculator shows how fast.
Data from public SEC filings and congressional reports. Information, not investment advice. Check every number against the filing linked on the page.