Former US President Donald Trump’s net worth has grown exponentially this month, increasing from under $4 billion at the start of October to $8 billion Tuesday. According to Forbes‘ real-time billionaires tracker, Mr Trump is now the 357th-wealthiest person in the world. His fortune swelled as his social media company’s shares reached their highest level since June 5. Trump Media & Technology Group closed up nearly 9% on Tuesday at $51.51.

Trump Media’s share increase does not appear to be linked to the company’s financial performance; instead, it has moved with the odds of Mr Trump winning the election, according to Forbes. 

Notably, most polls find the Republican leader and Vice President Kamala Harris virtually tied across the seven battleground states expected to determine the outcome of the election, and major election forecasts suggest the race is a tossup.

According to the CNN poll, in Arizona, Ms Harris has 48% support among likely voters, while Trump has 47%. In Nevada, Mr Trump leads slightly with 48%, compared to 47%  for Ms Harris. These narrow margins are within the poll’s margin of error, indicating no clear frontrunner in either state.

According to the latest presidential forecast by The Hill, Mr Trump bests Ms Harris with the former having 54% support and the latter 46%. The former President holds a narrow lead in five of six swing states – Nevada, Arizona, Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin – while Ms Harris has a slight edge in Michigan. However, the gap remains within the typical polling error, as reported by The Hill. 

While national polls are a useful guide as to how popular a candidate is across the whole country, they’re not the best way to predict the election result. Polls are just designed to broadly explain how the public feels about a candidate or an issue, not predict the result of an election. 

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Meanwhile, Kamala Harris’ net worth, along with her husband Doug Emhoff, currently stands at $8 million, according to Forbes estimates published in May this year. “That’s roughly 20 times the median net worth of Americans in their age bracket,” the report stated.

According to the outlet, Ms Harris had gotten “richer” since becoming the US vice president in 2021 (net worth was $7 million in 2021). However, replacing US President Joe Biden in the presidential race didn’t impact Harris’ bank account.