Congress Buys

Every Monday this strategy ranks every listed company by how many separate purchase filings members of the U.S. Congress published about it in the preceding 90 calendar days, and holds the top ten in equal weights. Both chambers count, each through its own register. A company that enters the ranking is bought on the next trading day; one that drops out is sold. A company that stays in the ranking is left alone — it is not bought again. The ranking is measured on publication dates only: a filing counts from the day its register published it, never from the day the trade was made.

It starts at USD 100,000 on Apr 7, 2025 — the day the rule first had something to act on — and the S&P 500 stands next to it from the same amount on the same day. Each trade costs 0.1% one way, 0.2% round trip.

What it does not do

• It counts a filing, not a chamber. House and Senate filings weigh exactly the same here, even though the two registers differ: a Senate filing carries no notification date and a scanned paper filing carries no lines at all, so it cannot enter the ranking either way.
• It is long-only. There is no short leg and no leverage; a company leaving the ranking is sold, never sold short.
• Reported size ranks, it does not weight. The form gives a bracket and not an amount, so a larger reported purchase can push a company into the ten — but inside the ten every position is the same size.
• It follows publications, not trades. A member may report a purchase up to 45 days after making it, and this strategy only ever acts on what was already public.

Every figure here is a calculation over filed forms, made afterwards, under assumptions that are written down. A backtest says what a rule would have produced on filings that were already public. The definitions are on the methodology page.