Susan Collins Insider Trading Claims: What Her Stock Trades Show

Susan Collins insider trading claims often follow her long Senate career and swing-vote profile. We do not claim she broke the law. Public STOCK Act data shows something quieter than the headlines: disclosed buys made money but trailed the S&P 500, and her trade timing sits below a coin flip.

The short answer

Question	What our data shows
Did her reported buys beat the market?	No. About 136% vs about 205% for the S&P 500 on the same dates
Did she pick unusually good days to trade?	No. About 46% overall (50% is pure luck)

So filings do not show a standout investor profile on either returns or timing.

Did her buys beat the market?

Here's how we measure it. We take the stock purchases Collins disclosed, estimate how those buys did, and compare that to buying the S&P 500 (via SPY, a fund that tracks the index) with the same money on the same days.

On 25 purchases we could price since mid-2016, Collins's disclosed buys returned about 136%. The matched S&P 500 path returned about 205%. Absolute gains were real—but she still lagged the index in this priced-buy window.

Names in her disclosed activity include PYPL, SYK, HOLX, TSCO, AMZN, and COP. Note the sample of priced buys is smaller than for the busiest House traders, even though her overall disclosure count is large (603 trades in our database)—many filings may be sales or hard to price cleanly.

Susan Collins disclosed stock buy returns vs matched S&P 500 purchases

One caveat: this is only disclosed stock purchases we could price—not her full net worth.

Did she time the market?

"Timing" asks: when Collins bought or sold a stock, was that a better day than a random day for that same stock?

Think of 50% as a coin flip.

Measure	Score	vs 50% luck
Overall	46%	−4 points
Buys	40%	−10 points
Sells	52%	+2 points

We scored 67 trades across 50 stocks (medium confidence).
Window: last 10 years.

46% overall is modestly below chance. Buy timing at 40% is the weak side of the split. Headlines that imply perfect Senate timing are not supported here.

Susan Collins stock trade timing vs random luck on the same stocks

Putting both together

Market returns on buys: trailed the S&P 500.
Trade timing: below a coin flip overall.

Seniority and national fame are not the same as market-beating disclosed buys. Neither lagging returns nor below-average timing proves or disproves insider trading—they only show what is in the public filings.

Track this on Politician Stock Tracker

See Collins's live numbers on Politician Stock Tracker at her Susan Collins stock tracker page.

Politician Stock Tracker — congressional stock trade data

Disclaimer

Data compiled from public STOCK Act financial disclosure filings. Return and timing figures use disclosed purchase ranges and statistical models; they are not audited portfolio statements or legal findings. This article does not allege insider trading. Not legal or investment advice.