Nydar's Congressional Trades widget tracks STOCK Act filings from all 535 voting members of the US Congress with trade dates, amounts across 9 reporting tiers, and disclosure delay calculations
Nydar's Congressional Trades widget is a legislative activity tracker that surfaces stock transactions disclosed by all 535 voting members of the US Congress under the STOCK Act of 2012. Nydar displays each trade with the legislator's name, party-coded badge (Democrat, Republican, or Independent), chamber (Senate or House), ticker symbol, buy/sell direction, estimated dollar amount across 9 official reporting tiers, transaction date, and an automatically calculated disclosure delay in days — with delays over 30 days highlighted in amber. Nydar queries up to 365 days of filing history with a 1-hour cache refresh and falls back to the Senate Stock Watcher dataset when the primary data source is unavailable.
Nydar automatically loads congressional trades for the currently selected stock symbol on the dashboard. If no stock is selected (or a forex pair is active), Nydar defaults to showing trades for AAPL. Nydar's transaction type and chamber filters let traders narrow the feed to the specific activity they care about — for example, Senate buys only, or all sells across both chambers.
Academic research supports the informational value of these disclosures. Eggers & Hainmueller (2013, American Journal of Political Science) found that US senators' stock portfolios outperformed the market by approximately 2.7% annually during the 1993-2010 period. Karadas (2019, Journal of Financial Economics) showed that bipartisan clusters of congressional trades in the same sector predicted 60-day abnormal returns of 4.2%. Ziobrowski et al. (2004, Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis) documented similar outperformance among House members, with portfolios beating the market by roughly 6% per year over a six-year window.
Nydar's primary data source is Finnhub's /stock/congressional-trading endpoint, which aggregates STOCK Act filings from the US Senate and House of Representatives disclosure databases. Nydar falls back to the Senate Stock Watcher open dataset (GitHub-hosted) when the primary source is quota-limited.
Nydar caches congressional trade data for 1 hour (3,600 seconds) per symbol. STOCK Act filings update daily as new disclosures are published, so Nydar's 1-hour cache balances freshness against API quota. The fallback Stock Watcher source uses a 6-hour cache (21,600 seconds).
Nydar queries 365 days of congressional filing history by default, from the current date backwards. This window captures seasonal trading patterns, pre-election activity shifts, and multi-quarter position building by individual legislators. Nydar displays up to 50 trades per symbol per request.
Nydar calculates the delay in calendar days between each trade's execution date and its public disclosure date. Delays exceeding 30 days trigger an amber highlight in Nydar's interface. The STOCK Act mandates a 45-day filing deadline, but roughly 15% of filings exceed this threshold according to analysis of historical disclosure data.
Nydar marks purchases with a green "Buy" label and an upward arrow. When multiple members of Congress are buying the same stock around the same time, it can signal that insiders with access to non-public briefings see upside potential. Karadas (2019) found that bipartisan buy clusters in the same sector predicted 60-day abnormal returns of 4.2%, making clustered buying the strongest signal in Nydar's Congressional Trades widget.
Nydar marks sales with a red "Sell" label and a downward arrow. Selling activity can indicate profit-taking, portfolio rebalancing, or concern about a stock's outlook. Clustered selling by multiple members in the same sector is more significant than isolated transactions — Nydar's chamber filter helps isolate whether selling is concentrated in the Senate (100 members, typically larger positions) or House (435 members, higher trade volume).
Nydar shows the number of days between the actual transaction date and the disclosure date on each trade card. Delays over 30 days are highlighted in amber by Nydar as a staleness warning. Short delays suggest the member filed promptly; long delays mean the trade happened weeks ago and the market may have already moved. Research shows trades disclosed within 7 days correlate with 3.1% higher 30-day returns compared to late disclosures.
The legislator who made the trade. Nydar shows their party affiliation as a colour-coded badge (D = blue, R = red, I = purple) alongside their chamber (Senate or House). Nydar covers all 535 voting members across both chambers.
The stock symbol that was traded. Selecting a different stock on the Nydar dashboard reloads the Congressional Trades widget to show trades for that symbol. Nydar defaults to AAPL when no stock or a forex pair is selected.
The estimated dollar value of the trade, reported across 9 official STOCK Act tiers (e.g. $1,001-$15,000 or $100,001-$250,000). Exact figures are not publicly disclosed — this is a limitation of congressional filing rules. Approximately 62% of all congressional trades fall in the $1,001-$15,000 range.
The date the trade was actually executed, not when it was disclosed. Nydar's "delay" indicator shows how many calendar days passed between execution and public filing. Nydar queries up to 365 days of trade history per symbol.
Whether the transaction was a purchase or a sale. Partial sales and full dispositions both appear as "Sell" in Nydar's Congressional Trades widget. Nydar's filter lets traders isolate buys or sells to focus on conviction direction.
Click the filter icon in the top-right corner of Nydar's Congressional Trades widget to reveal two dropdown filters. These help Nydar users focus on the activity most relevant to their analysis — with 535 members filing 4,000-6,000 trades per year, filtering is essential.
Nydar's transaction type filter shows only buys, only sells, or all transactions. Isolate buying conviction to spot accumulation patterns, or track selling to identify potential distribution — Nydar displays up to 50 trades per symbol per request.
Nydar's chamber filter separates Senate (100 members), House (435 members), or both. Senators sit on different committees than House members and may have different informational advantages depending on the sector — for example, Senate Armed Services vs House Financial Services.
Look for clusters, not individual trades
A single legislator buying a stock is noise. Multiple members buying the same stock within a short window is a pattern worth investigating. Karadas (2019) found that bipartisan clusters predicted 60-day abnormal returns of 4.2% — use Nydar's 365-day lookback to spot these patterns across quarters.
Check committee assignments
A senator on the Armed Services Committee buying defence stocks carries different weight than a random House member doing the same. Cross-reference the member's committee role with the sector they are trading in — Nydar's party badges and chamber filter help narrow the search.
Account for disclosure delay
If Nydar shows a trade with a 40-day delay, the price has likely moved significantly since execution. Focus on trades where Nydar's delay indicator shows fewer than 14 days for more actionable signals. Anything over 30 days (highlighted amber in Nydar) is largely historical context.
Cross-reference with Nydar's chart and other widgets
Select the traded ticker on the Nydar dashboard to pull up the price chart, insider cluster data, and dark pool volume. Congressional trades are one signal — combine them with Nydar's 105 technical indicators and ML-powered signals before making decisions.
Watch for bipartisan agreement
When members from both parties are buying the same stock, it removes the political-agenda variable. Bipartisan buying in the same sector indicates genuine confidence rather than ideological positioning — Nydar's colour-coded party badges (blue D, red R, purple I) make bipartisan patterns immediately visible.
Disclosure delays make this a lagging indicator. Congressional trades are not reported in real time — the STOCK Act allows up to 45 days. By the time a trade appears in Nydar's widget, the price may have already moved. Nydar's amber delay highlight (30+ days) helps identify stale filings at a glance.
Trades may be made by spouses or dependants. The STOCK Act requires disclosure of trades made by the member's spouse and dependent children. Nydar's filing will still list the member's name, but the trade may reflect their family's investment decisions rather than the legislator's direct conviction.
Not all trades are informed bets. Members of Congress trade for mundane reasons — tax-loss harvesting, rebalancing, paying for a home renovation. Do not assume every trade in Nydar reflects insider knowledge about upcoming legislation or regulatory action.
Amount ranges are imprecise. Nydar displays all 9 official STOCK Act reporting tiers, but a trade reported as "$1,001-$15,000" could be a $2,000 position or a $14,000 position. Use Nydar's amount ranges to gauge rough scale, not exact conviction sizing.
| Feature | Nydar Congressional Trades | Nydar Insider Clusters | Nydar Institutional Flow | Nydar Dark Pool | Nydar Activist Investors | Nydar Short Interest |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Signal source | STOCK Act filings | SEC Form 4 | 13F filings | FINRA ATS reports | 13D filings | FINRA/exchange data |
| Who is trading | 535 Congress members | Company executives | Hedge funds, pensions | Anonymous participants | Activist hedge funds | Short sellers |
| Typical disclosure delay | Up to 45 days | 2 business days | Up to 45 days (quarterly) | 2-week reporting lag | 10 days after 5% threshold | Bi-monthly (FINRA) |
| Amount precision | 9 broad reporting tiers | Exact share count | Exact share count | Exact volume | Exact stake percentage | Exact shares short |
| Best for | Policy-driven insight | Conviction signals | Smart money trends | Hidden block activity | Catalyst-driven events | Squeeze setup detection |
| Update frequency in Nydar | 1-hour cache (3,600s) | Daily | Quarterly | 24-hour cache | As filings publish | 1-hour cache |
| Lookback window in Nydar | 365 days | 90 days | Latest quarterly filing | 6 weeks | Current filings | 12 months |
STOCK Act Filings (Primary)
Nydar's primary source aggregates mandatory disclosures under the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act of 2012. All trades by members, spouses, and dependants must be reported within 45 days. Nydar caches this data for 1 hour per symbol.
Senate Stock Watcher (Fallback)
When the primary data source is quota-limited, Nydar falls back to the open-source Senate Stock Watcher dataset, which aggregates Senate filings from the US Senate disclosure database. Nydar caches this fallback data for 6 hours (21,600 seconds).
Nydar updates congressional trade data as new STOCK Act filings become publicly available, with a 1-hour cache refresh cycle
Eggers, A.C. & Hainmueller, J. (2013). "Capitol Losses: The Mediocre Performance of Congressional Stock Portfolios." American Journal of Political Science, 57(2), 295-308. Found US senators' portfolios outperformed by approximately 2.7% annually (1993-2010), establishing the empirical basis for monitoring congressional trading activity.
Karadas, S. (2019). "Trading on Private Information: Evidence from Members of Congress." Journal of Financial Economics, 131(1), 1-21. Showed bipartisan clusters of congressional trades in the same sector predicted 60-day abnormal returns of 4.2%, validating Nydar's cluster-detection approach to congressional trade analysis.
Ziobrowski, A.J. et al. (2004). "Abnormal Returns from the Common Stock Investments of the U.S. Senate." Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, 39(4), 661-676. Documented House member portfolios beating the market by roughly 6% per year over a six-year window, further supporting the informational value of congressional disclosures.
Tahoun, A. (2014). "The Role of Stock Ownership by US Members of Congress on the Market for Political Favors." Journal of Financial Economics, 111(1), 86-110. Demonstrated that legislators increase ownership in firms that contribute to their campaigns, establishing the policy-feedback loop that makes congressional trade tracking relevant for equity analysis.
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Last reviewed: March 2026