Donald Trump Offers Stock Market Advice: ‘You Are Better Off Holding’

Donald J. Trump, who is always happy to opine on matters of finance, said he possessed the prescience to unload much of his investment portfolio before the stock market took a dive in the past week.

For those with less foresight, he has this advice: Hold your stocks, don’t sell them.

“People have taken a big hit,” he said in an interview on Monday. But, he added, “You are better off holding.”

Mr. Trump’s logic is that it would be a cruel fate for investors who have already lost money in the latest market gyrations to sell off stocks only to watch the market rebound, as it historically does.

“I’d hate to see it come back and they end up with the short end of both deals,” he said.

“It’s a tough story,” Mr. Trump said.

The time to sell, he added, was around a month ago. “I would have said sell, if you asked me this question three or four weeks ago.”

The real estate developer said he has never concentrated much of his wealth in stocks, a fact confirmed by the personal financial disclosures he filed as a presidential candidate in July.

With stocks, he said: “You are so much in the hands of other people. You are in the hands of government and people who run companies.”

Mr. Trump’s July disclosure revealed a wide range of stock investments in companies like Apple, Bristol-Myers Squibb, and Kinder Morgan, the energy company.

But during the interview, he said he has sold off many of his stocks, without quantifying how many he still owns.

“I had a feeling things were bad,” he said. “I had a feeling we were too reliant on Asia.”

With that, Mr. Trump excused himself apologetically. He needed to tape an interview with Bill O’Reilly.