President Trump stockpiled millions into his super PAC, while a handful of GOP groups outraised their Democratic counterparts in the last stretch of 2025 as Republicans brace for a midterm cycle shaping up to be much like the anti-Trump 2018 midterms. 

Trump’s super PAC, MAGA Inc., has more than $300 million in the bank to start off 2026, according to recent campaign filings, while the Republican National Committee (RNC) outraised the Democrats, who are working to pay off debt from the 2024 cycle. 

Yet there are some bright spots for Democrats, too: Many of the party’s Senate candidates have outperformed their Republican contenders as the party looks to make inroads in the upper chamber.

Here are five takeaways from the last campaign filing reports of 2025: 

Trump stockpiles millions 

The president’s super PAC is starting off the year with $304 million — an impressive sum of money that demonstrates Republicans will not be without resources as they look to keep their narrow House majority and retain control of the Senate. 

The super PAC’s latest filing, which covers Dec. 23 through Dec. 31, showed the president received $7.5 million from the pro-Trump dark money group Securing American Greatness Inc. and $1 million from businessman and Los Angeles Dodgers part-owner Todd Boehly, among others. 

Other prominent figures who have donated to Trump’s super PAC over the past year include $12.5 million each from OpenAI president and co-founder Greg Bockman and his wife, $11 million from entrepreneur and investor Konstantin Sokolov, and $4 million from defense contractor chief executive Michelle D’Souza.  

A number of prominent businesspeople and donors have given to Trump or his aligned entities, particularly for his construction of the East Wing ballroom, as different industries have looked to curry favor with the president. 

RNC holds large cash-on-hand advantage over DNC  

The RNC outraised the Democratic National Committee in 2025, $172 million compared to $146 million. In December, the RNC edged out its Democratic counterparts at $16 million to roughly $13 million. 

The Republican Party also starts off 2026 with a nearly $100 million cash-on-hand advantage over Democrats: The GOP has $95 million in the bank to start off the year, while Democrats have $14 million cash on hand, in addition to close to $18 million in debt. 

Democrats have steadily been trying to pay off debt that was accrued during former Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign in 2024. Donors in the aftermath of the 2024 election also curbed their spending to different groups amid frustration over how the presidential cycle played out and as the party looked to reset itself heading into 2026. 

Across the board, however, GOP groups like the House Republican and Senate Republican campaign arms posted larger 2025 hauls than their Democratic counterparts. However, the cash on hand for the House and Senate Democratic campaign arms are nearly equal to or have narrowly surpassed their GOP counterparts.

Democratic Senate candidates largely outraise GOP challengers 

If there’s one financial silver lining for Democrats right now, it’s that the party’s Senate challengers in competitive races have largely outraised their Republican contenders. 

In Georgia, Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-Ga.) — seen as the most vulnerable Senate Democrat up for reelection this cycle — raised close to $10 million between October and December from his campaign. He starts off 2026 with close to $26 million in the bank.  

His GOP opponents trail far behind. Former University of Tennessee football coach Derek Dooley’s campaign raised $1.1 million and has $2.1 million cash on hand. Rep. Buddy Carter’s campaign (R-Ga.) raised $1.7 million, which includes a $1 million loan to himself, and starts off this year with nearly $4.2 million. Rep. Mike Collins’s campaign (R-Ga.) raised about $825,000 and has $2.3 million cash on hand. 

In Ohio, former Sen. Sherrod Brown’s (D-Ohio) campaign raised $7.3 million in the last quarter of 2025 and has nearly $10 million in the bank. Meanwhile, Sen. Jon Husted’s (R-Ohio) campaign raised $1.5 million between October and December and starts off the year with close to $6 million in the bank. 

Musk starts spending ahead of midterms 

Elon Musk has resumed pumping money toward GOP groups heading into the midterms, less than a year after he signaled he would pull back from political spending. The Tesla CEO gave $5 million each to two super PACs helmed by House Republican and Senate Republican leadership. 

All told, Musk has given $20 million to the two political groups in 2025, highlighting how the former Trump adviser is poised to play an important role again in the upcoming election cycle for Republicans.  

Musk spent millions in last year’s Wisconsin Supreme Court races, yet the liberal candidate handily won the vacant seat on the state’s high court. However, his spending helped level the playing field for Republicans.  

While his spending will help the GOP, Democrats are sure to seize on his involvement, too. In the past, they have featured Musk in their advertising, such as showcasing his chainsaw-wielding appearance during last year’s Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), in an effort to boost turnout among their voters.

Filings offer insight into contested Senate primaries  

The campaign finance filings also offer some clues about the fundraising strength of candidates in contested Senate primaries.  

Progressive oyster farmer Graham Platner, who was mired in controversy last year over past social media posts, raised $4.6 million in the last quarter of 2025 from his campaign and has $3.7 million in the bank. Meanwhile, centrist Maine Gov. Janet Mills’s (D) campaign raised $2.7 million in the last quarter and starts off this year with $1.3 million. 

In Texas, Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D) and state Rep. James Talarico (D) posted similar fundraising hauls — $6.5 million and nearly $6.9 million, respectively. Most of Crockett’s haul came from transfers from her House campaign. Talarico’s campaign also posted a cash on hand advantage — $7.1 million to Crockett’s $5.6 million.  

Australians risk losing a huge amount in superannuation inheritance due to little-known tax rules. Older generations will transfer trillions of dollars in wealth to younger generations in the coming decades, with much of this money to come via superannuation and property assets.

Most families don’t realise that their kids could lose a third of their inheritance to superannuation tax. But Pivot Wealth financial adviser and Yahoo Finance contributor Ben Nash said this tax could be “completely avoidable” with a bit of strategy.

When someone passes away, their superannuation is split into two main parts: the tax-free component and the taxable component.

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If the money goes to adult kids or anyone who is not financially dependent on the person passing down the super, the taxable portion gets hit with a “death tax” of up to 32 per cent.

“On a $1 million balance, that means $320,000 that can be completely gone,” Nash explained.

The biggest component of most people’s super funds is the taxable component because it’s made up of any compulsory employment super contributions, salary sacrifice or tax-deductible contributions, and the growth and earnings on these funds.

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The good news is it is possible to reduce or avoid the tax altogether.

“The fix here is what’s called a withdrawal and recontribution strategy. It’s a pretty simple concept, although the rules are a little bit complicated,” Nash explained.

“Basically, while your parents are still alive and eligible, they can withdraw some or all of their super, pay no tax on the withdrawal, and then put it back into their super as a non-concessional or after-tax contribution.

“That shifts their super balance from taxable to completely tax-free. When you do that gradually over time, you can save literally hundreds of thousands of dollars in future tax.”

Your parents would need to be over the age of 60 and meet a condition of release (like retirement) so they can withdraw part of their super tax-free.

The rules around withdrawing and contributing to your super fund, along with how much you put in, are complicated, so it is important to get financial advice from a professional.

The Productivity Commission previously estimated that $3.5 trillion would be passed on from Aussies aged 60 and over by 2050. More recent JBWere figures put the figure at $5.4 trillion over the next 20 years.

A Finder survey of 1,017 people last year revealed 41 per cent of Aussies – equivalent to 8.8 million people – were anticipating receiving an inheritance.

One in 10 said they were depending on an inheritance to achieve major financial goals like buying a house or retiring, while nearly one in five anticipated it would significantly improve their financial situation but they weren’t depending on it.

While you are taking a closer look at your superannuation, it can also be worth making sure you have a binding death benefit nomination in place.

More than a third of people surveyed by Super Consumers Australia had no death benefit nomination with their super fund, while 25 per cent didn’t know if it was binding.

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Tech company Oracle (ORCL) said on Sunday that it planned to raise $45bn (£32.8bn) to $50bn in 2026 to fund the expansion of its cloud infrastructure business.

The company said that it planned to achieve this funding target using a combination of debt and equity financing.

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“Oracle is raising money in order to build additional capacity to meet the contracted demand from our largest Oracle Cloud Infrastructure customers, including AMD (AMD), Meta (META), Nvidia (NVDA), OpenAI, TikTok, xAI and others,” it said in a statement, according to a Reuters report.

Oracle (ORCL) shares hovered just below the flatline in pre-market trading on Monday morning and are trading 3.4% in the red over one year.

Media and entertainment giant Disney (DIS) was in focus on Monday morning, following a Bloomberg report that it was close to picking theme-park division chairman Josh D’Amaro as the company’s next CEO.

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According to the Bloomberg report, Disney’s (DIS) board is aligning on promoting D’Amaro into the role and will vote on naming a new CEO in the coming week, citing people familiar with the matter. D’Amaro would take over from Bob Iger, who returned as CEO in 2022, having served in the role from 2005 to 2020.

Disney (DIS) had not responded to Yahoo Finance UK’s request for comment at the time of writing.

The company is set to report its fiscal first quarter earnings later in the day on Monday. Disney (DIS) shares hovered just below the flatline in pre-market trading on Monday morning and are 0.6% in the red over one year.

In Asia, shares in Hong Kong-listed electric vehicle (EV) company BYD slid 7.3% on Monday, after reporting a drop in sales in January.

BYD (1211.HK) said on Sunday that it had sold 210,051 vehicles in January, which was 30.1% lower than 300,538 it sold in the same period last year.

The company sold 83,249 battery electric vehicles last month, which was 33.6% lower than January last year and it delivered 122,269 plug-in hybrid EVs, down 28.5%.

Pharmaceuticals giant AstraZeneca (AZN.L) will begin trading its ordinary shares on New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) on Monday for the first time.

AstraZeneca (AZN.L), which is listed on the UK’s FTSE 100 (^FTSE) and Sweden’s OMX Stockholm 30 (^OMX), previously had American depositary shares (ADS) listed on the Nasdaq (^IXIC).

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Michel Demaré, chair of AstraZeneca, said: “This will allow even more investors to participate in AstraZeneca’s future. Our harmonised listing across New York, London and Stockholm reflects strong shareholder support for our growth strategy and positions AstraZeneca to deliver more innovative medicines to more patients around the world.”

AstraZeneca’s (AZN.L) London-listed shares were up 1% on Monday morning.

On the London market, gold producer Endeavour Mining (EDV.L) was the biggest faller on the FTSE 100 (^FTSE), with shares slumping 7.2% at the time of writing.

The fall in Endeavour (EDV.L) shares was driven by a drop in gold (GC=F) prices, as well as other metals, adding to losses from Friday’s session, when US president Donald Trump named Kevin Warsh as his nomination for the new Federal Reserve chairman.

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Wealth Club chief investment strategist Susannah Streeter said: “The shock unravelling of prices demonstrates just how concerned investors had been about perceived attacks on the independence of the Federal Reserve.”

“There had been concerns that a Trump cheerleader would be installed at the central bank, which could lead to politically led decision-making, and risks of runaway inflation,” she said. “But now financial industry heavyweight Kevin Warsh has been anointed as successor, with deep Fed experience, he’s not expected to be a pushover and that’s sparked this big reversal of safe-haven positions.”

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