WASHINGTON (DTN) -- Scott Bessent, President-elect Trump's pick as Treasury secretary, owns North Dakota farmland on which he earns between $100,000 and $1 million per year, but plans to divest himself of it if he is confirmed, according to the financial disclosure form he has filed with the U.S. Office of Government Ethics.

The farmland ownership was revealed in a New York Times article that said Bessent, a billionaire hedge fund trader, "plans to divest from dozens of funds, trusts and investments in preparation to become the nation's top economic policymaker."

The U.S. Senate this week will start holding confirmation hearings on several Cabinet nominees. The Senate Finance Committee has scheduled a hearing Thursday on Bessent to be Treasury secretary. Former North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum will have a hearing Tuesday by the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee for Interior secretary. South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem's hearing for secretary of Homeland Security will be held Wednesday before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs.

The financial disclosure form, which provides ranges for the value of his assets, shows Bessent owns as much as $25 million of farmland in North Dakota, which earns an income from soybean and corn production.

Overall, the farmland from the hedge-fund manager is a small portion of his portfolio. His disclosure form showed assets of at least $520 million, though the value is likely significantly higher.

According to the financial disclosure form, the farmland is located in Burleigh, Kidder, Eddy, Benson, and Wells counties. The disclosure form does not include the number of acres but says it is worth between $5 million and $25 million and earns rents between $100,001 and $1 million per year. The disclosure form also noted that the rent is based on a revenue-sharing agreement tied to the price of crops.

Based on average of cropland values around $2,300 per acre in North Dakota, Bessent would hold between roughly 2,200 to nearly 11,000 acres of cropland.

"Rent payments are through a revenue-sharing agreement, which is tied to the price of the crops produced (corn and soybeans)," the financial disclosure form says.

In his letter to the Treasury Department ethics office, Bessent said he is planning to sell assets that may cause a conflict of interest, including High Plains Acres LLP, the entity that holds the North Dakota farmland.

According to Bizapedia, High Plains Acres LLP is a partnership owned by Bessent and Scott Bradford of Victoria, Minnesota. Another directory lists Bessent's husband, John Freeman, as the partner with Bradford.

The directories list Bessent and Freeman as living at 720 Park Avenue, New York City. The couple lived in New York before moving to Bessent's home state of South Carolina.

In the ethics letter, Bessent said he is planning to divest himself of High Plains Acres within 90 days of being confirmed.

On a Thematic Investors podcast published last May, Bessent discussed his career and his views on investing.

He is interviewed by Kieran Cavanna, a co-founder and CIO of Old Farm Partners, a hedge fund allocation firm that has no connection to agriculture despite its name. Bessent has an investment in Old Farm Partners and also plans to sell that.

On the May 13, 2024, podcast, Bessent did not discuss agriculture but did note that data centers may contribute more to global warming than agriculture.

Bessent said he expects "a trillion dollars of spending by the hyper scalers, who would be Open AI, Microsoft, Amazon, Google, Oracle and the Musk companies on data centers, and data centers use a huge amount of electricity."

He continued, "We are probably working ourselves into an electricity shortage maybe by this time next year in a world where the average citizen is being told you are naughty for eating meat because your cows are contributing to global warming. Maybe these centers are going to be bigger contributors, but no one is going to tell them not to do it."

In the podcast the creation of a data center near a nuclear power plant is mentioned.

NYT link: https://www.nytimes.com/…

Jerry Hagstrom can be reached at jhagstrom@nationaljournal.com

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