FORBES MAGAZINE ESTIMATES that Donald Trump has lost $800 million over the last year. 

An investigation by the magazine puts his fortune at $3.7 billion. The journalists who carried out the research put the drop down to a softening of the New York property market.

The financial publication has cast doubt on claims by his critics that Trump’s tax returns, which he has failed to disclose, will show that he’s not a billionaire:

Forbes has been scouring Trump’s fortune for 34 years. Sometimes he’s up, sometimes he down–and for much of the 1990s he was out of the three-comma club.

However, a close examination of 28 of his properties shows  that 18 declined in value “including his trademark Trump Tower on Manhattan’s Fifth Avenue, his downtown jewel 40 Wall Street and Mar-a-Lago, his private beachfront club in Palm Beach”.

In recent decades, revealing tax returns has become standard for White House hopefuls. However, the Republican nominee has long refused to do so.

“I will release my tax returns – against my lawyer’s wishes – when she releases her 33,000 e-mails that have been deleted,” Trump responded when pressed on the issue in Monday night’s debate with Democrat Hillary Clinton.

His opponent shot back that such a challenge was “another example of bait and switch,” noting that presidential candidates for the last four decades had released their returns.

“I have no reason to believe that he’s ever going to release his tax returns, because there’s something he’s hiding,” she added.

Maybe he’s not as rich as he says he is.