Still at it
Martin Shkreli livestreamed himself violating lifetime pharma ban, FTC says
“I can always find a couple of biotech stocks to smoke,” Shkreli said in a livestream.
Martin Shkreli—the ex-pharmaceutical executive infamous for illegally hiking the price of a lifesaving anti-parasitic drug by more than 4,000 percent and getting a seven-year prison sentence for the fraudulent scheme he used to do it—has been under a lifetime ban from the pharmaceutical industry since 2022.
However, according to the Federal Trade Commission and the attorneys general of seven states, Shkreli has “flagrantly and repeatedly” violated that ban nearly the entire time—allegedly by trading stock in dozens of drug companies and discussing the industry during livestreams on social media.
On Tuesday, the FTC and the seven states asked a federal judge to hold Shkreli in contempt for the alleged violations. The states include New York, California, Illinois, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Virginia—the same states that joined the FTC in suing Shkreli in 2020 over the “elaborate anticompetitive scheme” involving the anti-parasitic drug, Daraprim. The scheme raised the price from $17.50 per pill to $750 per pill virtually overnight, while blocking generic competitors from entering the market.
“Egregious” conduct
In 2022, the federal court recognized the “seriousness” of issuing such a lifetime industry ban, but ruled that “Shkreli’s egregious, deliberate, repetitive, long-running, and ultimately dangerous illegal conduct warrants imposition of an injunction of this scope.” The ban, among many things, “explicitly prohibits” Shkreli from owning stock in pharmaceutical companies and making public statements that could influence a pharmaceutical company’s business, according to the FTC and the states.
With the alleged violations, the FTC and the states are now seeking to force Shkreli to divest from all pharmaceutical companies and pay a fine equal to his profits from trading pharmaceutical company stocks. They also want the court to lay out “clear and escalating consequences” if Shkreli violates the ban in the future, including further financial penalties and incarceration.
“The extensive record compiled by FTC staff shows that Mr. Shkreli chose to blatantly disregard the order after leaving prison,” FTC Commissioner Mark Meador said in a statement. “Among other actions, he has traded pharmaceutical stocks and actively sought to influence the business and management of multiple pharmaceutical companies through public commentary, in violation of the terms of the injunction. … A lifetime industry ban is only effective if breaches are met with consequences commensurate with the seriousness of the order.”
In a response, Shkreli said he was surprised by the FTC’s filing. “I could see totalitarian NY AG Letitia James trying to limit a citizen’s free speech but not from Trump’s FTC,” he wrote on social media.
“Magic trick”
The brief filed by the FTC and the states breaks down Shkreli’s alleged violations in four phases:
(1) a 2022 trading competition with another YouTuber; (2) shorting a small biotech firm in 2024, along with trading in other Pharmaceutical Company stocks; (3) a 2025 trading challenge in which he shorted three small biotech firms along with trading in many other Pharmaceutical Company stocks; and (4) a trading challenge begun in June 2026 with a $10,000,000 account in which he is again trading in Pharmaceutical Company stocks.
In numerous livestreams on various social media platforms, Shkreli would sometimes show his accounts on screen, the filing said. He discussed pharmaceutical companies at length, evaluating stocks and predicting the outcomes of pivotal clinical trials. In 2025, he told his viewers about his “magic trick,” saying: “It doesn’t matter what trades I make because I can always find a couple of biotech stocks to smoke.” Later in the year, Shkreli advised his viewers to short one pharmaceutical company’s stock, and the company’s stock price quickly dropped 17 percent.
The FTC and the states wrote in their filing that the stocks Shkreli discussed in livestreams are “likely the tip of the iceberg.” FTC staff only reviewed a fraction of Shkreli’s social media activity, and Shkreli has made several references to other accounts he has.
“I have some other accounts that I’[d] show you, but, like, I know feds are watching, so f[*]ck that,” he said, according to the filing.
