GOP Lawmaker Loses $17 Million After Favorite Pharma Stock Plunges

Last edited Tue Jun 27, 2017, 03:09 PM - Edit history (1)

Source: Bloomberg

GOP Lawmaker Loses $17 Million After Favorite Pharma Stock Plunges

By Doni Bloomfield and Brandon Kochkodin
June 27, 2017, 12:42 PM EDT

Chris Collins is biggest shareholder in Australias Innate
Shares down 92% Tuesday after experimental drug didnt work

Republican congressman Chris Collins hot biotechnology stock pick just went south. ... Collins suffered a paper loss of A$22 million ($16.7 million) after Innate Immunotherapeutics Ltd. said a mid-stage trial of its experimental treatment for multiple sclerosis showed no effect in helping patients. The New York congressman is the biggest shareholder in the Australian drugmaker. After the data was reported Tuesday, the shares fell 92 percent in Sydney to less than 5 Australian cents. ... Innates stock, sold in an initial public offering in December 2013, had gradually risen through 2016 before soaring early 2017 to peak at $1.77 on Jan. 25. ... Collins office didnt return a call seeking comment.



Collins, one of President Donald Trumps lead supporters in Congress, came under fire early this year for investing in the Sydney-based company while sitting on a House committee that oversees health-care policy. He personally owned about 17 percent of Innates shares, sits on the board of directors, and his children are also among the largest holders.

Some of Collins colleagues in Congress have also been getting into the company: Tom Price, now the Secretary of Health and Human Services, told Congress that he invested in the company in a discounted stock offering after Collins told him about it. And four other Republican House members bought shares in early 2017: Mike Conaway, Doug Lamborn, Billy Long and Markwayne Mullin. Price sold his shares in February.

The Office of Congressional Ethics is probing what role Collins, who has been an investor in Innate for 15 years, played in attracting investors to the company, the Buffalo News reported last month, citing people familiar with the matter.

Read more: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-06-27/gop-lawmaker-loses-17-million-as-favorite-pharma-stock-plunges

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I changed my link for the lede (as the kids say). Here's the original story:

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Stock Collins bought and touted collapses after drug trial failure
http://buffalonews.com/2017/06/27/value-stock-collins-lawmakers-bought-loses-value/

By Jerry Zremski
Published Tue, Jun 27, 2017

WASHINGTON Shares of the Australian biotech firm that Rep. Chris Collins touted to other members of the House and to leading Buffalo-area figures collapsed in value Tuesday after the company announced its once-promising new drug for multiple sclerosis had failed in clinical trials.
....

Collins told The Buffalo News Tuesday morning that he did not sell any of his shares in Innate before its price collapsed. ... Statnews, a business news website, calculated that the Innate stock Collins still owns -- which was worth $45.5 million at its peak -- is now worth only $1.5 million. However, it is unclear how much money Collins invested in the company over the 15 years he has been involved with it.

In the United States, the Office of Congressional Ethics also may be interested in the unusual stock trading activity involving Innate last week. The Buffalo News reported last month that the office is investigating Collins' investment in Innate. Investigators received several complaints questioning whether Collins who helped write legislation that speeds clinical trials and thus, theoretically, could benefit Innate had engaged in insider trading.

Collins tipped off then-Rep. Tom Price, now President Trump's Health and Human Services secretary, about Innate last year. That prompted Price to invest in Innate, and that became a matter of some controversy at his confirmation hearing. Federal documents show that Price sold his Innate shares in February for $250,000. ... But four Republican House members --Reps. Markwayne Mullin of Oklahoma, Billy Long of Missouri, Mike Conaway of Texas, and Doug Lamborn of Colorado -- bought Innate stock earlier this year nearer its peak price and may have lost much of their investment.

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Retweeted by David Fahrenthold: https://twitter.com/Fahrenthold

!!! Biotech stock @RepChrisCollins was pitching to GOP lawmakers in the Capitol plunges 92% after drug trial failure http://buffalonews.com/2017/06/27/value-stock-collins-lawmakers-bought-loses-value/

Link to tweet

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Here's my story this month on Chris Collins bragging abt making money for GOP colleagues on Innate Immuno stock $IIL

Link to tweet

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[div class"excerpt"]Exclusive: GOP lawmaker talked stocks with colleagues
http://thehill.com/homenews/house/336842-exclusive-gop-lawmaker-talked-stocks-with-colleagues
BY SCOTT WONG - 06/08/17 06:00 AM EDT

Rep. Chris Collins (R-N.Y.) has boasted about how much money hes made for other members of Congress by tipping them off to an Australia-based pharmaceutical company in which he is the largest stockholder, two GOP lawmakers told The Hill.

Collins, President Trumps chief defender and unofficial spokesman on Capitol Hill, told a group of House GOP colleagues over dinner earlier this year that he had urged colleagues to invest in Innate Immunotherapeutics and made them plenty of money in the process, said one GOP lawmaker who was present for the conversation.

He said that hes made members money, the GOP lawmaker told The Hill. ... Members of Congress? a reporter asked. ... Yeah, on his stock tip, the lawmaker replied.

If you get in early, youll make a big profit, Collins reportedly told another group of House Republicans last summer, according to a second GOP lawmaker who was part of the same 2012 class as Collins.