---
title: "FTC Wants Shkreli Held in Contempt Over a Lifetime Ban He Keeps Ignoring"
description: "Regulators say he traded at least 60 pharma stocks and livestreamed his picks since his 2022 ban took effect"
author: "Luis Goa"
published: 2026-10-13T15:21:47Z
modified: 2026-10-13T17:04:58Z
url: https://rews.cc/a/ftc-wants-shkreli-held-in-contempt-over-a-lifetime-ban-he-ke-c38f19
language: en
tags: ["pharma", "regulation", "trading", "ftc", "shkreli", "business"]
publisher: "Rews (https://rews.cc)"
---

# FTC Wants Shkreli Held in Contempt Over a Lifetime Ban He Keeps Ignoring

*Regulators say he traded at least 60 pharma stocks and livestreamed his picks since his 2022 ban took effect*

By Luis Goa · October 13, 2026 · https://rews.cc/a/ftc-wants-shkreli-held-in-contempt-over-a-lifetime-ban-he-ke-c38f19

## In brief

- FTC and seven state attorneys general ask a federal judge to hold Shkreli in contempt of his 2022 lifetime pharma ban
- Filing alleges he traded in at least 60 pharmaceutical stocks since his release from prison in May 2022
- One disclosed account traded $10 million across 11 stocks, including Pfizer and Moderna, in a July contest
- Regulators want profits disgorged, holdings divested, and escalating penalties up to incarceration for future violations
- The 2022 ban followed a monopoly scheme that raised Daraprim’s price from $17.50 to $750 a tablet

A lifetime ban from an industry is only as strong as someone’s willingness to go back to court and enforce it. The Federal Trade Commission and seven state attorneys general are doing that against Martin Shkreli, the pharmaceutical executive convicted of securities fraud in 2017, in a 37-page filing that asks a federal judge to hold him in civil contempt for “flagrantly and repeatedly” violating the lifetime ban on pharmaceutical-industry work a court imposed on him in 2022, as [Business Insider reported](https://www.businessinsider.com/ftc-martin-shkreli-lifetime-pharma-ban-contempt-2026-10).

The ban traces to a specific mechanism: a monopoly scheme built on buying an old drug and strangling its generic supply. Shkreli’s company acquired the rights to Daraprim, a 1953-approved toxoplasmosis treatment, and raised the price from $17.50 to $750 a tablet — a 4,186% increase — then used a closed distribution system to deny generic manufacturers the drug samples they needed to prove bioequivalence to the FDA, delaying competition for years. The FTC sued in January 2020; in January 2022, Judge Denise Cote of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York found the scheme illegal under antitrust law, ordered Shkreli to disgorge more than $64 million, and barred him for life from the pharmaceutical industry, a ruling the Second Circuit affirmed in January 2024. New York Attorney General Letitia James, whose office was among the original plaintiffs, said the [court found](https://ag.ny.gov/press-release/2026/attorney-general-james-urges-court-punish-martin-shkreli-brazenly-violating) the price increase and supply restriction “put patients at risk.”

**The price increase behind the ban** Daraprim price per tablet, before and after Shkreli's company acquired it, $

|  | Price per tablet ($) |
| --- | --- |
| Before 2015 acquisition | 17.5 |
| After Turing/Vyera price increase | 750 |

Source: [Federal Trade Commission](https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2026/10/ftc-states-ask-federal-court-hold-martin-shkreli-contempt-allegedly-violating-lifetime)

## The order, and how regulators say it was broken

The ban bars Shkreli from any role in the pharmaceutical industry, a term that covers more than running a drug company: Cote’s order was written broadly enough to reach trading in pharma stocks and commenting publicly on pharma companies’ prospects. The FTC and the states — New York, California, Ohio, Illinois, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Virginia — say Shkreli ignored that scope almost immediately after his release from federal prison in May 2022. The filing alleges he has since publicly traded in at least 60 pharmaceutical-company stocks and narrated the trades across YouTube, X and Reddit livestreams, according to [CNBC](https://www.cnbc.com/2026/10/13/martin-shkreli-ftc-pharma-contempt.html).

One episode gets detailed treatment in the filing: a trading contest Shkreli ran in July, starting from a disclosed account balance of $10 million and trading 11 pharma names, among them Pfizer and Moderna. Regulators call that account’s activity “likely just the tip of the iceberg,” citing Shkreli’s own words on a livestream, quoted in the filing: “I have some I’\[d\] show you, but, like, I know feds are watching, so f\[\*\]ck that.” If that statement is accurate, the $10 million account is the visible fraction of a trading book regulators cannot yet size.

[![Martin Shkreli Explains How To Become Rich With Trading](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/tDX22wq568o/hqdefault.jpg)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tDX22wq568o)

Shkreli livestreams trading advice on his YouTube channel, posted July 31, 2026, the kind of public pharma-stock commentary the FTC filing cites as a ban violation. Video: Shkreli Planet · YouTube

This is not the FTC’s first attempt to enforce Cote’s order. In January 2023, the commission sought a contempt finding after Shkreli ignored requests for a compliance report and an interview about Druglike Inc., a startup he founded after prison, which he argued was a software company and therefore outside the ban’s reach, according to the [FTC’s 2023 filing](https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2023/01/ftc-asks-federal-court-hold-pharma-bro-martin-shkreli-contempt). That round was about paperwork Shkreli never produced. This one is about conduct regulators say he carried out in public, on camera, for roughly four years.

**From price hike to second contempt motion** The sequence regulators lay out, over eleven years

| From | To | How |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Daraprim price hike *(2015: $17.50 to $750/tablet)* | FTC antitrust suit filed *(January 2020)* |  |
| FTC antitrust suit filed *(January 2020)* | SDNY ruling and ban *(Jan 2022: $64M+ disgorgement, lifetime ban)* |  |
| SDNY ruling and ban *(Jan 2022: $64M+ disgorgement, lifetime ban)* | Second Circuit affirms *(January 2024)* |  |
| SDNY ruling and ban *(Jan 2022: $64M+ disgorgement, lifetime ban)* | First contempt bid *(Jan 2023: compliance reports ignored)* |  |
| SDNY ruling and ban *(Jan 2022: $64M+ disgorgement, lifetime ban)* | Alleged stock trading, livestreams *(May 2022 onward)* |  |
| Alleged stock trading, livestreams *(May 2022 onward)* | Second contempt motion *(October 2026)* |  |
| Second contempt motion *(October 2026)* | Requested sanctions *(divestment, profit disgorgement, possible jail)* |  |

![From price hike to second contempt motion. The sequence regulators lay out, over eleven years](https://rews.cc/img/d64ea17953901cadcc9d53ce1ac28d348e7aa719.webp)

Based on [FTC and state attorneys general filings](https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2026/10/ftc-states-ask-federal-court-hold-martin-shkreli-contempt-allegedly-violating-lifetime)

The remedy regulators are asking Cote for has three parts: order Shkreli to divest any pharmaceutical stocks he currently holds; impose a fine equal to his profits from pharma-stock trading since the ban took effect, plus prejudgment interest, with no credit for offsetting losses; and set escalating consequences for any further violation, up to financial penalties and incarceration. That structure matters because a fine on profits alone, without the interest and the loss disallowance, would let a repeat violator treat the penalty as a cost of doing business rather than a deterrent.

> A lifetime industry ban is only effective if breaches are met with consequences commensurate with the seriousness of the order.

That line is from FTC Commissioner Mark Meador’s statement accompanying the filing. Daniel Guarnera, director of the FTC’s Bureau of Competition, framed the action as a warning beyond this one case: “Today’s action should serve as notice that the FTC will not hesitate to enforce violations of court orders.” Guarnera’s statement also describes Shkreli’s post-release conduct in blunter terms, saying he “wasted little time diving back into the pharmaceutical industry despite being permanently banned from doing so.”

Business Insider said it was unable to reach Shkreli for comment; no lawyer for him had responded to the filing as of Tuesday. What happens next is up to Cote, who has already found once that Shkreli’s conduct was egregious enough to justify a lifetime ban and a nine-figure disgorgement order. The open question is whether a second contempt finding, four years into a ban the FTC says he started violating within months, carries a penalty large enough to outweigh the audience and the trading profits a livestream career in stock-picking can generate.

## See also

- [FTC press release on the 2026 contempt motion](https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2026/10/ftc-states-ask-federal-court-hold-martin-shkreli-contempt-allegedly-violating-lifetime) — ftc.gov · The agency's own account of the filing and requested remedies
- [FTC v. Vyera Pharmaceuticals case docket](https://www.ftc.gov/legal-library/browse/cases-proceedings/161-0001-vyera-pharmaceuticals-llc) — ftc.gov · Full case history, filings and the original 2022 opinion
- [2022 opinion and order imposing the ban](https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/documents/cases/865_2022.01.14_opinion_and_order.pdf) — ftc.gov · Judge Cote's original findings and the terms of the ban