Mar 6, 2017

NantHealth stock plummets on report of self-dealing

Danny Moloshok / AP

The stock of cancer testing company NantHealth cratered by more than 23% at the close of Monday to an all-time low of $5.50 a share after an investigation by Rebecca Robbins at STAT found that NantHealth's founder and CEO, Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, steered a charitable donation back to his company.

Soon-Shiong gave $12 million to the University of Utah, but a contract required $10 million to be funneled back to NantHealth for genetic testing. Tax experts interviewed by STAT said the deal was at best an "optics problem" and at worst a form of money laundering.

Why this matters: Soon-Shiong, the world's richest physician who has talked with President Trump about being a "health care czar," has been criticized for inflating his own business claims. This report provides damning evidence about the extent of Soon-Shiong's actions to prop up one of his struggling companies.

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Orion Rummler

5 mins ago - Politics & Policy

Zuckerberg says Trump’s “shooting” tweet didn’t violate Facebook’s rules

Mark Zuckerberg at the 56th Munich Security Conference in Munich, Germany on February 15. Photo: Abdulhamid Hosbas/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

Facebook did not remove President Trump's threat to send the National Guard to Minneapolis because the company's policy on inciting violence allows discussion on state use of force, CEO Mark Zuckerberg explained in a post on Friday.

The big picture: Zuckerberg's statement comes on the heels of leaked internal criticism from Facebook employees over how the company handled Trump's posts about the Minneapolis protests and his unsubstantiated claims on mail-in ballots — both of which Twitter has now taken action on.

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Axios

Updated 24 mins ago - Politics & Policy

Coronavirus dashboard

Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios

Global: Total confirmed cases as of 7:30 p.m. ET: 5,916,464— Total deaths: 364,357 — Total recoveries — 2,468,634 — Map.
U.S.: Total confirmed cases as of 7:30 p.m. ET: 1,744,258 — Total deaths: 102,709 — Total recoveries: 406,446 — Total tested: 16,099,515 — Map.
Public health: Hydroxychloroquine prescription fills exploded in March —How the U.S. might distribute a vaccine.
2020: North Carolina asks RNC if convention will honor Trump's wish for no masks or social distancing.
Business: Fed chair Powell says coronavirus is "great increaser" of income inequality.
1 sports thing: NCAA outlines plan to get athletes back to campus.

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Orion Rummler

3 hours ago - Politics & Policy

Trump says he spoke with George Floyd's family

President Trump in the Rose Garden on May 29. Photo: Win McNamee/Getty Images

President Trump told reporters on Friday that he had spoken with the family of George Floyd, a black resident of Minneapolis who died after a police officer knelt on his neck on Monday.

Driving the news: Former Vice President Joe Biden said via livestream a few hours earlier that he, too, had spoken with Floyd's family. The presumptive Democratic presidential nominee implored white Americans to consider systemic injustices against African Americans more broadly, Axios' Alexi McCammond reports.

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