Leer en Español
While the world was unaware of the great threat posed by the Covid-19 pandemic, federal officials – who were informed – decided to make millionaire financial transactions that were very convenient for their pockets.
A Wall Street Journal report revealed that health officials were able to prepare for the economic crisis that was looming with the pandemic, including the renowned Dr. Anthony Fauci, who reportedly doubled his fortune with the advent of Covid-19.
The WSJ investigation reveals that Fauci starred in 10 mutual fund and stock sales totaling between $157,000 and $480,000 in January 2020. Overall, officials at another health agency, Health and Human Services, reported 60% more stock and fund sales in January than the average for the previous 12 months.
Federal officials owned millions of dollars in stock in the industries that benefited most from the pandemic.
According to the Wall Street Journal, about 240 health agency and Pentagon officials reported owning a total of between $9 million and $28 million in stock in pharmaceutical, manufacturing and biotech companies that won federal contracts related to Covid-19 in 2020 and 2021; in short, in the midst of the pandemic, federal officials decided to invest in the industry that was least hard hit by the arrival of the virus.
Senior federal officials are required to disclose their assets and financial transactions and those of their spouses and dependent children in annual reports. In addition, federal employees are prohibited from working on matters in which they have a significant financial interest, trading on nonpublic information learned on the job, and taking any official action that creates an appearance of a conflict of interest.
One of the big beneficiaries was reportedly Hugh Auchincloss, senior deputy director of the NIH’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, who, knowing in advance what was coming, decided to sell between $15,001 and $50,000 of an equity investment fund.
According to the WSJ report, its January sales amounted to the highest number of transactions it had reported for a single month since 2018, according to its own financial disclosures. Every share it sold fell sharply, just as it expected.Another official who was aware of the coming crisis and who pushed for sky-high transactions was Dr. Stephen Redd, a veteran epidemiologist who served as deputy director of the Public Health and Implementation Science Service at the agency (NIH).
Dr. Redd reported sales of between $95,004 and $250,000 in stocks and bonds in January 2020.
Dr. Redd said he had no prior knowledge of these transactions and added that neither he nor his wife knew why the financial advisor performed the transactions.
Fauci doubled his fortune
Dr. Anthony Fauci‘s net worth nearly doubled during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to financial disclosure forms obtained by the nonprofit government watchdog OpenTheBooks.org (OTB).
“The Fauci family’s disclosed net worth increased from $7.6 million (Jan. 1, 2019) to more than $12.6 million (Dec. 31, 2021),” according to OpenTheBooks.org (OTB) President Adam Andrzejewski.According to Andrzejewski, during 2021 Fauci’s household income, benefits and perks totaled $2,832,876.
OTB has filed four separate federal lawsuits in its efforts to force NIH to make public data on royalties valued at $134 million paid to more than 1,600 NIH executives, scientists and researchers from outside companies believed to be primarily from the pharmaceutical industry.
Sabrina Martín Rondon is a Venezuelan journalist. Her source is politics and economics. She is a specialist in corporate communications and is committed to the task of dismantling the supposed benefits of socialism // Sabrina Martín Rondon es periodista venezolana. Su fuente es la política y economía. Es especialista en comunicaciones corporativas y se ha comprometido con la tarea de desmontar las supuestas bondades del socialismo