Stock scan­dals: Biotech in­cu­ba­tor Fortress pur­chased bro­ker­age firm to tout its own star­tups — Reuters

When an an­a­lyst touts a biotech stock, you hope he’s not get­ting paid by the com­pa­ny’s own­er, right? Well that’s ex­act­ly what Jonathan Aschoff — and oth­er an­a­lysts at Na­tion­al — are be­ing ac­cused of, ac­cord­ing to a new re­port by Reuters.

Here’s the short of it: the biotech in­cu­ba­tor Fortress, launched by long­time biotech en­tre­pre­neurs Lind­say Rosen­wald and Michael Weiss, ac­quired the bro­ker­age firm Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ties in 2016. Af­ter all, if you’re in the busi­ness of star­tups, why not own a bro­ker­age firm that can help them raise mon­ey? Since buy­ing up the team of about 700 bro­kers, Fortress and its slew of star­tups have ben­e­fit­ed from the rec­om­men­da­tions of Na­tion­al’s an­a­lysts, ac­cord­ing to Reuters. Specif­i­cal­ly, the an­a­lysts have tout­ed the stocks of Av­enue Ther­a­peu­tics, Check­point Ther­a­peu­tics, and Mus­tang Bio, among oth­ers.

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