The Rise and Fall of Pharma Mogul Martin Shkreli

By: Shreeya Ram

Martin Shkreli, now 42 and a convicted criminal, spends his days far from the high-flying world of Wall Street and big pharma. Just a decade ago, he was a 32-year-old millionaire, making headlines as he raised the prices of life-saving drugs and seemed to play God with the lives of everyday Americans. Lovingly known in the media as America’s “Pharma Bro,” Shkreli would soon face serious consequences when he first started price gouging a life-saving drug as the CEO of a big pharma company. As a young millionaire enjoying fame and fortune, Shkreli surely couldn’t have imagined that he would later be sued for investment fraud. He would also face a tumultuous legal battle regarding the Wu-Tang Clan’s rare album Once Upon a Time in Shaolin.

Long before his fall from grace in Big Pharma, Shkreli was a rising star in finance. At 17, he was interning on Wall Street, paving the way for him to set up his own Hedge fund, MSMB Capital, at the age of 23 (Retrophin). He later founded the biotech company (Hurtado). In February of 2015, Shkreli founded Turing Pharmaceuticals, later renamed as Vyera Pharmaceuticals, using assets from Retrophin (Owles). While Shkreli’s professional ventures shaped his reputation, his increasingly provocative public statements hinted at the path that would eventually lead to his downfall. 

In April of 2023, Shkreli came out in a YouTube video claiming that politician Vivek Ramaswamy was a personal “friend” and major investor in Shkreli’s business ventures (Lippman). It was later confirmed by Ramaswamy in an interview that the statement was untrue (Lippman). In truth, Shkreli’s relationship with Ramaswamy was limited to a professional level, as a hedge fund that Ramaswamy worked at had invested in Shkreli’s Retrophin (Lippman).

Even before his name resurfaced in connection with Ramaswamy, Shkreli was already infamous for one of the most shocking scandals in the pharmaceutical industry. What brought Shkreli into the media spotlight was his decision in 2015 to dramatically raise the price of a life-saving drug at Turing Pharmaceuticals. In September of that year, Shkreli bought the rights to a drug called Daraprim. At the time, Daraprim was the sole FDA-approved medication for treating toxoplasmosis (Office of the New York State Attorney General). This parasitic infection can have severe, sometimes life-threatening effects on people with weakened immune systems, such as infants born to infected mothers and individuals living with HIV (Office of the New York State Attorney General). He raised the price of this drug for a single pill from $13.50 to $750, an almost 5,000 percent increase ​​(Yang). The result of this was that patients who were dependent on Daraprim had to turn to lesser-known, more risky alternatives.  

There were alternative companies that offered to back the production of an alternative to Daraprim that would cost $1 compared to Shkreli’s $750; however, FDA regulations and the small market size for Daraprim rendered these efforts essentially useless (Owles). Even though Daraprim was so important and played a crucial role in treating the deadly toxoplasmosis, the reality was that it wasn’t a widely used drug, and the process for making an alternative to Daraprim and getting it approved by the FDA was not feasible.  After shocking the public with a 5,000 percent price hike, Shkreli received much public backlash and criticism on social media, yet he did not face any legal repercussions. Still, the attention he earned on social media effectively gave him the nickname of “Pharma Bro.” 

What appeared to be a story of entrepreneurial triumph was, in reality, the early stage of a series of actions that would lead to Shkreli’s legal troubles. At the end of 2015, Shkreli was sued by his hedge fund investors and charged with securities fraud. He essentially used his company, Retrophin, to pay back his hedge fund investors at MSMB Capital, misappropriated funds, and used false incentives to lure in investors (United States Attorney's Office Eastern District of New York). He was convicted in 2017 but was free on a $5 million bail (Clifford). However, while awaiting sentencing for his fraud conviction, Shkreli had his bail revoked after posting on Facebook that he would pay $5,000 to anyone who could bring him a strand of Hillary Clinton’s hair during her book tour (Clifford). 

In 2018, he was sentenced to seven years in prison by United States District Judge Kiyo A. Matsumoto of the Eastern District of New York and was made to pay a $75,000 fine and $7.3 million in forfeiture (United States Attorney's Office Eastern District of New York). Shkreli ended up being released early in May 2022 (Larson et al.). Vyera Pharmaceuticals filed for bankruptcy in 2023, at which time Shkreli had already stepped down from his role (Katersky). Then, in late 2024, Shkreli was sued by the Federal Trade Commission and seven states due to his price gouging and blocking competition for Daraprim production ​​(Office of the New York State Attorney General). Shkreli lost the suit, was given a lifetime ban from participating in the pharmaceutical industry in any capacity, and ordered to pay $64.6 million (Office of the New York State Attorney General). 

One month after his release from jail, Shkreli moved to Queens, New York, to live with his sister (Larson et al.). He began working as a legal consultant for an unnamed company, earning $2,500 a month (Larson et al.). The final stage of Shkreli’s decline came as his legal battles expanded beyond finance, reaching into entertainment and copyright law. Back in 2015, Shkreli spent $2 million on a rare Wu-Tang Clan album, Once Upon a Time in Shaolin, which later became tied to his legal issues. He gave up the album to pay for a portion of the $7.3 million he was asked to pay for in 2017 when he was first convicted (Stempel). The PleasrDAO collective paid $4 million for the album in 2021 and, in 2024, filed a lawsuit against Shkreli for allegedly playing a copy he made of the album while live-streaming on social media (Stempel). On September 25, 2025, U.S. District Judge Pamela Chen wrote in her 32-page decision that Shkreli must face that lawsuit (Stempel). The next steps in Martin Shkreli’s legal proceedings remain to be seen.

Shkreli may have become the poster child for corporate greed and reckless behavior, but the truth is that he is far from alone. There are hundreds of Martin Shkrelis in every big industry in America and abroad. His downfall exposes deeper systemic issues within Big Pharma and beyond, where profit too often takes precedence over human lives. In the end, Martin Shkreli is less a rogue villain than a mirror reflecting the darker truths of American capitalism.

Works Cited

Clifford, Stephanie. “Martin Shkreli Is Jailed for Seeking a Hair from Hillary Clinton.” The New York Times, 13 Sept. 2017, www.nytimes.com/2017/09/13/business/dealbook/martin-shkreli-jail.html.

Hurtado, Patricia. “Martin Shkreli’s Journey from Pharma Exec to Inmate #87850-053.” Bloomberg.com, Bloomberg, 8 Mar. 2018, www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-03-08/martin-shkreli-s-journey-from-pharma-exec-to-inmate-87850-053. Accessed 3 Oct. 2025.

Katersky, Aaron. “Judge Upholds ‘Pharma Bro’ Martin Shkreli’s Ban from Pharmaceutical Industry.” ABC News, 23 Jan. 2024, abcnews.go.com/Business/judge-upholds-pharma-bro-martin-shkrelis-ban-pharmaceutical/story?id=106612918.

Larson, Erik, et al. “Ex-‘Pharma Bro’ Martin Shkreli Is Now Living in Queens on $2,500 a Month after Nearly 7 Years in Prison.” Fortune, 23 May 2023, fortune.com/2023/05/23/pharma-bro-martin-shkreli-now-living-in-queens/.

Lippman, Daniel. “How Vivek Ramaswamy Helped Make Martin Shkreli the ‘Pharma Bro.’” Politico, 23 May 2023, www.politico.com/news/2023/05/23/vivek-ramaswamy-martin-shkreli-pharma-0009833.

Office of the New York State Attorney General. “Attorney General James Announces Latest Win against Martin Shkreli for Illegal Scheme to Monopolize Lifesaving Drug.” Ag.ny.gov, 23 Jan. 2024, ag.ny.gov/press-release/2024/attorney-general-james-announces-latest-win-against-martin-shkreli-illegal.

Owles, Eric. “The Making of Martin Shkreli as ‘Pharma Bro.’” The New York Times, 22 June 2017, www.nytimes.com/2017/06/22/business/dealbook/martin-shkreli-pharma-bro-drug-prices.html.

Stempel, Jonathan. “Martin Shkreli Can Be Sued for Copying Unique Wu-Tang Clan Album, Judge Rules.” Reuters, 26 Sept. 2025, www.reuters.com/legal/government/martin-shkreli-can-be-sued-copying-unique-wu-tang-clan-album-judge-rules-2025-09-26/.

United States Attorney's Office Eastern District of New York. “Martin Shkreli Sentenced to Seven Years’ Imprisonment for Multi-Million Dollar Fraud Scheme.” Www.justice.gov, 9 Mar. 2018, www.justice.gov/usao-edny/pr/martin-shkreli-sentenced-seven-years-imprisonment-multi-million-dollar-fraud-scheme.

Yang, Maya. “‘Pharma Bro’ Martin Shkreli Released from Prison Early.” The Guardian, 18 May 2022, www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/may/18/martin-shkreli-release-prison-early.