Puff Daddies

摘要

Pharmaceutical companies routinely get sued for drugs later found to injure patients. But Bristol-Myers Squibb is being sued in an unusual class action over a high blood pressure drug that never made it to market. The issue: Did executives pump up the company's stock by touting the drug as a blockbuster, even while they knew clinical trials were going poorly? When Bristol-Myers eventually dropped the drug, its stock plummeted 29%, taking $2.7 billion out of its market capitalization. The company says its comments merely amounted to "puffery"-and thus aren't actionable.