$SAVA Exposed: Con Artist's $16M Scam Ignites 40% Plunge

Well as my good friend Freddy Mercury would say, “Another one bites the dust”. This time it’s none other than Cassava Sciences (NASDAQ:SAVA) that’s done did it. 

(Source: Giphy) 

Now most investors may remember them from previous scandals such as their “egregious misconduct” scandal back in 2023…

(Source: Market Watch)

But their most recent (and ongoing one) takes the cake in their rolodex of fraud. So what exactly has Cassava Sciences in hot water once again? Well as it turns out, one of Cassava’s star players, Professor Hoau-Yan Wang, allegedly turned into the Walter White of the medical research world. 

(Source: Justice.gov) 

But instead of cooking up blue meth, he’s accused of cooking the data on Alzheimer’s research. And not just any data—this was the kind of stuff that convinced the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to fork over $16 million in grants. Talk about breaking bad.

(Source: Giphy) 

According to the Department of Justice, Professor Wang, who was a tenured medical professor and a paid consultant for Cassava, allegedly engaged in a multi-year scheme to fabricate and falsify scientific data. Which, let's be clear, wasn’t just a little white lie - It’s a major fraud against the United States, wire fraud, and false statements - basically the trifecta of academic dishonesty. 

(Source: MakeAMeme) 

From 2015 to 2023, Wang allegedly submitted bogus data to the NIH to secure funding for a potential Alzheimer’s treatment and diagnostic test. And looking at the court documents, this issue reads like the plot of a badly scripted Suits episode: data falsification, improper statistical tests, and even stonewalling FDA inspectors from accessing his lab. Uhhh guilty much? 

If convicted, Wang could be looking at some serious prison time—up to 20 years for each count of wire fraud alone. But what about the real head of the monster? 

(Source: New York Times) 

Well as expected, Cassava Sciences took a nosedive today, plummeting more than 40% after the indictment news broke.

Imagine being a $SAVA investor waking up earlier this morning only to see your position in flames like Will Smith’s reputation after his infamous Oscars slap. Brutal. 

(Source: Giphy) 

Keep in mind, this whole debacle centers around Cassava’s Alzheimer's drug, simufilam, which was supposed to be the next big thing in treating the disease. Yet apparently, it’s looking more like the Fyre Festival of pharmaceuticals as the attraction ended up securing $16 million in government funding from 2017 to 2021 with only false records backing the legitimacy of it. 

(Source: Cheezburger) 

So based on that, it’s definitely understandable why the NIH is pissed. That’s a lot of dough being thrown around on what now appears to be a house of cards.

But as if the plunge in $SAVA’s stock price wasn’t bad enough, the court of public opinion isn’t doing Cassava any favors either. 

(Source: Justice.gov) 

The biotech world is already fraught with skepticism, and stories like this only fuel the fire. Plus, given that they apparently knew what was going on the whole time… the level of empathy is about as high as my bank account after a weekend of shopping with my wife. 

(Source: Giphy) 

So what’s next for Cassava Sciences? Well, if you’re an investor, it might be time to re-evaluate where you’re putting your money.Because when the dust settles, the real losers aren’t just the companies or the fraudsters—it’s the patients who believe in the promise of a new treatment.

And now that $SAVA has orchestrated a rug pull of this fashion, it’s going to be hard for them to claw back any notable type of reputation within the market. Especially since this isn’t their first time being caught in the spotlight as the bad boys of biotech. 

So as we await more details including how the markets digest $SAVA sentiment over the weekend, one thing is for sure: Big Pharma needs a serious reality check, and maybe, just maybe, a dose of its own medicine.