There’s a lot of discussion and detail in Thursday’s Post story about the Frist stock sale. But this passage at the end sticks out like a sore thumb …
According to Thomson Financial, a reporting service, seven senior HCA executives sold 574,882 shares worth $19,942,610 between May 17 and June 10. A company spokesman, Jeff Prescott, said the executives are entitled “like other stockholders [to] make personal decisions . . . about when to sell.” He said the executives complied with “blackout restrictions” imposed by the SEC to prevent dealing within a certain period prior to restatements of earnings.
An SEC spokesman said it is the commission’s policy not to comment on investigations, and would neither confirm nor deny that it is probing insider trading at HCA.
The passage is left sort of <$NoAd$> hanging there, without context or further explanation. In fact, that last graf is the end of the article. Is Frist in some real trouble over this? And if he is, who can explain how a guy with such vaunting ambitions for higher office would do something so foolish and, it would appear, easy to detect?
