Martin Shkreli, the 32-year-old Turing Pharmaceutical CEO who this week jacked up the price on a life-saving drug by an astounding 5,000 percent, apparently doesn’t have the stomach for his own racket: he announced Tuesday night he’ll decrease the price of the drug in the face of intense public scrutiny.

The firestorm began this week when Shkreli’s company raised prices on Daraprim, a drug typically used to treat toxoplasmosis—a parasitic infection that can be fatal for patients with HIV or cancer. The pills, which usually cost $13.50 a piece, began retailing for $750, and Shkreli—already a known asshole—became universally vilified.

For little while, at least: despite bombastically vowing to fight for his right to profit off the sick and frail, Shkreli appears to have folded after just 48 hours of public scrutiny. Via the New York Times, which Shkreli is now apparently boycotting:

After fiercely defending the price increase in various interviews and on Twitter for two days, Mr. Shkreli backed down a bit late Tuesday. He told television news networks that the price of the drug, Daraprim, would be lowered, though he did not specify what the new price would be.

“I think that it makes sense to lower the price in response to the anger that was felt by people,” he told NBC News. He declined to comment for The New York Times on the pricing announcement, and did not reply to an email request for comment on other matters mentioned in this article. “I think our relationship is over,” he wrote in response to an email seeking comment on Tuesday

Score one for the invisible hand of the Twitter.

Contact the author at gabrielle@gawker.com