Private Phone. Secret Recordings. Inside One CEO’s Relationship With a TV Anchor

livemint.com:

Under Armour founder Kevin Plank gave television anchor Stephanie Ruhle a private phone with a special email address to communicate with him, sent her confidential financial information about the sportswear maker and enlisted her help to refute concerns about slumping sales, according to newly released court documents. Plank and Ruhle were questioned by lawyers earlier this year in connection with a shareholder lawsuit, and portions of their depositions and some of their emails were recently unsealed in court. The documents provide new insights into their close ties and her unusual role as his adviser, which The Wall Street Journal first reported in 2019.

Plank and Ruhle corresponded regularly and at all hours, according to the documents. In 2016, Plank sent Ruhle what he described as a secret recording he made of a conversation he just had with another top executive at Under Armour. Earlier that year, the then-Bloomberg anchor advised Under Armour to give internal data to Bloomberg’s competitors to manage negative publicity, the court documents show.

A spokesman for Under Armour said, “As we’ve said, Mr. Plank has utilized outside advisors and that’s what these documents show. None of the information was used improperly." He said Plank wasn’t available for an interview.

Ruhle, who is now an anchor at MSNBC, didn’t respond to requests for comment. ‘She’s a confidant’ During his deposition, Plank described Ruhle’s role. “She’s a confidant," he said.