Good points which apply to just about anyone buying stock, especially small bio, especially in the stem cell sector.
A few thoughts here:
These stocks are tricky. I got swept up in the ATHX "news" as well, even after allot of DD (at least in my opinion pretty decent background research before buying) with 2-4 mos as watch before getting into a long term position; researching the company, looking into the sector, etc. My mistake was not looking close enough into the trial design and then not setting a stop-loss or buying puts to protect the downside going into the recent trial, but note, on small tech bios setting stop loss is a two edge sword where my rule for these companies is not to use this defensive technique (MM's can and will just drop price taking one out of there position).
Because of my research I'm still long & still believe the company will make a run overcoming the recent trial. They have a strong pipeline and I believe ATHX is well managed. ATHX is one of the survivors in the stem cell sector shake out over the past few years. The science is sound, and ATHX's approach to it is sound, and they have demonstrated safety which is the most important and first benchmark. The stem sector has been beat up over the past few years and and I believe the sector is setting the stage (as any new and difficult science does) to demonstrate its ability to meet large areas of unmet medical need.
So, it's a long term investment game in ATHX for me. Looking back over the year, wrt the company managing it's work, pipeline, funding vehicles and the "news-flow" ...it has occurred to me that ATHX may have played the game - to get their stock price up - for their offering earlier this year; to get it in before the recent trial... which, at the end of the day was a smart move. Although, we are certainly paying for it now (the street has recognized this maneuver and it's reflected in the well over done stock price). In my view ATHX here represents a great buying op, unfortunately for me (and probably others) I have enough risk on the table already in this stock; will likely add only once we break $2.00.
