Arena Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (ARNA)

[SpeculativeHoldings]

ARNA is my pick for 2010 as far as metabolic drugs are concerned. Obesity is a major issue in our country:

I'm involved in an internship where I run a program that addresses childhood obesity. Here's a a little something from a blog that I wrote:

The United States is currently in the midst of an epidemic that has neither vaccine nor cure. Evolving cultural and familial customs, rapid innovation in food marketing, and even changes in public policy has helped spread this epidemic. Currently one in three children in the United States are obese, and this rate has more than tripled in the past 40 years according to the HHS (US Department of Health and Human Services). Obesity trends are heading in the wrong direction. While childhood and adolescent obesity has grown considerably in recent years, not a lot is being done to educate children so that they can adopt and maintain healthier patterns of eating and exercise. It also doesn’t help that only 10% of public schools are still offering physical education programs. If the need for improvement in child health is not taken seriously, we will face a future where life expectancies are shorter than they are today due to obesity related illness like type II diabetes and cardiovascular disease.

Statistics for adult obesity rates in the USA are MIND BOGGLING, and currently the cost on our healthcare system is $147 billion.

A successful drug tapping into this market could yield high profits for investors that get in early. As you can see from the above snippet, the number of obese patients will only increase from here. Obese children have a 70% or greater chance of becoming obese adults. THE MARKET ISN'T GOING TO RUN OUT HERE. Need for a successful weight loss drug will only increase. We need a drug to fill this niche left empty by phen-fen.

With all that said, my bet is on ARNA and it's candidate Lorcaserin.


Some previous comments that I've made:
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=50757838

http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=51287926