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As an North East Coaster who hasn’t been out to SoCal that much lately, In and Out burgers are not available to me but their reputation puts them in a special category of fine dining. I’m suddenly feeling very hungry :)
This location sounds close to Las Brisas restaurant right on the coast, if it’s still around. Might be a good venue option for board members to meet for a fine dining meal.
Very interesting and hoping my bias as a long time long isn’t deluding me, I am thinking (IMHO) the following:
1) would BP do a trial with Dcvax-L if dcvax was likely not to be approved? IMHO no
2) if the trial branches are Dcvax and Dcvax + Keytruda, doesn’t that position Dcvax like a SOC to compare the efficacy of Keytruda+Dcvax against? IMHO yes however my bias may particularly be affecting my judgement.
Your thoughts please?
It’s been a year and a half since I posted the “screen play” about our hero and her little company’s epic quest to improve the survival, with vastly better QOL, of GBM patients and ultimately for all solid tumor instances.
Although I thought the P3 trial results would have been known by now, the plot has continued and thickened. The recent positive plot elements include the sharing of encouraging blinded data, the hiring of IR and CFO, and most importantly that people (trial participants) apparently are living several years and more beyond their enrollment in the trial.
Among the negatives are that the Sawston funds appear to have been consumed, additional dilutions/fund raises, continued sparse communication from the company, and that data lock, TLD release, and success/failure of the trial are still not achieved. The share price remaining in the 21-25 cent range for a late P3 trial biotech with encouraging results shakes the logic around success while some other biotechs that are not this far along have their share price and market cap grow.
Is this a compelling suspenseful plot or what?
Even staunch Longs such as myself are repeatedly tested by weighing the positives and negatives and running through the logic trail over and over.
I guess I’m an optimist, continuing to come out net positive that the plot will prove to be an inspiring set of outcomes and a major advance medically, for patients, investors, and our hero’s,
Regarding Les statement, FDA involvement from the FDA’s perspective can not directly prevent Nwbo from providing commentary HOWEVER I think Les points to the inherent risks of the FDA interpreting any part of a statement as negative to the FDA.
Since the FDA is the approver of the treatment it seems like common sense to avoid even the chance to piss off the approver or run afoul of politics, etc.
I’ve found myself in situations where a statement was taken completely or partially not as intended innocently, and imagine what those wanting to hurt Nwbo would say to distort in a negative damaging manner, like had been done previously many times as blatantly obvious merit less attacks.
Unfortunately I’m seeing and experiencing more miscarriages of justice and systems rigged with bias such as to perpetuate existing ecosystems of jobs even at the expense of what is logical and right.
So Les’s statement of cautiously avoiding running afoul of the FDA when approaching approval sounds prudent to me, fwiw and imho.
BSB,
Thanks for your reply. It’s encouraging that your observations regarding efficacy are positive and our diverse views of management are what they are and contribute to the large pool of views and information this board provides its readership.
Since finding this board, it’s become the only board I read daily.
Thanks to all for sharing!
BSB
Do you and your friends who invested big bucks in NWBO believe the odds are good that DCVax-L will be approved and our investment will be successful?
While I didn’t invest millions I did put a lot of money for my circumstances, initially buying around $3/share and buying more on the way up to $12+ figuring if NW bought in big to the tune of over $100M, there was smart money betting big.
Digesting all the info on this board and all the pro/con points and factoids, and the various presentations, I keep concluding the risk/reward is worth it, and after paper losses of more than 90% I decided I’d hold to the end.
IMHO management is driven to bring a more effective treatment to those with cancer, and not necessarily to optimize shareholder returns and not driven by riding a gravy train of sorts as some believe. These are successful already wealthy people that I believe can get a higher financial return for their efforts elsewhere.
Senti thank you for your input and your choice to use T :)
WW55 we are each entitled to our views and can learn more by sharing and integrating all the diverse viewpoints than not. So I value your perspective and I’ve lost the most investment value when I ignored input I didn’t agree with.
Ike, if I were LP I wouldn’t touch that question if for no other reason than it is controversial in nature and a no win position. Not that we shareholders should be kept in the dark, however discretion is the better part of valor, so to speak.
WW55, maybe having worked for large corporations I have a perspective that C-suite management salaries and perks for LP and LG are not grossly out of line. Consider that most senior executive managers make more than $500k and $375k while typically having large organizations to carry out their directives and do the drudge work. NWBO is relatively much leaner with a small number of employees, so I’m guessing LP and LG wind up doing relatively more actual work for relatively less compensation while fighting off the attacks of those wanting NWBO to fail in disruptive treatments for cancer, all IMHO.
Marzan, interesting find! Looks like this technology can also be used to identify multiple paths that can also be preemptively patented to prevent competitors from selling such an equivalent. However given what’s been in the news lately, one might worry about whether the technology could possibly be abused.
I don’t understand how LP would not keep her bod position with all her own votes and friendly insiders?
Also,although I’m down more than 90% on my investment I have long believed that for LP reaching success of the Dcvax treatment as a new and quite tolerable treatment for cancer is the goal, with or without shareholder investment success.
And I believe genius towards this goal demonstrates LP’s smarts, dare I say genius again.
Consider the following elements and structure:
+ trial includes multiple countries which provides diversity and some checks and balances vs BP/FDA attacks
+ manufacturing and patents were private in Cognate and friendly hands to negate hostile takeovers of Nwbo
+ shut down of attacks and frivolous lawsuits that were distracting and costly to defend (Black and diligence)
+ Sawston deals and repositioning of manufacturing for less conflict of interests and multiple sourcing
+ and much more
Looking at the event schedule all the speakers have 15 minute time slots.
It may be a real estate deal but even so it appears to have been a good deal that brings a big chunk of funds to Nwbo that are needed to get to approval hopefully without vulture and dilutive funding.
Thanks Sentiment! The excerpt you provided is what I was thinking as unambiguous. I do acknowledge that ambiguity in this matter is in the eye of the beholder and everyone is entitled to their view.
I’m not very knowledgeable about detailed trial process so I don’t know about things like SAP timing opportunities and possible prerequisites. However one significant difference between 2017 and 2018 is the exposition of the tail, which very recently appeared to be deemed established enough for the nwbo’s advisory group to support concluding the trial. So perhaps 2017 was deemed to early and risky towards achieving FDA approval?
Whether LP was using another carrot to lead everyone on to keep the company and trial going, maybe.
At this point with the recent moves with Bigger and Sawston, and Cognate, and the statements of moving to conclusion, it feels like end game. I’ve been wrong before and could be wrong again with this investment, however when I try to analyze the logic and what info is publicly available, I keep coming up long.
Scotty, Linda didn’t impress you when she realized and stood up to what appeared to be a move against Nwbo and current management to effect a wolf in sheep’s clothing takeover of the company and/or its manufacturing secret sauce?
My belief is that LP has been committed to getting Dcvax over the goal line for reasons that might be more important than stock gains. Of course stock gains are a very good thing for Nwbo and Longs including LP however I feel that extending lives of loved ones has been the top goal to achieve whether with or without stock profits. I also believe both goals may be achieved.
Hasn’t LP very recently stated quite clearly that the phase 3 trial will now move to data block and unblinding in deliberate order. This statement wasn’t ambiguous sounding to me unlike most previous statements.. the timing may be open to speculation however the decision to proceed to closure appears to be clear.
Turns out that ENMD wound up making a deal that provided Celgene with the basis to create and market Revlimid, a blockbuster cancer drug that propelled celgenes stock price and opportunities. ENMD went on trying to bring a particular kinase inhibiter drug through the clinical trial process, and still is. Over the years ENMD stock price was mostly around $1 and less, even less than Nwbo current SP.
A change of management and strategy to address China and American drug opportunities, along with new investors and insider ownership, recently moved CASI (new symbol) from sub dollar to a high in the $8+ area and now back down to around $4+.
This saga took place over more than a decade, and no, I still didn’t sell shares. So it seems I’m drawn to long and painful investments. Like many of the longs in Nwbo I keep holding and adding, to way more than I should have, on the basis of the science, the respected doctors and trial sites, and a belief that LP is in this effort for more than financial gain.
I could be very wrong on all the above however I keep going through the logic and keep betting long. It’s also not all about money since like many others here I have family fighting a cancer and the thought of a well tolerated treatment that might extend lives is such a dream possibility.
For full disclosure I am long Nwbo casi and celgene, but at levels that wouldn’t put my family finances at terrible risk. After all, one shouldn’t risk more than tolerable, imho.
First and likely only reply to your posts, however how do you explain the patients discussed at Chicago ASCO ? Cherry picking? Unrelated spontaneous remissions? And the lead doctor from the UK clinical trial giving his emotional appeal to make Dcvax available? All regarding an ineffectual vaccine for which LL is receiving building recognition? That’s all.
Ex thanks for the info
Would there be tax advantage to exercise warrants while the market price is lower, assuming a later rise in price?
Flipper, is it possible or probable that in the end game the company is better off not telegraphing the last steps timing? It’s completely baseless but I’m feeling it’s a possible strategy not to make it easier for those who might mount an all out campaign against Nwbo.
In any event I also feel I’m staying full long for the end game.
LP stated it is excruciating pressure to end the trial, so unless she’s ingenuous to the point of being a scammer, I believe it’s more likely she’s trying her best to make DCVax successful.
In LP I see a wealthy person who doesn’t need to scam us shareholders but rather a very tired fighter that is determined to advance DCVax and I would even say at the expense of us shareholders if it becomes unavoidable collateral damage.
I would guess someone of LP’s intelligence, connections, and proven accomplishment, would have been doing some other money making activity instead of foregoing “easier” ventures to give DCVax her full attention.
I know this is baseless feeling however I don’t buy the deliberate scammer scenarios.
Happy there may be gray areas about what is real or imaginary, however AFs negative pieces were frequently transparently distorted to say it kindly, and that anonymous internet hit piece report was found to be largely baseless.
So there were these examples of targeted malicious aspersions that wound up being more than unsubstantiated.
The frivolous lawsuits are less certain to be related to targeted attacks because one notices these types of wannabe class action lawsuits against many companies these days seemingly for any thin excuses to organize suits where the biggest and most likely gains go to the law firms organizing and bringing suit.
I think this is only my second post, but I feel compelled to go through the NWBO story logically. Full disclosure I am a long for a long time, since about a year before the stock went over $12.
Logic Trail:
Approach "invented" by UCLA neurologists/researchers and NWBO wound up being the biotech entity to participate in the trials. Linda Liau, a top and respected neurologist becomes lead investigator of the Phase 3 trial (skipping Phase 1/2 trials to avoid writing a book.)
Trial winds up in multiple countries (USA, Germany, UK, Canada) and over 80 participating sites/hospitals, including UCLA, NYU, Overlook (in NJ), and many other highly respectable medical organizations and physicians in the USA.
In Germany and UK you have the equivalent highly respected physicians and organizations, and DCVAX-L achieves first of kind designations in Germany and in the UK, never mind that NWBO may not have received any payments, which might have been nice but nonetheless very significant as I doubt the smart people in Germany and the UK would have had anything to do with a fraud or scam company, trial, and treatment.
So far see the main point of establishing there are too many smart reputable people on both the trial and Governments health agencies and hospitals, etc.
Enter NW, fund manager extraordinaire putting up something like $180 million of investment. That's when I was convinced NWBO was for real and had a shot of succeeding, adding significantly to my position as I'm sure many did, enjoying the rise to over $12 per share.
NW hasn't sold, as many of us haven't, probably figuring wth, might as well stick with it as most of our investment is a paper loss anyway so might as well go big ( as a certain CEO with the initials LP likes to say.)
Now what do you all make of the obvious barrage of apparent distortions (being kind IMHO), very questionable law suits of interesting timing, routinely negative "journalist" pieces, and why not throw in an epic conglomeration of negative assertions from a mysterious "group" on a non-traceable site on the internet. What high drama and interest in this little biotech!!!
Just for extra measure, add in further drama of people who might have had conflicts of interest being involved in meetings and asking for manufacturing details related to this vaccine, IMHO.
So what came of all these negative energies, accusations, legal proceedings, and generally negative challenges? Not much with respect to bearing out the negatives, with cases resolved without major consequences, and many if not all negatives not being born out, and that mysterious internet group disappearing from the scene.
However, these "challenges" did get some of the perhaps intended results of casting aspersions, weakening NWBO financially, and probably causing NWBO to clam up to perhaps avoid further attacks and not provide even potentially good info that might be distorted, etc., all IMHO of course. It probably had influence on the stock price plummeting to the sub-dollar area we've been in for a long while now.
If you're given to conspiracy theories, one could write quite a screen play conjecturing a big coordinated multifaceted effort to drive little NWBO-like company into chapter 11. (Maybe Michael Douglas and Charlie Sheen could be approached to reprise another Wall Street flick - "Blue Dingbat doesn't like lysate pulsed dendritic vaccines!")
Let's explore the movie theme a bit more, shall we? We need an already wealthy CEO type who takes on the challenges, maybe not only because of the huge business and monetary successes that might accrue, but our hero is more driven by a stronger conviction to make progress against a dreadful disease, and maybe to the point where even investors may have to be somewhat sacrificed by collateral damage to get this potentially game changing treatment over the finish line!! Wait, this treatment would not only make great progress against one of the worst cancers, but potentially all solid tumor cancers!!!
Of course, we would have a co-hero of the science and clinical application of outstanding skill, dedication, and integrity, who also has lost close family to this dreadful disease.
Our CEO character would be a solid and decent type who of course would be educated and graduated with honors from one of our best and most difficult to get into university schools. Hey, Princeton would fit that bill pretty well - if it worked for Russel Crowe in a Beautiful Mind, and Albert Einstein to teach at, it should be a nice touch for our story.
So our heroes fight the good fight against all these negative forces that would like to stop them from getting the disruptive treatment over the finish line. Despite taking a toll on our CEO type who keeps fighting the good fight and is determined to Go Big or Go Home, foregoing the temptation to sell out to forces that may or may not live up to their proposals to take the treatment over the finish line, and maybe our hero wants to share in the moment of success. Success perhaps more for humanity, than for the riches that may be earned.
Such a high stakes story line! Our hero and her team try real hard not to be tripped up as they see the light at the end of the tunnel. Timing is important and needs to be balanced right to run the trial long enough to assure the best shot of demonstrating the treatment's efficacy, while also feeling the pressure of keeping a promising treatment from those who might desperately need and benefit from it.
In the mean time, our hero and her team provide individual cases of treated patients that have had remarkable responses to treatment, and some that have survived many more years than even the most positive hopes. But the naysayers have done such a good job of impacting the stock price and probably also the general trust of this little biotech, that even the most dramatically wonderful survivors and their family members telling their remarkable experiences, and more than a smattering of positive articles and news pieces hitting the public after our team of heroes manage to publish some still blinded interim results, the fortunes of our little biotech and it's stock price barely improve. Apparently everyone is from Missouri now, so to speak.
Now for the dramatic finish! Will our heroes refuse to fall and find the last bits of energy (and funding) to cross the finish line successfully?
Wow! wouldn't it be poetic justice if one or two very high profile public figures in need of the treatment manage to find the treatment and greatly benefit from it? That would be too much of a stretch maybe for our story, but just saying.
But I digress, I started by saying I wanted to go through the logic trail and I wind up describing a movie.
Point is the logic that NWBO is a scam just doesn't seem to hold water.
Complaints that management probably made some mistakes might have some merit.
However there is also merit in what might be the genius of structuring a multi-country trial so as to not be at the mercy of any one FDA-like agency, a sort of checks and balances. There might also be genius in structuring the NWBO-Cognate relationship such that production was in friendly hands and provided a sort of poison pill against unfriendly takeover and protection of the Intellectual Property assets.
To those that knock NWBO impatiently, I suggest that it isn't easy to carry out this endeavor with a skeleton crew. I would imagine LP and LG are tired of managing this very long crusade with a small team. In fact, we all reacted to how tired LP appeared at the end of the ASCO webcast. Do the naysayers believe that our lead trial physician from the UK wasn't showing genuine emotion when speaking about what he has seen clinically?
So to end this very long post and go back to just reading all your posts, there is no guarantee of success until it is achieved and it all may end badly despite heroic efforts. It may also result in great progress against cancer, which my mother happens to be battling as well and I don't think DCVAX would be available soon enough to treat my mother's particular case and we are waiting for another experimental drug that may provide a miracle albeit not likely with the quality of life that DCVAX appears to offer.
I believe NWBO and LP in particular are doing the best they can and are committed to getting to the finish line for the fight against cancer more than for shareholders and even her own finances, and we will soon within a year either make it or at least pass the baton to others that will run the next leg of an ongoing relay race to beat cancer.
Alpha puppy, did I not follow the math correctly where you have 311- 1x1 = 148 ? I used an x because I didn't remember the exact number, but I don't get 148 from the subtraction.
Otherwise your posted analysis is quite impressive and your conclusions are encouraging, to use a word that Dr. Bosch and LP seem to like.
This is my first post on ihub and I am long nwbo for years and waiting with mixed emotions like many here.