Register for free to join our community of investors and share your ideas. You will also get access to streaming quotes, interactive charts, trades, portfolio, live options flow and more tools.
Register for free to join our community of investors and share your ideas. You will also get access to streaming quotes, interactive charts, trades, portfolio, live options flow and more tools.
1. They are scientists, not investors. They win if it's approved and it's more likely to be approved if they don't have a bias.
2. The treatment is licensed by a third-party that has nothing to do with them or UCLA. It's a licensee deal. They are not founders of the company or involved in any way. Therefore to look at them like they are entrepreneurs who don't own their company, seems really off, logically and fundamentally.
3. Impugning to them or UCLA any illegality, because the university licensed a treatment to a third-party, and the two scientists don't have ownership in the shares of that company, is really beyond the pale for me. It's very difficult for me to take this kind of point seriously.
ARGS is treating a different condition completely. This is not a race with ARGS. I wish ARGS success, but it's not really relevant at this time.
I think it was not for anything, in fact, said, but because certain things said were being transformed from an ambiguous context, into a tool to try to destroy her work. I think any person with common sense would see the nature of the trolling and take something like that down.
In this era, people have to be extra careful, and sometimes take extra steps to stop that kind of activity from being incredibly destructive.
You're very kind Pap9x. I wouldn't even put myself in the same category as Flipper on the subject. Flipper has made so many really excellent posts here with incredible information over a long time, and I'm here mostly reading and cheering (the most informative, rational posts, IMHO), here and there, or jumping in, from time to time. Thank you Papa9x!
People act, or ID's act like ARGS has never been discussed here. It has been. I remember going back and forth with people about it.
Examples: http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=123223465
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=123295976
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=127182681
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=124488432
i don't recall the full discussion I had, or with whom, but it's something that a number of people are already watching here. So the surprise about its existence tonight, as if no one knew, is a bit of a surprise.
Additionally, it's NOT the "same technology". I believe their vaccine is an RNA technology. And the difference has also been discussed, if not here, then on other sites, but I'm pretty sure here too. Some posters have suggested they target more limited antigens than DCVax. That might be a disadvantage, it has been suggested. However, others are following ARGS trial as another promising technology, not immediately, directly competitive, and well worth following with other cancer vaccine and vaccine technology companies.
Branko has it in his picks: http://askthebranko.blogspot.com/2016/04/argos-therapeutics-args-my-price-target.html
And there are Seeking Alpha articles.
From their website:
"Our proprietary process uses RNA isolated from the patient’s disease sample to program dendritic cells to target disease-specific antigens."
http://www.argostherapeutics.com/precision-immunotherapy/arcelis-platform/
RNA vaccines have also been in the news because, including on this site, because of the failure of CureVac's Phase IIb trial.
http://labiotech.eu/curevac-mrna-jpmorgan-failure/
http://www.genengnews.com/gen-news-highlights/curevac-prostate-cancer-vaccine-candidate-fails-phase-iib-trial/81253700
There's also this company, BioNTech: http://labiotech.eu/first-all-cancer-mrna-vaccine-that-works-is-published-in-nature/
And there are a bunch of other promising technology platforms that create vaccines tools. However, with CureVac's failure, it raises a question that people have been discussing. Are RNA vaccines useful for cancer in the long-run? We'll see. It's a bit of a different technology, however. There are also DNA vaccines. Again, it seems strange that there are posts indicating this is all new. One of the companies I follow that has a DNA vaccine technology is Inovio. INO. They have a DNA vaccine technology and an approach that can quickly create vaccines against many diseases. One disease they have gone after is ZIKA, but they also have at least one cancer trial, and I expect they will roll-out their platform against many targets, as will many of these companies.
If NWBO can reach a substantial valuation earlier, with its DCVax technology, you may see a variety of mergers. The company that assembles a platform of immune regulatory tools will certainly have a lot of potential growth in the future.
But again, it's not like people here don't know there are lots of dendritic cell trials out there. IMUC's trial is often discussed around here.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1976249/
https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/causes-prevention/vaccines-fact-sheet
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3721379/
Despite all of this, it still takes a long time to get these technologies approved and available, they are expensive, in some cases, and there are different approaches that may or may not pan out in the long-run. When you have a Phase 3, with promising results, pending, it's going to likely have substantial value, and whether it is rolled-up into a BP, or it rolls these other players into itself, in the long-run, remains to be seen.
Most of us are here by ourselves, I'd presume, but some are not, apparently.
I was very clear not to "blame the victim", whatever that means:
I'm fairly certain that Liau said exactly the opposite of what is being implied here. Many placebo patients crossed over in the Phase III.
Absolutely not. It's her choice, to remain objective. Many clinicians in her role choose to not invest to avoid the appearance of a conflict.
That's not my disposition, and I doubt it's productive. Most of the time, I've lost because I've mistimed my investment, not because what I invested in was not a good opportunity.
You can't always anticipate the future, but to use one's loss as a justification for taking a pick-axe to the company you invested in, IMHO, shows a lack of perspective on how any of this works that likely won't serve you well in your investments generally.
I usually move on, if my losses are substantial, I take them against gains and wait out the decline. If the company is still a good opportunity in my estimation, I look for the right entry point, in terms of the size of the opportunity compared to the market cap, time to market, likelihood of success, etc. I also still recognize that any company is still a gamble and even good people can look stupid when a good opportunity fails, even if they turn out to have done everything they could to make the idea succeed. Being an entrepreneur will give you some perspective and I highly recommend trying it if you haven't already, and you may very well have done so. My only point is, it's a good way to get some perspective.
Wishing you good luck in your investing endeavors.
Apparently, BP didn't want to fund it then, and their resistance is likely even the reason it has taken so long, IMHO.
I doubt this is their biggest worry. They know it takes a lot to get to this point, and many other drugs take a long time, no matter the resources.
There is an awareness now that is advancing everything, and sometimes the timing all only comes together, when it comes together, which seems like it may be now.
Unlike big drug companies that prioritize and then deprioritize with the winds of whatever the latest fad is... NWBO is a single focus vehicle. It makes the opportunity a bit binary, ultimately, though not entirely. But that keeps everyone focused, for a long time, on the goal here. BP is not like that... and that's why the best innovation in biotech is coming mostly from tiny, undercapitalized companies, contrary to AF's ridiculous theory.
"bullish spin"
Just because someone doesn't agree with your take or criticism, doesn't mean that disagreement is absolutely bullish or not. You may simply not have made your case in a manner that is convincing, and it may also be that you cannot do so because everyone knows the information isn't yet available. So you have to be pushing some pretty serious assumptions to make a powerful negative case at this stage, and you'd have to suggest basically that everyone, at some level, is either incompetent or has bad motives at the regulatory agency, hospital, company and in the doctor's offices.
I recognize you could conclude there are risks that we simply can't know, and not invest. That's cool. Sit it out with a watchful eye.
I think most people who have money invested know there is a risk that it won't work. They've evaluated both sides and come out on one side or the other on the "more likely than not" equation. Most of us are not here to convince the skeptics, God knows why they post here, of the other argument. The responses mostly are to ensure that people can see that there are reasons why others have concluded otherwise.
Not sure why any of the bigger skeptics would spend so much time passionately researching and posting the opposite on an obscure bulletin board where people who have invested hangout. Most people here are investors, but they are investors because they want to see cancer treatments improve, and lead to cures.
Hard to know until we get the information. That seems to be indicated, and perhaps, since checkpoint inhibitors are already approved drugs, they are getting them anyway. As placebo patients who have crossed over, I doubt they have to get permission. They get the benefit of the drug, but they are not the object of the trial. And the "standard" of care continues to evolve. That might be the concern too.
They are getting the benefit of increased knowledge, as they should.
Shorts will say, publicly, whatever they ultimately do, that they don't believe, if it still fits their institutional requirements and long-term efforts. The PR comes, and they will still publicly suggest it's false information, or they'll concede briefly while they regroup.
I don't expect much rationality from shorts. Lots of noise and team and heat, even some argumentation for other audience members, but rationality is not the objective. It's all for show.
The "so called" shorts, who are really discount takeover artists... who set companies up for cheap takeovers after raiding and attempting to undermine their value proposition, while waiting for all the commercial, regulatory and technology risks to be mostly eliminated, have a set of standard ways to attack.
1. Tech doesn't work.
2. Managers, or scientists, or both, are crooks or incompetent, incapable, or are alarmingly uncommitted or just using the venture for jobs, money, etc.
3. Under pumping... pumping, but falling far short of real value, to set low expectations and undermining the value proposition possible given the incredible risk, enthusiastically presented however.
5. Undermining the companies based upon structural or legal issues and suggesting fraud, incompetence or similar motives.
It's always the same, and I'm sure there are many more that I'm not going to list out in this post entirely thoroughly. You've likely seen it all here before as well.
I see a lot of it these days... whether it's NWBO or similar companies, that crowd is always looking for a "steal"!
When shorts are on a tear like they were here. The circumstances don't really matter, and all of these companies end up having to dilute to finance until they have revenue anyway, unless they sell out the product to a partner, which is often the reason, IMHO, for the short attacks. Pressure!
No one's perfect, but I doubt many of the things that were pointed to here by the shorts were the CAUSE of the problem, they were vulnerabilities that the shorts focused on here. Every other company has vulnerabilities. The so called "shorts" (I think the drivers are more like takeover artists looking to eliminate the investment risk and buy the company, or its assets, virtually free, though many others play along for profit - hence wolf pack) will sort through the garbage of the company, it's executives, etc. These people are incredibly focused and they have lawyers that work with them to create mischief.
This is not my first run around the block. I'd say, wait in most instances until they are done, if you can do it. There are some companies that they seem not to attack, sometimes, but I think that is often more a function of the companies being invisible, already having partners or having big backers who are cash rich and have virtually unlimited resources (and ties to BP) to make such attacks useless.
But you can never know what companies will get attacked like this, and usually it is the most promising companies with applications worth billions, that are easily misunderstood and misportrayed. Cell therapy companies have been attacked mercilessly as well, especially the earlier companies.
I have no idea what "scares" you about that clip. Are you misunderstanding the goal here? I just don't get what is freaking you out... could you explain a bit more?
Evaluate. My post was in agreement with you "YES" at the beginning... and disagreeing with Al. I think you misread ME this time. "She" was LL, not RKM, and she did not say the trial had failed.
Though I appreciate the clarification. No worries.
Yes, what I saw from RK and Senti was the discussion of the video, earlier, where it was disputed by the shorts that she had said the trial had failed. I think it was one of those "newbies" saying that, and why she wasn't invested in the company, etc... the usual stuff that shorts say.
I think you're mistaken. LL could have no such information and would surely never do what you're saying. I suspect you either mistook what was said or this is a post of a highly questionable nature.
The short count is their claim to fame, and likely they are looking at live numbers. For historical outstanding shares, they may likely have to look that up, and not update as frequently.
I suspect that the short count is likely to be more accurate, because they should be sourcing live trade data on that from a relatively frequently updated source. Outstanding shares are dated numbers frequently at many sites that are used for reference including Google and Yahoo, as well as at sites for which people pay subscriptions. Such historical numbers are more often updated on a historical / quarterly or monthly basis, I expect.
Actually, he is holding, and he'd have sold it all if he had given up. It's his fiduciary duty, regardless of whether 20% or 80% of his investor's money were lost, to preserve capital, and percentages matter for men like him. He's holding because he clearly still knows there is value here. It's easy to make that sound like nonsense to people who don't know better. But those are the facts. He has a legal duty to sell if he considers this a loss. Preserving capital is the primary directive for fund managers, for both regulatory reasons and also out of legal obligation to his investors - as well as reputational duties and the object of reducing losses and increasing returns as a matter of statistical business measurement.
He simply wouldn't be here if he were gone.
I have assumed his holding is the same or slightly less. I have not contemplated whether he has bought more and have not calculated it.
Holding mostly the same, even if he sold a little, means very little. It would be great if he increased his holdings, which seemed to be suggested the other day possibly, and if he reduced a tiny bit, I'd expect that is more consistent with rebalancing, since giving up really means selling the entire lot, not just a bit of it.
I think they are just confounded a little bit by the OTC, but are very active posting. As I usually say, I label them "shorts", but the real agenda is far more complex of those driving the effort. It's usually to remove the shares, cheaply, from your possession, in a cheap buyout, after all the regulatory and technology risks are mostly resolved.
No, that is an inaccurate count of the shares outstanding. So that detail has not been updated on that site. Latest numbers are in last official filing from the company with the number, and it's in the 156 million range.
Well said as always RKM. I appreciate your perspective!
Where the doctors are not working directly for a company, but an institution, it's very common, unless they found the company (which is not the case here, this was a licensing), that they avoid the appearance of bias by getting involved in such corporate or investor events. I've seen this kind of disclosure repeatedly in medical presentations by researchers and clinicians involved with extremely promising drugs and therapies. I've never seen anyone read into such disclosures that it's because they medical professional was avoiding a potentially bad investment, it's usually assumed to be a clarification that they want to maintain their scientific objectivity and avoid any suggestion that their motivations are anything other than pure, in regards to the science.
You also see such disclosures in medical journal publications, at least reputable ones.
Not true and completely bogus. She doesn't own stock and did not sell or buy based upon her academic presentation of her views on the challenges of a trial with a cross over arm, with long OS. There are no potential "criminal" sanctions of any sort that would apply to her. Just nonsensical and bogus crap on this board today.
Very nice Dan88!
You guys didn't get the deal? Too bad.
I agree, I believe she doesn't care about the company or stock price, except that she does want her technology to succeed - if scientifically it is proven beneficial for patients. She owns no shares in the company. That's in her disclosure when she speaks typically.
I didn't mention positive or negative outcomes. I was talking about motivations for attacking such companies. Didn't touch on that. Thanks though.
I would guess that we may very well chat with some of the characters regularly, on various platforms. One can't always know who anyone is, but there are certainly money managers here, and elsewhere, I'm sure, who are working the company with negativity, not positivity, with the hope of owning a controlling stake and driving some sort of event that allows them to take the full value for cheap.
Some are no doubt frustrated that the structure here (with LP and Cognate particularly) makes a hostile buyout difficult. Driving the price down and creating more dilution is a way to steal most any of these companies away, eventually. It's a part of the game, I have no doubt. I would not even be surprised if they worked with the acquiring companies, indirectly, of course, many not really knowing the part they play fully.
That's what shorts always say, from day one. Premature celebration. I appreciate the prices I have bought at, but for me, the battle's just begun.
Agreed!
I suspect in many cases this is likely, though sometimes even bad news can be more ambiguous and you may need time to evaluate before you just release raw data without analysis. They might therefore provide highlights in that context, but with further indication of analysis pending. There is probably some judgment applied there, which would need to be reasonable and given some deference.
True that! IMHO.
True vator!
Agreed. They may want to do more statistical analysis before they release more complete results and conclusions. So they can delay, I suspect, for some time, while they complete that kind of analysis for a particular context of release.
Here it is: Immunotherapy World Forum 2017
Sessions
19-Jan-2017
16:30 - 16:55
http://www.immunotherapyforum.com/speakers-hjjh/linda-powers
NEW THERAPEUTIC APPROACHES - EXPANDING THE REACH OF CANCER IMMUNOTHERAPY TO ALL PATIENTS IN NEED OF BETTER TREATMENT
Apparently, they want to squeeze out the current holders...
http://www.pumacap.com/distressed-securities/
According to Milner.
Exactly. AF tries to move share price with commentary. He's not reflecting reality, he's trying to shape it. Big difference that!
Agreed. It's being attacked also because it makes the hoped for cheap takeover much more difficult, to impossible. These companies are run down so that they can be bought out cheap. Let the initial shareholders bear the risk, and the new buying entities get all the upside. It enhances one's stock portfolio, if you're a professional investment manager. Push the losses to the early investors and scoop the cream off the top after the buyout. They don't even need a lot, just a steady return in another large company will do.