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Just came back from the Alzheimer’s Drug Discovery Foundation Conference. Would love your opinion on this article, it’s an exploration of the big picture issues in the search for an Alzheimer’s, NTRP was a big inspiration for this: https://medium.com/@mtokarsky/stopping-the-alzheimers-death-clock-850331468783?source=linkShare-ea682af74f7c-1518009000
The shorts campaign on this stock is so unfair ... total manipulation last 10 min of trading today. Can't wait for some awesome good news to teach these people a lesson
Outdated and irrelevant
I think the reason for the fall in stock price is simple. The company PR is focused on the big picture of finding 'the cure' for AD and the MO of Bryostatin does suggest promise in that regard. This is what investors were hopping for from the Phase 2 data and they were naturally disappointed.
From the scientific perspective, the study does prove important aspects of Bryostatin MO in regrowing synapses and in crossover of results observed in mice to humans. This is a huge step in finding a cure and perhaps other studies of longer duration or in combination with other drugs could produce the actual miracle cure everyone is hopping for. This is why the company presented the results as positive. The efficiency results of the current study however were not dramatic enough to support a believable big picture 'cure' narrative, not at least to the average investor. To these investors who were expecting a simple 'cure', the hypothetical implications of the study are all way to much pie in the sky and in fact presenting the modest efficiency results as a potential cure comes across as spin.
On the other hand the study results do clearly demonstrate that Bryostatin at 20 m is safe and does help very advanced AD patients improve cognition and quality of life in a way that is useful to both patients a care givers. If based on those results a Phase 3 is likely to be approved and a Bryostatin can be brought to market in the near future as a useful drug for advanced AD patients, this would make NTRP into a multi-billion dollar company. This narrative, if true, is realistic and supported by Phase 2 data and I believe would justify a current stock price of 5X to 10x of what it is now.
Yes, in the future, studies may show that Bryostatin is actually a pathway to a real cure, but those future studies would be a lot more likely to happen if the company would communicate a clear and believable narrative of how Bryostatin can be brought to market for even advanced AD patients based on current Phase 2 data on efficiency.
What we have with NTRP is the opposite of Spin and pump, which is equally unfair to investors. The data here seems strong with a clear path to market. There is a compelling case to be made, but the company is failing to to tell its story in a clear and coherent way. If it did, this stock would be trading at 5x or even 10x current value. I think if it would be great if a group of investors who have taken the time to look into the science of NTRP, would be granted a Q&A with Dr. Alkon and have a chance get mere insight into both the data and company strategy. A more coherent and clear narrative could be a game changer. Would anyone be interested to join in making a request for such a Q&A session?
Just heard that a $3 mil private placement was announced at the conference, but I can't find the link. Does anyone have info?
Seems to me like they have a simple and brilliant strategy which happens to maximize current share holder value. Focus on short duration improvement for advanced AD will get this drug to market fast and cheap. On Phase 2b data FDA should have no issue approving Phase 3 at 20 m for either 13 or 26 weeks, either way they will have a drug to market in about a year. With 25 mil in cash and 1 mil shares in reserve seems like they have all they need to get it done. Even a deal in place to produce the drug.
Once you have that massive cash flow, other applications and studies can follow.
For a company accused of pump and dump, there doesn't seem to be much pump and good PR coming from the company. Possible reason could be that they have the cash they need for Phase 3 and don't much care about current SP.
They need to first bring a drug to market. That's the smart approach. The reality is that most effective cures are not one drug miracle pills. AIDS is treated with a cocktail of drugs all at just the right dose, Chemo for cancer is a complicated proses involving alternating several drugs at very specific doses and intervals. It's hard to get this right, without extensive trial and error. The FDA trial process is rigid and expensive. It becomes much easier once a drug is in legal use with real patients. I think that's their goal in first getting approval for advanced AD, given the clear benefit and safety seems like they will get it done.
Seems like the 20 m dose has a significant effect for severe AD patients. No safety issues. No miracle cure either, but seems ridiculous to say it's a failure.
I'm no expert, but seems like the data is positive in terms of FDA approval for Phase 3 and a solid market for the drug. Miracle cure it's not, at least not yet, but most commercially successful drugs aren't miracle cures
Thoughts anyone ?
Heard there is a PR. Can't find it. Anyone see it? Care to share the link
Do you know what the protocols are in terms of when we would hear any news?
Heard that the abstracts can only be released post presentation. Guessing there must be rules for this conference, otherwise they would stream live.
Big presentation, would be nice if someone would at least do a Facebook live from their iPhone :) AAIC is a serious forum, so guessing there are protocols against that or something.
Is there a live stream for this presentation?
What's also interesting to me is why isn't anyone talking about the already established short term impact. Yes, we all hope and pray for reversing AD and a magic cure. But a drug doesn't need to be that, for it to sell. It just needs to help some % of patients in a valuable, some of the time and do more good then harm.
It seems like at the very least it's an established fact that a dose of Bryostatin has an immediate effect of taking an advanced AD patient who is effectively in a non-responsive vegetative state and awakening them to a degree where they can have a conversation with their loved ones. Perhaps a last few weeks of conversations. Isn't that in itself valuable enough for this drug to be useful?
Yes, it seems like it's really much more then that. It seems based on the science that AD is actually reversed. But if the question is whether Bryostatin and NTRP have value, isn't there value just in the immediate proven impact?
This is all way to much ridiculous misinformation. Bryostatin has an incurably strong safety record with over 1500 patients in Cancer studies. Given the horrible and hopeless state of advanced AD patients it's ridiculous to say that it wouldn't be prescribed.
The other drug you mention is totally irrelevant; it's a totally different MO, not a competitor, doesn't regrow synapses and reverse AD, not addressing advanced AD patients, offering no real hope for anything but delaying symptoms of onset and with unresolved safety issues.
You are right from the grand picture perspective. But in terms of NTRP SP, what matters is that even with a small efficiency for late stage AD the drug has a huge multi billion dollar market.
The value of SP is calculated at annual sales x3 (think it takes into account the fact that other drugs can come to market in time, hence we only count on 3 years sales)
Back of envelope: say 1 million AD patients in the US (out of a total of 5 million) @ $10k per patient per year (I saw $18k per year potential price, so being conservative) = $10 billion per year annual sales x3 years = $30 billion company value = about $3k per share SP.
This doesn't take into account sales in the rest of the world. Doesn't take into account other applications like Fragile X. Also, there is no fundamental reason in the MO why we should assume the drug will not impact early stage AD. It simply hasn't been tried for early stage, but we would assume that once approved for late stage, they will do trials on early stage.
$250 mil would be something like a 5x jump in the SP. .. in terms of immediate impact of positive data .. that would seem like a healthy and conservative range.
But depending on how good the data is, doesn't seem impossible to go up much higher. Given the need for the drug, the hopeless condition of advanced AD patients and already proved safety .. would seem like it would be fast tracked by the FDA and have BP parters all over it..
Looked over the facts and it just seems so logical to expect good news on the 19th!
1. The AAIC is the top scientific conference for AD. The presentations need to be accepted in a highly vetted, peer reviewed and competitive process based on Scientific merit.
2. Even though the PR press release just states that 'data' is being presented. The actual title in the conference schedule is 'Bryostatin-1 Improves Cognition and Daily Living Tasks.. https://ep70.eventpilot.us/web/planner.php?id=AAIC17lite . It seems logical to assume that this title had to be approved by a panel of scientists who actually saw the data to be presented and felt that this was the most appropriate way to describe the presentation. The title of the presentation is buried deep in the conference scheduling app, it wasn't publicized to pump stock.
3. On the Conference call in May, Dr. Alkon mentioned that the 17 week data seemed to trend in a positive direction and that results are being processed to be presented at a conference soon. If there was no positive trend to report, it would be counterproductive to mention anything. This would all seem to fit together well.
Even without an improvement for efficiency and P value at 17 weeks, the FDA would be hard pressed not to approve a Phase 3 study since pre set study end points were met for Phase 3, some trends for efficiency were shown and there are no serious safety issues. The company would seem to be on track to produce a much needed drug and its value should dramatically increase. But with an improvement in P values and efficiency at 17 weeks, would seem logical that NTRP would be worth billions overnight.
The data is powerful.. strong science behind MO + animal studies + CU patients who are way to well documented to be faked + the up trend at 12 weeks in Phase 2 while not definitive in terms of P values, is never the less strong and fits into the science behind the MO. It seems like we could continue that trend in efficiency at 17 weeks and beyond. That would be a total home run!
If you are looking at small biotech's working to bring drugs through the FDA process. Most fail. This is high risk vs high reward investing. With NTRP you could have a 20x jump in the stock price all triggered by a little extra data released in two weeks. If that kind of upside didn't come with risk, then making money on these investments would be easy. No one is saying this is easy. You need to be comfortable with the risk.
Sounds like ICR guides pre and post IPO bio techs in stuff like PR and investor relations: http://www.icrinc.com/sector/healthcare/
They seem quite big and respected in the field. 15 billion in transactions. This seems like a reaction to the fiasco with the last press release. This kind of respected firm is exactly the kind of counsel NTRP needs. As much as the science behind NTRP was always solid, the PR and investor relations were a bit amateur. Hope this will now be corrected.
For advanced AD that is a very significant response. Keeping in mind as well that the whole MO of the drug is to reverse disease and not just treat sometimes. Also, as with any drugs some patients will respond very strongly as we saw with the CA patients and others minimally. The stats are an average and make it hard for a lay person to appreciate the true significance. When it comes to a terminal illness like AD or cancer drugs which offer hope to even a small % of patents are regularly approved.
I.E. incredibly toxic chemo drugs which only offer a 15% improvement over doing nothing become the standard of care despite incredibly harsh side effects and even risk of death.
With Bryostatin there are no chemo like side effects and the safety record is strong, so the efficiency bar for approval is quite low
like
The science is solid, animal studies show very strong results, the CA patents at 26 weeks improved remarkably, the p2 patients at 12 weeks seem to show trend towards improvement and we can hope that the 17 week data will be presented on July 19th at a major AD conference. We also know the drug is safe from all the past cancer studies. For severe AD would be hard to imagine the FDA not approving any drug which shows some improvement and is safe.
This stock is obviously risky, the same as any bio stock bringing a single drug through the FDA process. But with that risks comes incredible potential reward, given that potential the stock price seems very undervalued.
Been following the stock fluctuations closely and PR. Not much of an effort to pump and no patterns of small stock bids to influence stock price positively. There do seem to be short sellers who have a very organized campaign to bid down the stock price.
I believe the shorts and very nervous and rightly so.
As for stock price, there were and are very strong reasons for this stock to be at $28 or even higher given the incredible potential. Seems like on July 19, even a small improvement on 17 week data could give a 10x jump. That's a huge oprotunity if you as me!
Anyone who has done the least bit of research can find that Dr Akelon is an incredibly well respected scientist in AD research. NTRP not only went thorough the very rigorous process of being listed on the NASDAQ, they also received huge grants from non-profits such as the Fragile X foundation. This is an incredibly difficult and competitive process in which the company and the research is scrutinized for its scientific research and financial structure. Beyond all that the papers on NTRP Bryostatin research were published in top scientific journals with review and collaboration of the most respected researchers in the field.
The blogger holds short positions in NTRP, he clearly states that. His clear intention is profit and I'm pretty sure he represents a group working to manipulate the stock. Most of the info is irrelevant hype.
What in the world do past cancer trials have to do with AD or Fragile X? If anything these past trials just lay the ground work in proving that the drug is safe.
We had excellent results with CA and promising Phase 2 results at 12 weeks. The big question is whether the trend and P values continue to improve at 17 weeks. If yes, this stock will sky rocket instantly. Even without up trend at 17 weeks, the promising improvement at 12 weeks the FDA may still give approval, given the safety record and clear benefit to some patients. Borderline low P values are mainly an issue if there were safety concerns or if there are much better options. With advanced AD, any drug which is safe and may be helpful stands a very strong chance of being approved.
Must be, how in the world would one instantly find that many shares to buy all at the same price.
I though prearranged large trades like this didn't go through the regular trading system.
Does this mean anything in particular ?
Someone just bought 188k shares @ $7.54.. that's a nice % of the company. Thought such moves were made outside the regular trading system.
Curious why late July?
Isn't the 17 w data + FDA meet on Phase 3 more likely? That's what was mention on the conference call.
Looks like some before and some after with no one selling, just buying.
This is what I think the company's strategy is with short Phase 2 and why the big guys are staying in.
If you read the study, seems like there is an immediate strong impact with each dose in the first hour, then tapering down and then slow build up over long periods. The 3 EA patients were at 25 mg for 26 weeks, with incredible transformations. Phase 2A was just one dose. Phase 2b was 12 weeks. Phase 2A and B studies were not designed to test efficiency, but to test dosing and prove safety, which is whats needed to get FDA approval for Phase 3. By not doing a 26 week Phase 2b they cut development time and cost tremendously, a great value for investors who are here for the long game. The company has $25 mil in the bank and hence the immediate SP doesn't impact operations. Saving time though allows them to preserve maximum share holder value long term, if they could get through Phase 3 without major dilution. Just my highly unprofessional observations, would love to hear if others agree.
Thanks! All makes sense now. Thank you to everyone who responded. This board is developing into a great community of intelligent investors. So refreshing!
Have a question, would appreciate it, if anyone can help explain. This lists https://fintel.io/sob/us/ntrp HBC as buying 5.7 mil shares which seems bigger then the whole float. Yet, on HBC 13G https://fintel.io/i13d/hudson-bay-capital-management-lp it says those 5.7 mil shares are 2.65% of NTRP. I'm assuming that these are some kind of special shares. Does anyone know how this works?
Latest on institutional buyers moving in: https://fintel.io/sob/us/ntrp Institutional ownership way up.
Only buys - no sells.
So ridiculous to call this a P&D. The value of this stock is based on the probability of Bryostatin success, you are buying a possible future, not a current reality. Same as TESLA or SNAP in the tech sector or all small cap Biotechs taking drugs through the FDA process. Its about taking a calculated risk, based on viable theory of how a particular company may be able to bring a currently none existent and unproven reality of into being and make money. The massive difference here is that, while with Tesla or Snap, there is no one piece of news which could come out tomorrow and conclusively validate the current sp valuation and on the other hand are there countless variables which may prevent that valuation from materializing. Here we are one small piece of news away from this being $100 or even $1000 per share. If tomorrow, `17 week data shows continued improvement of a point or two.. bang its a home run. If it doesn't, there are still countless variables of how this drug could prove efficiency. I.E. spesific groups of patients or in combination with other drugs etc.. The company has $25 mil in the bank and more then a million shares in reserve without the need for dilution, plenty of room to maneuver. So yes, this is a stock which could go down by 50% one day and go up 5000% on another day. That all depends on research results, and anyone investing in such a company needs to have a stomach for that kind of volatility.