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In all fairness if anyone think that Bogey's "conservative" estimate that in the not too distant future that this company will be worth 600 BILLION DOLLARS, then by all means don't tender your shares as Mario or someone else will certainly offer $100 a share as a "starting" bid if Astellas walks away. lol
I just bought a Powerball Quick Pick Ticket for Wednesday and really don't think that my chances are all that much worse than seeing $100 a share than winning the Powerball.
Two minutes ago I received my first call ever from this solicitor group from a very polite young lady who explained the situation to me and asked me if I had any questions.
I told her that I have been a shareholder for ten years and understand everything which needs to ne known.
She didn't put any pressure on me at all.
She thanked me for my time and that was it.
To me it is no different than representatives for candidates calling people up prior to an election.
In short, I say so what, big freaking deal!
Imo to conclude that there is desperation on anyone's part based on all of this is insane and just more instance of the silly and illogical positive speculation and conclusions drawn over the last few years from future cc's such as announcing a JV, shareholder's meetings, what this speaking engagement of PW or that speaking engagement of PW will yield, the ad nauseam predicitions of when the NEJM article will come out and what it will say, blah, blah, blah and now Mario's presence-it gets old and boring!
Thus to conclude and summarize, I say that the track record of the conjecture, gossip, unfounded rumors and speculation cited above historically spaking has been totally PITIFUL since I have been a member which is ten years when the forum started,and I challenge anyone who disagrees with me to prove to me that what I have said above is not almost 100% true!!!
Again meaningless to me anyways as I never played nor had an interest in playing Bridge.
I could bring up some stuff about reverse line movement in sports gambling to make an analogy re: the present price of Ocata but won't bother as folks who aren't into wagering on sports and how the line can and will move/be influenced wouldn't understand it.
Sorry I don't play nor understand Bridge. but I do shop at Macy's and, understand how businesses operate and stand by what I said in my sarcastic analogy of the clearance item in a previous post.
In addition to what you rightfully say, perhaps someone can tell us if there were any other bidders/companies at this auction and if so, which I doubt, then how come there were no other competing bids for this "hot item?"
Imo at this jucture to say that $8.50 is an opening bid only for Ocata makes about as much sense as saying that a final clearance sales Summer item at Macy's which has been reduced from $89 to $10 to get rid of it and which has been sitting at that price for two months and still unsold, is now going to be/should be RAISED back up to $25 in a final attempt to sell the item. lol
You know its one thing to try to assess the subjective value of a painting or other work of art because beauty is in the eyes of the beholder so to speak and also dependent upon how much money folks with deep pockets are willing to pay to obtain this in order to meet this subjective and emotional need.
And yes to be fair there are those who would be interested in this painting/work of art only as an investment with the expectation that someday it would be worth more.
The dynamics change dramaticaly when one talks about a financial matter such as is the case with Ocata.
Yes the subjectivity still enters into the equation but only in a business sense, ie the amount one is willing to offer so as to put the odds in their favor that they can eventually turn a profit.
Thus while shareholders can put a multi billion dollar valuation on the company several years down the road if everything pans out(which thinking imo is quite biased/one sided because of their investment), potential suitors look at things in a much more objective way re:risk and reward and utilize a lot of different factors and standards of valuation in arriving at their decision.
Thus it seems clear to me that after several years of this company having been shopped around all over the country and world, that the powers that be have deemed that the company is worth $8.50 and that no one values it to be worth more than that other than biased shareholders.
Thus the problem at this juncture is for Astellas or possibly someone else to possibly move the price a little higher so that there will be the 50% +1 needed for the deal to be approved.
If this does not occur and/or Astellas walks away, I don't see other possible suitors changing their original assessments and getting into a bidding war-if the company was that highly thought of, imo Astellas or some other company would have offered more prior to now-for me it is as simple as that.
Imo the current $8.50 price reflects reality of what this company is worth now based on what is and NOT what could be years from now IF and a big IF if everything goes according to plan.
High School stars in varying sports rightfully don't usually receive anywhere near the salaries of PROVEN superstar professional untli/if/when they prove themselves I don't care how much potential they show; they need to prove they get it done on the professionl level against other proven players.
If Ocata was on the brink of marketability, well then yeah, then they might be entitled to a higher premium.
Unfortunately though that is far from the case, and the fact is that the company has all kind of testing and financial obstacles hurdles to overcome as well as very likely unforeseen competition moving forward.
Imo PW saw the light here and being the self serving jerk that he is, realized that $8.50 was a very generous offer indeed rather than what he deemed as long odds moving forward and advised the BOD to accept it.
I also believe that Lanza agrees with him and probably advised him of his overall appraisal of the long odds here of Ocata going at it on its own.
I got a chuckle out of this:
In his open letter to Mario, our buddy Bogey states his usual idiotic/moronic/delusionary and clueless dissertation with absurd numbers, but this time one of his own folks in essence tells him in so many words that what he says is completely out of touch with reality and to make sense for reasons stated.
Here is the segment I am talking about and the response which follows:
Bogey the Booger:
Ocata's AMD/SMD trials have been approved for phase 2 with Orphan, ATMP and pivitol status from the EMA approved for SMD. Within 12-24 months, data and results from phase 2 will be available and as you know this is typically when Big Pharma gets really interested and makes their move. The market opportunity for just AMD/SMD alone is well over $600B with over 30M in the US and UK afflicted with macular degeneration. It is important to note that losing ones sight is the second biggest fear people have next to getting cancer and today there is no real treatment or cure for AMD.
Response:
Dr Lanza has called the RPE cells the low hanging fruit. This means the easy one to work with. The value you give of $600,000,000,000 for treatment if true would break the bank and back of insurance programs. Why use numbers that put you in shreklies class? The medical change you describe by price for service is unaffordable. So why use those numbers when writing to a smart guy?
Imo I think there is a lot more than appropriately meets the "eye" as to why PW decided to sell with the BOD's consent-some of it had to do with self servig motives which in turn was affected by what he perceived as a very difficult road to hoe with the FDA which imo may have been made worse because of suspicions that the latter was in be with BP who felt that their precious profits would be threatened by what Ocata offered or could offer some day.
Also, you talk about those afflicted with AMD at the other forum.
Even if that is true and assuming that the folks I cited before were not pumpers, then equally as bad, imo many over there suffer from another form of blindness, the figurative type and one which to my knowledge at this time cannot be treated with any stem cell therapy.
Hmm-How come then no other BP company is either interested in acquiring and/or doing a jv with Ocata after at least several years, and that the highest and probably only bid they have been able to get comes from a Japanese Company?
I personally believe that while there is no crime involved, many of the posters at the forum with their insane $100 predictions and/or that Ocata is a slam dunk, etc., in many cases are nothing but self serving pumpers who know how and do write a convincing 100% one way optimistic posts.
The only person "paying" these folks are the posters themselves, ie "paying" themselves to try to convince others to try to get folks to buy to get the stock price higher while at the same time spreading false,unfounded rumors and gossip.
For me even though this is not punishable, imo this is where the real crime lies.
Its also been suggested that if he does gain control, he could take the company private.
ps It wouldn't shock me terribly if Astellas does raise the price to $9 or a little more if it is needed, but I can't imagine at this point that they or anyone else is going to engage in any kind of a bidding war-it is not like the company is on the brink of commercialization.
And now you know the rest of the story, or should I say the REAL truth and not the imagined and fabricated one!
I regard Mariano's overall involvment in this as a quick and easy flip/trading opportunity for some easy money, nothing more and nothing less.
I would love to be wrong for sure, but I have always called it as I see it.
A few years ago when it was alleged that then ACTC had defaulted on a loan, many in here thought that the company was on the edge of bankruptcy.
Yours truly thought that bk talk was a lot of hogwash and publicly stated that this would pass and things would get back on track.
You enjoy you evening also!
As I have said before, over the last few years especially, there has been so much wild positive speculation/gossip about future events regarding Ocata/PW(when he was thought to be the savior by some lol)and what he was going to say at this or that cc and/or at one of the stops on the ongoing traveling circus/roadshow and on and on and on, and NONE OF IT EVER CAME TRUE.
If this time is is different, it will be a first!!
Perhaps but I stand by what I just said in previous post.
Don't forget also that PW is a self serving/greedy SOB and imo if he felt he could have got more, he would have gone for it.
Of course there is nothing wrong with others feeling that more is needed.
My only point is that after all of these weeks, months and years, Ocata is still a long, long way to go before it even gets a product to market and imo is not in the driver's seat here.
Other BP companies obviously have big reservations for known and stated reasons for getting involved at all with Ocata at this poin,t and imo neither they not Astellas is going to go all out to buy this company at any cost.
Imo there would have been a lot more interest expressed than has been up to now if other companies were all that interested and/or in any hurry.
Again you hopefully are right but as an investor in this company for ten years and who has followed it closely during this time,it just seems to me that at this juncture, anything more than a $1 or so increase in the bid seems highly unlikely.
I also agree with Captain Kirk that a bump in price prior to the Jan. 21 deadline is pretty likely to get the 50 percent + 1 needed.
The only problem with that analysis is that initially they raised the offer $.10 form $8.40 to $8.50.
Thus I can't imagine them all of a sudden going up by $4.75-I would be shocked and happy if they raised it as much as $1.00.
I also disagree with the notion of a first offer as this company has been shopped around for at least a few years with nothing even close to $8.50, meaning imo that this is closer to a final offer than an opening one.
Ocata sold to billionaire Mario Gabellyup and to some internet chat site group led by some guy who goes by name of Bogey for $100 a share! lol
http://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/muscatinejournal.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/0/7a/07a0e129-489f-5b3d-9ece-356427aa524c/5473ce446e37e.image.jpg
I am "quite sure" that now since Mario has simply entered the fray, that all of the other BP companies who have been silent all of these months and who have not made any bid even close to $8.50, are all of a sudden going to jump in open arms to start wildly out of control bidding, which will leave $8.50 in the dust as new bids perhaps even up to Bogey's $100 a share for this slam dunk company with "ZERO" obstacles and financial hurdles to overcome and with a product to hit the market place in the "very forseeable future." Okie dokie. lol
Wow-what an eye opener-thanks!
Until/if proven otherwise, all things considered, I consider Mario's involvement here as for quick "lunch money" only(in all fairness a bit more than a Quarter Pounder With Cheese Meal).
Thanks kyrie for taking he time to respond to what I asked you-it helps, and I certainly do respect it.
Acually unlike many, I am actually ahead now after all of these many years of acccumulating as my average price is a little over $6.00.
As stated before, I still own 1/2 of my total max. number of shares and am going to wait until the last possible processing date before Jan. 21 to see if there are any new developments which would lead me to tender those shares rather than to sell them into the market.
If the deadline was this Monday, I would sell.
Here's our savior, folks.
Could his ten outstretched fingers perhaps mean $10 a share is coming our way?
http://www.valuewalk.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/mario-gabelli.jpg
Imo there comes a point in many cases where there is point of quickly diminishing return of tenacity and admiration for such if and when the former becomes a total blinders on obsession with a point of view which is clearly out of touch with reality and which becomes self defeating.
Here is the latest letter as posted at the other forum from Bogus/Bogie of the other forum, this one to Mario, the latest Hail Mary hope.
Keep in mind that Bogey/Booger has written to just about every BP Company and World Goverment on earth imploring them to buy Ocata as the Stock of a Lifetime with obviously no responses and/or positive ones or else I am sure he would have posted them.
Will this time be different and will Mario be in fact the White Knight who comes running over and makes how own bid to save Ocata shareholders from the Evil "Borg" Astellas which wants to assimilate Ocata into its empire or will he just yawn and consider it just one of the zillion letters I am sure he has received over the years from other advocates from other companies stating that their company is the stock of the century-stay tuned folks as the next exciting episode of Ocata Turns unfolds before your own EYES,that is if you are not appropriately in this case BLIND:
An Open Letter to Mario Gabelli
Mr. Gabelli,
First off, on behalf of myself and hundreds of Ocata Therapeutics retail shareholders we would like to congratulate and thank you for taking a +5% position in Ocata Therapeutics.
We hope that your interest is much more than an arbitrage play and as one of the world's best value players in the market today, that you too have recognized not only Dr. Lanza's brilliance but also how under valued his company is.
As I'm sure you know, Dr. Lanza is one of the top Regenerative Scientists in the world and his company with around 150 patents and pending patents control almost all cell types created from a blastomere and IPSC. They have 7 FDA approved clinical trials underway covering the US, UK and Korea, using uniquely derived RPE cells for the treatment of AMD/SMD/MMD, one of the world's largest unmet medical conditions, and to date are having great success as recent published results in the Lancet show. Including the reported "Cowboy patient" who went from legally blind 20/400 to able to get a driver's license with 20/40 vision within 60-90 days after a single injection, nearly 3 years ago.
Dr. Lanza and his team also have many published papers from pre-clinical studies where they have shown their MSC's have greatly reversed MS, Lupus and Crohn's disease in mice, rats and canines after a single injection. They have even shown using their patented Hemangioblast science, the ability to produce scalable, universal blood and platelets.
So yes hundreds of retail investors agree with your investment and insight that Ocata may be a true diamond in the rough.
Now comes the fun part. You have done many things in your life and at 72, I hope you might be looking for something very meaningful that you can leave the world and I hope by your recent investment that it might be to help propel Dr. Lanza's potentially curative science forward where billions of people will benefit in the decades to come.
But in order to do this a change in leadership within the company is critical IMO. As you know Astelles, a Japanese firm has a tender offer underway which will move this US born science of Dr. Lanza and all of the patents over to Japan's control. The vote count is currently a virtual tie with each side controlling about 36% of the outstanding shares based on your recent investment and what was published back in mid December so it is critical another 14% does not slide over to Astelles.
To gain control of this company we need around 6m more shares in the non tender column coupled with the current 15.3M shares that are a firm NO TENDER and hope between you and your peers that we can lock these final shares down, move forward with a new BOD, keep this American born science under the USA flag and get this science and these trials back on track.
As your history shows, you too recognize there are times when a company has a great product/solution but a change at the BOD and executive level is required for the company to reach its full potential and IMO this is one of those times so your leadership would be greatly appreciated in helping to bring about this change.
Ocata's AMD/SMD trials have been approved for phase 2 with Orphan, ATMP and pivitol status from the EMA approved for SMD. Within 12-24 months, data and results from phase 2 will be available and as you know this is typically when Big Pharma gets really interested and makes their move. The market opportunity for just AMD/SMD alone is well over $600B with over 30M in the US and UK afflicted with macular degeneration. It is important to note that losing ones sight is the second biggest fear people have next to getting cancer and today there is no real treatment or cure for AMD.
The loyal retail shareholder base that I mentioned which discusses and tracks Ocata's shareholder count daily is at Investor Stemcell and I encourage you to stop by, browse and post if you like.
I congratulate you for your vision and boldness and hope your motivation is not only to make money on your new investment but also be a catalyst for a game changing solution within the healthcare industry that can eventually help millions move away from their pill popping addiction and begin to bring about real cures for the world.
Thanks again for stepping up with your significant purchase and I truly believe with your help and Dr. Lanza's science we can help usher in real change within the healthcare industry.
Kind Regards,
BF
What one would like to know sometimes is secret, meaning that imo it is speculation/gambling to invest based only on one's assumptions which may prove to be false.
In a sense survivial of the fittest in the investing world and in many cases those with the most money.
More likely gamblers who are SPECULATING only that there might be a slightly higher bid to $9.00 to $9.50.
$100 a share talk again, uh-uh huh,yeah sure,right on-you might want to see if Bogus/Boogie the Booger from the other forum (the guy from the other forum who predicted that price for 2015)thinks that the $100 is now way too conservative.
Nothing is certain for sure, and that is why at least for now I am "playing it safe" by retaining 50% of my shares.
I just go to think though and as Captain Kirk has pointed out, the "big boys" involved in this deal for Ocata and Astellas are far from amateurs, have been through tis before, meaning that the chances are overwhelming that they will prevail even if they have to raise the offer price by a token.
Imo it is pretty difficult as the saying goes to beat these folks at their own game.
Unfortuntaely the stench pervades the entire investing community and imo is one of the reasons that most BP possible partners consider Ocata a pariah and are not interested in getting involved.
Sorry if it sounds like bragging, but it is too bad that the overwhelming number of shareholders didn't see as I and a few other posters saw very early in his tenure, that his despite his proclamations that he was going to restore shareholder value, that he was in actuality nothing more than a self serving/lying jerk!
If per chance Astellas were to raise the bid to $9.50 between now and Jan. 21, the tender would go through, and as Yankee announcer John Sterling would say in this instance, "Ball Game over, Astellas/Tender Offer wins, Astellas/Tender Offer WINS!!! lol
Are you saying that a drop of 50% or more in stock price down to $3 or $4 is no big deal.
Hmm-for me a drop for a shareholder who has equity of say $500,000 at $8.50 to be reduced to $250,000 if the stock price gets cut in half is nothing to sneeze at.
When you couple that possibility with how long it would take/if ever for the stock would ever recover to $8.50 while at the same time considering how much money would be lost in lost opportunity in better stocks/segments of the market which are pointed in a positive direction,the outlook becomes even more gloomy and worrisome.
That certainly is not a gamble I am going to take with any funds available whether they be discretionary or not.
I still think that PW, Lanza, Vincent and a number of other folks are aware of some really negative undisclosed information about Ocata which made this determination.
Most folks agree that is PW is a self serving, lying jerk.
Thus imo if he thought he could milk more money for himself at this juncture by not selling, he would not have-for me it is that simple.
Thanks for posting that-it simply corroborates what I have believed for a while and then some;it tells me that based on the facts which exist TODAY from someone obviously in the know, that the $8.50 or possibly a tad higher is all that the circumstances and the market deem this company to be worth all things considered.
Even though for reasons stated by Captain Kirk the tender will probably go through very soon at this price or a little higher,I am going to wait until the procesing deadline time to see if an increased bid adn if not, sell the remaining 50% of my shares into the open market.
Just the thought of Lanza alone going to Astellas no matter what the fate of Ocata is unsettling enough for me-how would the Cleveland Cavs do without Lebron James? lol
Thanks for that very enlightening explanation-that is what I was looking for in the question I asked in a previous post.
Imo investors are speculating, nothing more and nothing less.
This goes on all of the time in the market with mixed results at best.
Throwing anything but totally discretionary money at this stock at this juncture with the hopes of a much higher price by my standards is riverboat gambling.
Captain Kirk and Kyrie offered explanations you might want to consider.
My own opinion is that if folks knew ALL of the UNDISCLOSED reasons why PW sold and ALL of the UNDISCLOSED HUGE negative hurdles and obstacles remaining with the testing and financing, there might be a different overall tune whether it is wise to accept the $8.50 offer or not.
Lack of sustained financing to continue for a number of years, possibility of conducting tests with a hostile FDA which is in bed with BP , the latter which would rather see Ocata fail for its own personal gain, possibly being blindsided by a better technology someday from a company where funding is not an issue along with total scorn by many possible suitors imo are all reasons why the $8.50 bid seems like a gift.