Biotech Values

[jessellivermore]

Amarin's Huge Hidden Value....

AMRN's history up until Nov 29 2010 was a typical long term biotech loser with the usual funding, by equity sales profile..Then a "miracle" happened...They set out with the idea purified fish oil derived EPA with the DHA removed would produce less of a rise in LDL-C (a bad cholesterol) during Triglyceride (TGS) lowering than the naturally occuring EPA-DHA mix.

The miracle was there was no elevation of the LDL-C ...Since increasing LDL-C increases CAD risks...the non elevation is a good thing,, but it turns out this is not really the whole story...

Why is the non elevation such a surprise??? The answer lies in the minutiae of blood lipid chemistries...Cholesterol is not water soluable and must be protein bound in the bloodstream..TC stands for total cholesterol which is made up of several fractions depending on protein densities..Theses are VHDL-C..very high density lipoprotein...HDLC-C high density....LDL-C... low density...etc. General rule high density good, low density bad...

The confusion arises when the blood fractions are measured...Only TC and HDL-C are normally measured directly. Non HDL-C, which is not the same as LDL-C is measured by subtracting the HDL-C from TC...LDL-C is calculated from the FRIEDEWALD EQUATION...which is

LDL-C = TC - HLD-C - TG/5

A consequence of this equation is agents which lower trigs (TGs), in the absence of other factors, increase LDL-C. This has been the case in other TG lowering agents...

The important point in AMR101 is the only way pure EPA could lower TGs and not raise LDL-C is to either lower TC or raise HDL-C...both of which are statin like effects..This mean AMR101 posesses statin like effects in addition to its TG lowering properties and might be useful either to replace statins or to lower their requirements in certain clinical situations...Since EPA has a better safety profile, is better tolerated and is possibly cheaper.....

It is not clear either the company or the market understands this at present....

regards ":> JL