Replies to post #228198 on NorthWest Biotherapeutics Inc (NWBO)

[GoodGuyBill]

But he also never sold his shares and he also trivialized the p5 report but I bet you don't remember that.

[GoodGuyBill]

If NW said that his investment in NWBO was an "error in judgement" then why has he not divested his NWBO position during the many months the stock was falling from $12 to 14 cents? Did he not have a fiduciary responsibility to get out? He didn't and he still hasn't.

Normally I would agree with you to "Believe him" but the fact that he continued to hold his position for numerous months (close to a whole year) while the stock fell from $12 to 14 cents suggest that his original rationale for investing in NWBO is still holding true. The recent UNPRECEDENTED interim blended data, 60+ renown medical experts like LL, Ashkan and others supports my position.

Also, what else could NW say: "I tried to go "Mano a mano" with lp and got b-slapped, stomped and kicked down a flight of stairs" (figuratively speaking of course). No he made up that bs about the p5 report/Governance issue--both of which existed months before he mention them in his sorry excuse.

Now your turn: what supporting information can you provide to justify your position that NW invested almost $200 million in NWBO without doing even basic due diligence and, after the fact, concluded he had made an "error of judgement" and after 4 years later still hasn't sold one damn share! That's one hell of a way to address a $200 million judgement error, wouldn't you say? :)

Woodford has publicly stated that his investment in nwbo was an "error in judgment".

You say this UK sage couldn't possibly fail at due diligence. Well, he has publicly admitted exactly that. Which of course 100% supports my analysis of the events.

Woodford screwed up.

Woodford publicly admitted screwing up.

Believe him instead of constructing some elaborate conspiracy theory.

[biosectinvestor]

Link and timing please. If you can't produce it, it's an unprovable assertion. Like most things said on most bulletin boards.

Some of us believe that he had plans for the company and part of his behavior had to do with those alternative plans, not just as an "investor". But go ahead, present the timing, link and details rather than asserting broadly without it. Otherwise it's just generic, disconnected blather.

Things change. And some people's motivations are not always apparent.

And, had he "made a mistake", he would have had a fiduciary duty to sell asap. So as I've always said and someone else just said, the fact that he did not sell, completely undercuts this argument.

Fund managers have to protect the interests of their fund investors. It's not his personal interest. Its a fiduciary duty, and it's very serious. If he truly believed what you suggest, he'd have had a duty to sell asap.

[gropgrip]

Neil Woodford
17 Jan 2017 at 3:09 pm
Hi Mark,

Thank you for your comment. As you and many of our investors are aware, we based our original decision to invest in Northwest Biotherapeutics on its compelling science and its unique approach to harnessing the immune system to fight cancer. Clearly, since then, things have not proceeded as we had hoped they would but, thus far, we have not seen anything that would contradict our original hypothesis.

There are always many factors to consider when making an investment decision and my 30+ years of managing money have taught me many things, not least that you never stop learning from the investment decisions that you make. As I said at WPCT’s AGM in the summer, the decision to invest in Northwest was not an error in due diligence but an error of judgement on my part.

Every investment decision involves making judgements about risks and judgements about potential rewards and I have certainly learnt lessons from this episode. From the outset, I was aware of the potential governance issues at the company, but I underestimated the extent of them. Furthermore, I overestimated our ability to influence change at the company. We will always do everything that we can to ensure positive long-term outcomes for our investors, but this case study suggests that it is not always enough. The governance issues at Northwest Biotherapeutics have continued to conspire to shred investor confidence in the business.

Northwest has periodically raised further finance over the course of the last year or so, the proceeds of which we presume are being applied to continuing with the trials. We have not participated in any of these fundraisings and we still await a response to the investigation that we called for in late 2015. We have not had any meaningful contact with the Board for some time.

In a very recent press release, the company stated that it had completed the Phase III glioblastoma registration trial even though it had not been able to recruit the final 17 patients because of a regulatory intervention that the company never shed any light on. The total number of patients in the trial of 331 should, according to the company, be enough to power the study. We await the results of this study as well as the results of other studies, which have yet to read out.

From here, we wait and retain hope that at least one of the trials reads out positively. This is something which, given events, we would apply a lower probability to now but, nevertheless it is certainly possible.

Regards
Neil