Replies to post #32766 on Marker Therapeutics Inc (MRKR)

[Phantom Lord]

I'm going to start by saying I don't believe they will execute the full deal. At least I certainly hope they don't. My reasoning for this is that they had the same type of deal in place with Aspire Capital that expired in September. It was for $30M and if I remember correctly they only used about $6M of the deal.

That being said, IF they do execute the whole thing for the full $25M (we would need SP of ~$10 for that to happen since the deal does have a limit on shares) it SHOULD be enough cash to take them into Q2 of 2024. If they keep managing their cash position it might make it into Q3 but that's stretching it.

If what I was told is to be believed then the plan is to get the lymphoma trial up and running this quarter so that they can have a data readout by the end of the year. That's all that was said but the implication was clearly that if that data readout impresses and the SP increased then they will do the offering then. To get to that point though they need about $10M-$15M extra cash. The LPC deal can provide this bridge.

They did publicly say last year that they were exploring other options for financing including looking internally at their board. As incompetent as management may seem they know that this LPC deal does not provide them with enough funding. My opinion is that they are still exploring other financing options and did the LPC deal to provide some flexibility. I really hope they don't execute the full deal and like I said earlier I don't believe they will. Best case scenario they come up with better financing and don't execute on any of the LPC deal.

I don't think the new trials are really going to have a major effect on their cash burn. Obviously they will cost money but they will be smaller than the AML trial. Remember the entire AML trial is only going to cost ~$25M of which $15M is funded via grants. I expect the lymphoma and pancreatic trials will come in at maybe half of what the AML trial will cost. So about $10M-$12M if that. It might even be less since these trials should be considerably smaller than the AML trial.

Regardless of the LPC deal and even if they are able to get more funding I fully expect we see a secondary offering this year. I just don't see a way around it. The question is do they make it to the lymphoma readout before they do it. They are playing a dangerous game with their cash position right now.