Investing in biotech stocks - My experience so far

BrockStoker

Bill Gates (The Bill and Melinda Foundation) is invested in Amyris, but not in Arrowhead as far as I'm aware. There are quite a few people on the ARWR YF MB who have 10's of K of ARWR shares, bought in the low single digits (in many cases) however, and are ARWR millionaires already. Some of these guys have decades investing in and/or working in the biotech sector, so they are worth listening to IMHO. A couple have even followed my lead and invested in AMRS too.

I've actually been playing catch up, and hadn't got round to reading the post moneyfoolish re-posted here as I'm still busy, but I devote at least a few tens of minutes every day to reading so I don't get totally left behind. More exited than ever for our prospects here.

Hope you are all well, and looking forward to the good times coming as I and other investors are!

moneyfoolish

Absolutely correct, BS. In fact, I read on the YF MB that Dicerna (DRNA) which I believe uses similar technology to ARWR (correct me if I'm wrong, BS) has an institutional shareholding of 83% whereas ARWR has only 66%, the rest being held by retail investors.

BrockStoker

The institutions have totally fudged it with RNAi, which is great for us since they will pile in after us, assuming everything goes to plan of course. Looking at how low trading volumes are, you have to wonder how squeezed the share price will get if all of a sudden people want to buy.

If you didn't already see it check out Tad's notes on the Jeffries fireside chat with CA - here's a tiny snippet:

"Enac data end of june
aat data at easl
data from nash end of june...well validated target
first precilincal for dux 4 end of june
first slug of hif2 data end of june early july...
end of summer dux 4 in clinic
apoc3 and ang3 end of summer
phase 2 studies as well as a phase 3 study in fcs
aat data at easl...a full data set"

It should be interesting to see how the share price reacts over the next few weeks - will it run up (as it seems to be doing today - good to see it back in the top ten percentage gainers on the scoreboard), and then sell off at the end of June, or will it be range bound till the data hits, and we get a big jump? Could be a bit of a mixture I suppose, and exactly what happens will depend on how the market takes the data. If the hints/suggestions are correct (tumors shrank so much that it made biopsies impossible), then some jaws should drop IMHO.. and share price could move significantly. With other good readouts at around the same time, anything is possible.

On another note, one company I've had my eye on for a few weeks, LWLG , but decided not to buy in the end (risky!!!), popped today - ha!

https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/LWLG?p=LWLG

BrockStoker

The writing was already on the wall, but Vertex has now formally dropped VX-864 ("competition" for ARO-ATT). ARWR up in after hours, and VRTX down, again - rinse and repeat.

Nice fireside chat too (see YF message board). I'm playing catch-up again, but sounds like ARO-COV is achieving knockdown to a high degree.

EVFM doing OK too, along with BNGO and AMRS. Portfolios starting to recover and gathering momentum one again. Hope everyone is doing OK, and enjoying the current run!

moneyfoolish

Things are improving BS. I'm now only a couple of percent down on ARWR but still about 20% down on AMRS. Also hoping the Innova scandal revealed today by the FDA means Avacta's LFT which is the best on the market will get some orders and consolidate it's share price. ARWR looking promising but like all biotechs can easily fall from grace if trials fail.

BrockStoker

@moneyfoolish - Yes, a biotech can easily tank with bad trial data. Keep in mind though, ARWR's TRiM platform does not follow the usual rules that conventional small molecule drugs follow. The chances are essentially stacked in ARWR's favor. I'm not saying they can't fail, but once we know it's already working, the chances that it will fall at a later hurdle is near microscopic. Good Amazing times are nearly here!

Hope you have some good Avacta news!

jjdc

Avacta looking good today. MHRA registration earlier in the week, approval to sell to europe today, so if they don't get a slice of the £8bn(!) tender award for the sovereign UK test, I'm sure Europe, and at some point the US will take them off our hands. Cash generated will ensure clinical trials of ava platform line, precision and other affimer targets can be accelerated (which is the real focus of the company, the covid test is a sales pitch for affimers) , this is the type of share that comes around once a decade. Now we have approvals, and 3rd party validation, the risk is lowered at this SP. Add in the innova scandal and its looking good, Raymond, its looking very good.

All going well, I see £20+ sp by end 2023, assuming they aren't bought out before then.

BrockStoker

@jjdc good to hear. Not sure about the "once in a decade" bit, but if their tech is up to scratch then they should at least be able to keep up with the pack.

What's stealing the show for me today is EVFM. A bit of free publicity from the NY Times, and up 25%+ intraday on big volume. Some serious momentum building there it looks like.

moneyfoolish

BrockStoker said:

@moneyfoolish - Yes, a biotech can easily tank with bad trial data. Keep in mind though, ARWR's TRiM platform does not follow the usual rules that conventional small molecule drugs follow. The chances are essentially stacked in ARWR's favor. I'm not saying they can't fail, but once we know it's already working, the chances that it will fall at a later hurdle is near microscopic. Good Amazing times are nearly here!

Hope you have some good Avacta news!

I have to say that the more I read about ARWR, the more positive I feel. Also, I think there are a lot of very knowlegeable stock holders on the Yahoo board who have been investing in this stock for many years and understand the science very well. The fact that they are becoming so confident is encouraging as some of them have been holders and accumulating for 20 years and more. Avacta went up 18% today but that only takes me to a level position! As with ARWR, AWRS and EVFM, I bought at almost the height of the market a few months ago. However, I am now 5% up on ARWR but still 20% down on AMRS

moneyfoolish

jjdc said:

Avacta looking good today. MHRA registration earlier in the week, approval to sell to europe today, so if they don't get a slice of the £8bn(!) tender award for the sovereign UK test, I'm sure Europe, and at some point the US will take them off our hands. Cash generated will ensure clinical trials of ava platform line, precision and other affimer targets can be accelerated (which is the real focus of the company, the covid test is a sales pitch for affimers) , this is the type of share that comes around once a decade. Now we have approvals, and 3rd party validation, the risk is lowered at this SP. Add in the innova scandal and its looking good, Raymond, its looking very good.

All going well, I see £20+ sp by end 2023, assuming they aren't bought out before then.

I hope you're correct! My only concern on the LFT side is not the Avacta test itself as there seems to be no doubt it is the most accurate on the market but whether LFT tests are going to be used a great deal. Certainly, our Government seems to be going for vaccinations and I saw last week that a large group of EU countries are going to allow travel to each other based on having vaccinations without any testing at all. Lots of other opportunities for Avacta in other areas as well but it would be very nice to get a good SP increase based on LFT sales as a starter!