Allan: whatever happened to SPOOZ? Do you still follow PVCT? Is it a stock that still interests you?
Re: NNVC, I'd like to make a comment on speculating in biotech companies. Following this blog for so many years, I get the impression at least some readers who follow Allan's advice think NNVC is a sure thing. They buy more when the stock falls heavily, and regret that they didn't buy enough when it shoots up. I have a core speculative position in NNVC, but in my mind I had already written off the dollar amount spent acquiring those shares, and here's the essence why: A few nights ago I revisited some old documents pertaining to an investment (via private placement) I had made 9-10 years ago in a biotech company that started up in '97. The bottom line is my shares are worthless as the company was dissolved after burning cash for some 6-7 years. Such is the nature of biotech investment. The company had a strong existing research product, a pipeline of several potentially megalucrative HIV-related products all backed by a few very strong patents. It ran out of cash after "real world" problems prevented it from exploiting a manufacturing plant it built that was meant to kick start a lucrative marketing deal with Fischer Scientific. Unfortunate problems with the core physical asset, the plant, physical and legal, derailed the project. There was a big change in management towards the end, but they saw no way of keeping the creditors at bay, I guess. The plan was to go public in 2001 but 9/11... an IPO could have changed the course of that company's history. I have some history investing in biotech. I believe, and this may be a truism of investing in general, that a lot of luck is involved, maybe serendipity too. I have a couple of biotech-related degrees and I'm not sure if that helps either. FWIW, pre Nasdaq crash I'd invested in a few biotech companies I identified as long term holds after much meticulous research and even familiarity with people inside these companies. A few disappeared or ended up penny stocks. One did relatively well until its collapse early last year, probably foreshadowing the result breast cancer gene patent case of a few weeks ago...
What I've learned (about myself?) is that what sucks the most is losing money in a fraudulent "venture." I don't think NNVC is that, so whatever happens, happens. I lost money on SPZI but I won't blame Allan. I thought it was an interesting speculative play, and definitely did not average down. I hate buying on the way down unless it's an explicit part of a legitimate trading strategy. See Allan Gartman here. I thank Allan for producing this blog even if I don't believe in EW, and am not a subscriber, because I don't trade stocks...
btw, Anonymous, thanks for reminding me of the greatness of Stephen Crane.
But dont you also see the evolutionary aspect of medical and scientific research that has taken place between 1999 and 2010 ? How does that fit into your thinking?
Just as an analogy...what if your post was about gold exploration.... and the years and events you were talking about was western USA 1845...and you post said..."I went out west,panning for some gold,in 1845.I found a few bits of silver in nevada but mostly nothing and then upon some rumors(trappers and fur traders who talked to indians who said they saw gold in the streams in california) you went to california but only found a few nuggets ,in 1847...and so you decided its alot of work and alot of risk,etc... and then...in 1848,after you left....somebody made a breakthrough discovery.
@ 2:53 PM I've got my own biotech basket of stocks that I regularly invest in. Always on the lookout for interesting startups, preIPO. To answer your first couple of questions, Yeah, in fact, I'm very big on companies like CGEN.
Crane belongs to a genre of literature known as Naturalism (19th & early-20th Century). Principally an American genre (e.g., Nathaniel Hawthorne, Stephen Crane, Theodore Dreiser, Frank Norris, and to some extent Steinbeck, e.g., "Tortilla Flats"), but also found in Thomas Hardy (English) Return of the Native and Gustav Flaubert (French) Madam Bovary. Literary Naturalism varies from Hardy's & Crane's Cosmic Naturalism (providence, fate, chance) to Dreiser's Spencerian Naturalism (chemism, darwinism, historicity). Later on, Naturalism developed into the 20th Century's Magic Realism (Brazil's Gabriel Marquez).
***** But I digress. *****
The question the Naturalist writer is always addressing is not an existential one, but a cosmological one. Namely, "what is man's place in the universe given the uncertainty whether his actions willful or determined?"
* * This is pertinent to the Market Trader who daily encounters a stock market wrought with PPT manipulation and it all seems predetermined by these Operators.
Theodore Dreiser (who's Titan trilogy, incidentally, detailed a life similar of the J P Morgan) would ask of us tonight the following question:
So what if the PPT and Fed Reserve are manipulating the markets. Ask yourself: what is manipulating them? For they too are subjects of nature whatever it is.
Only thing is they don't know it, for pride and ego have blinded them. The market will eventually get the better of them just like it did the geniuses at LTCM in 1998.
ps. sorry for the longish posts, but Karl Denninger posted this afternoon indicating he is flummoxed by the stock market's lack of risk factor calculation. And so, a philosophical appetite is present in the blogosphere this night, and it wants rumination.
9 comments:
Thanks for the ideas.
Allan:
whatever happened to SPOOZ?
Do you still follow PVCT? Is it a stock that still interests you?
Re: NNVC, I'd like to make a comment on speculating in biotech companies. Following this blog for so many years, I get the impression at least some readers who follow Allan's advice think NNVC is a sure thing. They buy more when the stock falls heavily, and regret that they didn't buy enough when it shoots up. I have a core speculative position in NNVC, but in my mind I had already written off the dollar amount spent acquiring those shares, and here's the essence why:
A few nights ago I revisited some old documents pertaining to an investment (via private placement) I had made 9-10 years ago in a biotech company that started up in '97.
The bottom line is my shares are worthless as the company was dissolved after burning cash for some 6-7 years. Such is the nature of biotech investment.
The company had a strong existing research product, a pipeline of several potentially megalucrative HIV-related products all backed by a few very strong patents. It ran out of cash after "real world" problems prevented it from exploiting a manufacturing plant it built that was meant to kick start a lucrative marketing deal with Fischer Scientific. Unfortunate problems with the core physical asset, the plant, physical and legal, derailed the project. There was a big change in management towards the end, but they saw no way of keeping the creditors at bay, I guess.
The plan was to go public in 2001 but 9/11... an IPO could have changed the course of that company's history.
I have some history investing in biotech. I believe, and this may be a truism of investing in general, that a lot of luck is involved, maybe serendipity too.
I have a couple of biotech-related degrees and I'm not sure if that helps either.
FWIW, pre Nasdaq crash I'd invested in a few biotech companies I identified as long term holds after much meticulous research and even familiarity with people inside these companies.
A few disappeared or ended up penny stocks. One did relatively well until its collapse early last year, probably foreshadowing the result breast cancer gene patent case of a few weeks ago...
What I've learned (about myself?) is that what sucks the most is losing money in a fraudulent "venture."
I don't think NNVC is that, so whatever happens, happens. I lost money on SPZI but I won't blame Allan. I thought it was an interesting speculative play, and definitely did not average down. I hate buying on the way down unless it's an explicit part of a legitimate trading strategy. See Allan Gartman here.
I thank Allan for producing this blog even if I don't believe in EW, and am not a subscriber, because I don't trade stocks...
btw, Anonymous, thanks for reminding me of the greatness of Stephen Crane.
Interesting thoughts,Khalid ...
But dont you also see the evolutionary aspect of medical and scientific research that has taken place between 1999 and 2010 ?
How does that fit into your thinking?
Just as an analogy...what if your post was about gold exploration.... and the years and events you were talking about was western USA 1845...and you post said..."I went out west,panning for some gold,in 1845.I found a few bits of silver in nevada but mostly nothing and then upon some rumors(trappers and fur traders who talked to indians who said they saw gold in the streams in california) you went to california but only found a few nuggets ,in 1847...and so you decided its alot of work and alot of risk,etc...
and then...in 1848,after you left....somebody made a breakthrough discovery.
@ 2:53 PM
I've got my own biotech basket of stocks that I regularly invest in. Always on the lookout for interesting startups, preIPO.
To answer your first couple of questions, Yeah, in fact, I'm very big on companies like CGEN.
wanna swap lists?
heres a few of mine
BTIM
ISCO
NNVC
GERN
CUR
AVXL
WKBT
I also bought GNVC a day before it Tanked and lost me 2 thousand.
MSBT.OB
It's going to be big
khalid @ Stephen Crane
Crane belongs to a genre of literature known as Naturalism (19th & early-20th Century). Principally an American genre (e.g., Nathaniel Hawthorne, Stephen Crane, Theodore Dreiser, Frank Norris, and to some extent Steinbeck, e.g., "Tortilla Flats"), but also found in Thomas Hardy (English) Return of the Native and Gustav Flaubert (French) Madam Bovary. Literary Naturalism varies from Hardy's & Crane's Cosmic Naturalism (providence, fate, chance) to Dreiser's Spencerian Naturalism (chemism, darwinism, historicity). Later on, Naturalism developed into the 20th Century's Magic Realism (Brazil's Gabriel Marquez).
***** But I digress. *****
The question the Naturalist writer is always addressing is not an existential one, but a cosmological one. Namely, "what is man's place in the universe given the uncertainty whether his actions willful or determined?"
* * This is pertinent to the Market Trader who daily encounters a stock market wrought with PPT manipulation and it all seems predetermined by these Operators.
Theodore Dreiser (who's Titan trilogy, incidentally, detailed a life similar of the J P Morgan) would ask of us tonight the following question:
So what if the PPT and Fed Reserve are manipulating the markets. Ask yourself: what is manipulating them? For they too are subjects of nature whatever it is.
Only thing is they don't know it, for pride and ego have blinded them. The market will eventually get the better of them just like it did the geniuses at LTCM in 1998.
the movie Top Gun anthem
ps. sorry for the longish posts, but Karl Denninger posted this afternoon indicating he is flummoxed by the stock market's lack of risk factor calculation. And so, a philosophical appetite is present in the blogosphere this night, and it wants rumination.
Since the beginning of this 2010 rally, the DJIA has diverged from the rising US$. This has happened twice in the past, but not for long.
DJIA:US$ vs. DJIA chart
something to keep in mind while Euro falls vs. US$ (at least for now).
Allan,
The Euro (6e #f) tracks really well. I use a 5, 3.5 setting on ATR. Has been fantastic the last 2 years. Your 7,4 would work equally well
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