Good morning!
Last night, VHC received the final judgment in its court victory against Apple from last November. The jury award of $368M was confirmed, along with daily damages that total about another $18M+. Their request for an injunction (yes, an injunction against the iphone4 (!) amongst other products) was denied. The parties were ordered into mediation within 45 days to come up with a license for royalties – or else the judge will impose one. All in all, a clear win for VirnetX AND the trial against Cisco starts in two weeks – on the same patent suite, in front of the same judge who oversaw victories against Microsoft and Apple, and who used to be a software engineer.
Add to that this morning the USPTO reviewed and confirmed several core patents that VHC holds.
Uni-Pixel makes touchscreens and films that may represent an order of magnitude improvement in cost and flexibility for Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs). They have signed several agreements and licenses in the last few months (including Texas Instruments and an unnamed “major PC maker”).
The company had its 4Q12 earnings call last night and I expect good things for all of 2013 from this company. They are ramping up to production mode and have $5M in pre-orders already. Wall Street seems to be cheering them on today, with the price up 23% to the $23+ level.
Excellent news from both.
Best regards,
Trond Hildahl
--This is presented for educational and informational purposes only, and should not be construed as personalized legal, tax, investment, or financial advice. Stocks may lose value and this is not recommendation to buy or sell this particular issue.
Wednesday, February 27, 2013
Friday, February 22, 2013
Flip-flop on Celsion
It is no secret that I was an outspoken bull on Celsion for the last three years.
While I have quite a lot of sympathy for current shareholders, I personally am 100% out of the stock right now. I had a good exchange with a current bull, and thought it would make the basis for an interesting post.
---
Most important, first:
>>did you flip around and go short?
Nope - I never short.
At the absolute most if I am quite certain of a decline I'll buy puts. Don't *like* the idea or process of shorting - too many problems/games that can be played but I guess this is not the time or place for that. [TH - I have PLENTY of posts here over the years to illustrate my issues with shorting]
>>Did you ever consider that PFS in the control group as a whole was 14.4, BUT what if it is less in other subsets? Such as China's 200 patients? What if PFS in the China subset is only 12?
I considered it, and here's my take:
We had very convincing arguments that we'd be golden if PFS came in anywhere under 17 months or so. (Perhaps you'll recall that although I was extremely bullish my own continued mantra was we should expect around a 14:24 PFS. My control arm projection was almost spot on - but with "not even close" we obviously made some kind of dreadful miscalculation of the hazard ratio.)
So given that 14.4 wasn't close, I hold out very diminishing hopes that even a clear subset at 12 would have been stat-sig.
Add to that, that for a 200 patient subset to achieve 12 when the overall was 14.4, the ex-Chinese group would have been even worse than 14.4.
And the DMC at interim did not halt for failure, which if we weren't close at 14.4, with a subset of ~500 out of 600 at the time showing a 15+ PFS ... I propose that such a situation simply couldn't have happened.
And finally:
>>They will not go bankrupt. They have a lot of cash now, 2 ongoing trials, RCW is VERY promising, and probably what they should have focused on in the first place.....
You are right, BK is not going to happen. But massive dilution has happened, and that cash will disappear faster that you might think. ABLATE is only 80?? patients but they were slow to enroll to conserve cash for HEAT results. Gearing up now cost $. And that is ph2, which they were depending on good HEAT results to allow off-label. By itself ABLATE is not registrational. More money needed! And if you'll recall, even the BS BiotechSage admitted HCC ph1 looked decent and it was MLC and distant mets that posed the problem.
I agree that RCW may be the best shot. But they took ... so ... long ... to enroll even the ph1, I don't see the larger ph2 finishing with results anytime before 2016.
I put a HUGE amount of time, attention, and DD into the bull case. But I am always cogent about what might happen and once the "unthinkable" happened then I have to put credence in the bear case until proved wrong (again). The reward is definitely there, at this price, but the risk is, in my opinion, much worse.
GLTY
Trond
---
So there you go. I followed my principles and took my basis out in the $7s and $8s, but for three years, and the time and effort I put into this, I am not sure I "got my money's worth" here. Another lesson in the minefield called biotech.
Best,
Trond Hildahl
** This is presented for educational and informational purposes only, and should not be construed as personalized legal, tax, investment, or financial advice. My own resources, risk tolerance, and personal situation have been taken into consideration for any trades mentioned and should not be used as a basis for someone else's trades. Stocks may lose value and this is not recommendation to buy or sell this particular issue.
While I have quite a lot of sympathy for current shareholders, I personally am 100% out of the stock right now. I had a good exchange with a current bull, and thought it would make the basis for an interesting post.
---
Most important, first:
>>did you flip around and go short?
Nope - I never short.
At the absolute most if I am quite certain of a decline I'll buy puts. Don't *like* the idea or process of shorting - too many problems/games that can be played but I guess this is not the time or place for that. [TH - I have PLENTY of posts here over the years to illustrate my issues with shorting]
>>Did you ever consider that PFS in the control group as a whole was 14.4, BUT what if it is less in other subsets? Such as China's 200 patients? What if PFS in the China subset is only 12?
I considered it, and here's my take:
We had very convincing arguments that we'd be golden if PFS came in anywhere under 17 months or so. (Perhaps you'll recall that although I was extremely bullish my own continued mantra was we should expect around a 14:24 PFS. My control arm projection was almost spot on - but with "not even close" we obviously made some kind of dreadful miscalculation of the hazard ratio.)
So given that 14.4 wasn't close, I hold out very diminishing hopes that even a clear subset at 12 would have been stat-sig.
Add to that, that for a 200 patient subset to achieve 12 when the overall was 14.4, the ex-Chinese group would have been even worse than 14.4.
And the DMC at interim did not halt for failure, which if we weren't close at 14.4, with a subset of ~500 out of 600 at the time showing a 15+ PFS ... I propose that such a situation simply couldn't have happened.
And finally:
>>They will not go bankrupt. They have a lot of cash now, 2 ongoing trials, RCW is VERY promising, and probably what they should have focused on in the first place.....
You are right, BK is not going to happen. But massive dilution has happened, and that cash will disappear faster that you might think. ABLATE is only 80?? patients but they were slow to enroll to conserve cash for HEAT results. Gearing up now cost $. And that is ph2, which they were depending on good HEAT results to allow off-label. By itself ABLATE is not registrational. More money needed! And if you'll recall, even the BS BiotechSage admitted HCC ph1 looked decent and it was MLC and distant mets that posed the problem.
I agree that RCW may be the best shot. But they took ... so ... long ... to enroll even the ph1, I don't see the larger ph2 finishing with results anytime before 2016.
I put a HUGE amount of time, attention, and DD into the bull case. But I am always cogent about what might happen and once the "unthinkable" happened then I have to put credence in the bear case until proved wrong (again). The reward is definitely there, at this price, but the risk is, in my opinion, much worse.
GLTY
Trond
---
So there you go. I followed my principles and took my basis out in the $7s and $8s, but for three years, and the time and effort I put into this, I am not sure I "got my money's worth" here. Another lesson in the minefield called biotech.
Best,
Trond Hildahl
** This is presented for educational and informational purposes only, and should not be construed as personalized legal, tax, investment, or financial advice. My own resources, risk tolerance, and personal situation have been taken into consideration for any trades mentioned and should not be used as a basis for someone else's trades. Stocks may lose value and this is not recommendation to buy or sell this particular issue.
Those Friendly Banks
So I’m listening to the radio as I tool around town.
Chase Bank has a new prepaid debit card they are offering – the Chase Liquid.
The announcer is all breathless because you won’t get socked with ANY extra fees – all you pay is one low monthly fee – which I later investigate and find to be $4.95. Keep in mind you can load as little as $25 on it – at least they’re keeping fees under 20% a month!
It’s a full one minute spot, and I swear that at least 30 seconds are devoted to a reiteration that other fees are despicable and unnecessary and highly frowned upon.
And at the end … the fast-talking fine-print guy adds, “Other fees may apply.”
Aintcha glad those Big Banks are looking out for us?
Chase Bank has a new prepaid debit card they are offering – the Chase Liquid.
The announcer is all breathless because you won’t get socked with ANY extra fees – all you pay is one low monthly fee – which I later investigate and find to be $4.95. Keep in mind you can load as little as $25 on it – at least they’re keeping fees under 20% a month!
It’s a full one minute spot, and I swear that at least 30 seconds are devoted to a reiteration that other fees are despicable and unnecessary and highly frowned upon.
And at the end … the fast-talking fine-print guy adds, “Other fees may apply.”
Aintcha glad those Big Banks are looking out for us?
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