“#1 Pharmaceutical Trade for This Year” Stephen Leeb

by Travis Johnson, Stock Gumshoe | June 17, 2009 4:37 am

It’s been a few weeks since we looked at a teaser from Dr. Stephen Leeb[1], and I sure do see his name out there a lot, so I thought this one might be interesting for a quick once-over.

And incidentally, yes, if you insist on using the Dr., I’ll try to remember to throw it in when I write about you — that goes for you, too, Dr. Skousen, and any other newsletter writers who like to tout their educational achievements. In return, I think it’s only fair that you call me “Master Gumshoe.” I never did get that PhD, but still…

Ah, I kid because I love. Dr. Leeb, by the way, does actually have a doctorate — and it’s in psychology, so perhaps that makes him a keen observer of the mass of human foibles that is the stock market, I don’t know. I do know that lots of my readers have argued about his prescience over the years, and that the most frequent phrase I hear uttered when it comes to Leeb is “Peak Oil.”

But today it ain’t about oil[2], it’s about drugs — this teaser ad is for his Aggressive Trader[3] service — he’s got a pharma stock picked out for our attention, and all he asks in return is, well, a thousand bucks or so for a subscription to his service. We don’t have any subscriber reviews in yet for Aggressive Trader, but if you want to see what other folks think of some of the other Leeb letters you can click here[4].

So, um, how about we try to figure this out for a price that’s a bit more, shall we say, free-ish?

Here’s the pitch:

“You know that for some time I’ve been optimistic about the long-term prospects of certain health-related stocks. Now, with President Obama pushing for more affordable healthcare[5], companies that provide treatments for illnesses that plague the old should see their earnings multiply within a few years.

“In fact, healthcare is one industry that should prosper regardless what happens in the economy. People just can’t afford to stop spending money on health.”

I more or less agree with that point — I do think healthcare stocks are likely to perform better than most investors fear right now — but it’s far from a slam dunk. I don’t quite get the logical connection between “pushing for more affordable healthcare” and “see their earnings multiply,” though, especially for stocks that don’t specifically make products that cut costs or increase efficiency (like electronic medical records, or generic drugs). But we’ll give him the benefit of the doubt for a moment.

“Now, I have to confess that for several years I’ve been watching one company in particular which has an exceptionally exciting story. I’ve traded it a few times, with a good deal of success. But I believe its moment of truth will occur sometime within the next six months.

“This company owns several drugs which appear to be the most revolutionary and effective treatments for adult diabetes[6] and obesity[7] in existence. Both of these conditions are widespread among the elderly and middle-aged – which gives the company a tremendous potential market.

“Like most stocks, this one suffered from last fall’s sell-off. Plus, it has been hampered by various board members fighting for control of the company (who could blame them?). Consequently, you can now buy the shares for 25% what they sold for a year ago, and a smaller fraction of their long-term potential.

“But now the internal strife in the company has been resolved. It has a collaboration agreement with Eli Lily and several other pharmaceutical firms, which should help it develop and market its treatments faster. And it has developed a drug delivery method that should appeal more strongly to patients.

“Overall, I see this stock as highly undervalued. I expect sometime within the next six months, its price will make an unexpected and stunning leap forwards.”

OK, so that’s a decent little crop of clues. I think we can sniff out which company it is … but he does say that he’s not picking the stock here …

“Right now, I am encouraging participants in my Aggressive Trader program to take a position in this stock – but to do so in a leveraged way. Rather than buy the shares outright, we are plunking down a small amount of cash upfront. If I’m wrong, and the stock goes nowhere, we will lose very little. However, if I am right, our profits could be much higher….

“The thing is, while I’m confident this biotech will reward us handsomely, I cannot pinpoint an exact date when the shares will take off. It could start three months from now, or tomorrow.”

OK — so it sounds like we’re buying call options[8] here, not the stock. And if we’re assuming that it will move sometime in the next 3-6 months there’s no way that I can guess exactly which option contract it might be, but we can look at a couple of them.

And I can at least tell you the name of the stock — this almost has to be …

Amylin Pharmaceuticals (AMLN)

Heard of them? Yes, they get into the news quite a lot, especially for a relatively small and unprofitable biotech company — they have a market cap of under $2 billion, and they do indeed focus on diabetes and obesity drugs (which are often connected), including a few new technologies and compounds that could, depending on your perspective, be considered “revolutionary and effective.” The shares aren’t quite going for 25% of what they traded for a year ago, but they’ve come close to that margin in recent months (and if you extend that comparison out to 20 months or so instead of a year, they’re still there now, way below their highs). That fall is partly a result of the market crash and the shareholder tumult, but it’s largely due to the growth rate for their primary drug, Byetta, falling off a cliff in the face of side-effect concerns, heavy competition, and, perhaps, the quick consumption of low-hanging fruit in the available patient base.

This solution — and I’m pretty sure it’s the right one — was sent in by Gumshoe reader Harold Kinney before I had even looked at the ad, so we’ll stop to give him some quick kudos.

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OK then, moving on …

… the stuff about boardroom drama is a perfect match — Carl Icahn[9] and some other outside investors won a couple board seats in a contentious proxy battle that came to a head just about two weeks ago, and, perhaps most importantly, one of the board members ousted was the Chair, who Icahn has been calling out on the carpet for some time. The company fears that Icahn will try to sell the company, which, if true, could also move the share price — and Icahn and Eastbourne (an institutional investment firm that also fought the board) will probably at least push for more cost-cutting and efficiency measures, particularly if these lead drug candidates don’t pan out as well as hoped … and they did, for whatever it might be worth, get the backing of Amylin’s former CEO. Amylin has already been doing this, particularly in paring back their sales force. Here’s the update on the board election if you’d like the details[10].

And as to the timeline of drug developments for Amyiin, always of big import if we’re dealing with biotech options? They are hoping to see approval for their extended release exanatide, which is a once-weekly oral version of their twice-daily injectable drug Byetta, in March of next year. That’s not necessarily a slam dunk, Amylin sounds confident but Byetta itself has had its share of stumbles that have slowed sales growth, and the FDA[11] could always ask for more info. If you want to catch up on the details there was a good article by a Zack’s analyst last week, including updates from their presentation[12] at the American Diabetes Association meeting.

So that major development, while it faces potentially very significant competition (including from Eli Lilly, which is partnering with Amylin as well as working on its own similar compounds), could certainly be expected to move the share price — and if the buzz builds, it might easily do so well before the FDA response next year. And just to throw one more (albeit small) wrench into the works, a little company called Intarcia is also trying to develop yet another delivery system for exanatide[13], which it claims doesn’t impinge on Amylin’s patents, using an implantable pump (instead of oral time-release or the current regular injections).

The extended release action for Byetta is provided via technology from Alkermes (ALKS), in case you’d rather have a somewhat more indirect (and currently profitable) play on this potential drug.

The obesity drugs under development at Amylin are of much less import than their flagship product Byetta, at least so far, but the one that seems to get the most attention is a drug they picked up from Amgen a while back, Pramlintide/Metreleptin. I don’t know much of anything about that, but there’s a pretty good article about it from last Fall[14], and you can catch up on the details on Amylin’s Pipeline web page[15]. Weight loss is a key side effect of many diabetes drugs, too, since weight gain is a big risk factor in diabetes, so who knows, maybe they can even hit up the same patients with buy one/get one specials.

So … what to do? I don’t know what Leeb’s options trading typically looks like, or if he really does stick with short term movements for his Aggressive Trader subscribers — if so, options are available for July and October on this name, so one fairly conventional approach would be buying the October $12.50 call options, which at the current price of $1.60 means you’re counting on AMLN getting above $14 within the next four months (that’s about a 30% gain from the current price, which is around $11.60). Alternatively, if you really think the stock won’t move until the Byetta extended release drug approval is given (or not given) next March, you could get a little big fancier with a calendar spread using the LEAP[16] options — sell the January 2010 options and buy the January 2011 options, which at the $15 strike price would cost you about $1.70 (Buying the Jan 2011 15 strike for $3.20, selling the Jan 2010 15 strike for $1.50). In that case, you’d like AMLN to stay below $15 until January, then shoot up to the moon later in 2010. Just a thought, I don’t really know what options Leeb would pick for this trade, and there are endless permutations that you could consider (and risks in any trade, of course).

So whaddya think? Byetta has been a disappointment recently, will the new oral version beat out the competition (assuming it’s approved?) Will their obesity drugs, both in mid-stage development, take off and bring yet more investor attention? If you do think AMLN is a great play for some biotech volatility, what announcements do you think are likely to be important, and what options trade would you try? Let us know with a comment below.

And as I noted above, we’d love to hear from more subscribers to this or any of Dr. Leeb’s newsletters — click here to see other Leeb subscriber reviews and add your own[17].

Endnotes:
  1. Stephen Leeb: https://www.stockgumshoe.com/tag/stephen-leeb/
  2. oil: https://www.stockgumshoe.com/tag/oil/
  3. Aggressive Trader: https://www.stockgumshoe.com/tag/aggressive-trader/
  4. see what other folks think of some of the other Leeb letters you can click here: http://www.stockgumshoe.com/reviews/tag/tci-enterprises/
  5. healthcare: https://www.stockgumshoe.com/tag/healthcare/
  6. diabetes: https://www.stockgumshoe.com/tag/diabetes/
  7. obesity: https://www.stockgumshoe.com/tag/obesity/
  8. options: https://www.stockgumshoe.com/tag/options/
  9. Carl Icahn: https://www.stockgumshoe.com/tag/carl-icahn/
  10. Here’s the update on the board election if you’d like the details: http://www.reuters.com/article/marketsNews/idINN0251402120090602?rpc=44
  11. FDA: https://www.stockgumshoe.com/tag/fda/
  12. good article by a Zack’s analyst last week, including updates from their presentation: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Amylin-Update-Post-ADA-zacks-15466936.html?.v=1
  13. little company called Intarcia is also trying to develop yet another delivery system for exanatide: http://www.reuters.com/article/marketsNews/idINN0519712320090606?rpc=44&pageNumber=1&virtualBrandChannel=0
  14. pretty good article about it from last Fall: http://www.xconomy.com/san-diego/2008/10/04/amylin-resurrects-obesity-drug-in-new-combination-with-diabetes-drug-symlin/
  15. Amylin’s Pipeline web page: http://www.amylin.com/pipeline/
  16. LEAP: https://www.stockgumshoe.com/tag/leap/
  17. click here to see other Leeb subscriber reviews and add your own: http://www.stockgumshoe.com/reviews/tag/tci-enterprises/

Source URL: https://www.stockgumshoe.com/reviews/leebs-aggressive-trader/1-pharmaceutical-trade-for-this-year-stephen-leeb/


15 responses to ““#1 Pharmaceutical Trade for This Year” Stephen Leeb”

  1. Katie Catt says:

    But isn’t the official abrerviation for Masters Degree “MS? and isn’t that somewhat confusing …genderly speaking…MS Gumshoe?

  2. Jill says:

    No matter what you call him, I think “Great Gumshoe” works well!

  3. Joseph M says:

    Travis
    I relly appreciate your newsletter.
    I really liked the silvershots article. I plan to capitalise on that one. As far as bio tech the way the market is scidish right now no thanks. But keep up the good work. When I have some real money(10,000) to invest I plan on subscribing to your letter. Because you do the little guy like me a huge favor desciphering all the so called”cahnces of a lifetime” newsletters. Keep up the good work

  4. Sean says:

    So Gumshoe,

    When do we get the “answer” to all the ads on your site.

    You give away information that would otherwise make money for other businesses; why not give away the product behind the ads on your site?

    Just a thought.

  5. Ram says:

    Master Gumshoe :),
    I signed up to your newsletter couple of months ago. Really enjoying reading the articles every morning. Great stuff! I too hope to join the irregulars soon!

  6. Dusty says:

    I love that “the greatest stock that ever was” shows up here as a third-rate also-ran. Saves me a lot of wondering if I am missing something. As Gumshoe noted in his reply above, almost all these teaser stocks are pathetic. I also consider that any stock that makes this forum is a prime candidate for my list of Never, Never, Don’t Be That Stupid. The record backs up the title for that list.

    About newsletters, Dr. Leeb is driving me nuts. I subscribe to one of his basic newsletters. I get an occasional delightful insight into the market. Every day I get one, usually two, sometimes three ads for his more expensive letters that all start out sounding like more good information and shift into something that sounds to me more like the con man in the fancy striped suit standing by the side of the carnival midway.

    Travis, hang on about readership. I think it is called “. . . fool some of the people some of the time. . .” and middle class America knows the second shoe is in the air in freefall. We are all backing off until the smoke clears.

    ——Dusty.

  7. ponce says:

    Biotech? All sound too good in the beginning but very few make it. DCGN, SVA, NHPI, CRXL, SOBM all losers. I rather gamble on the Casinos, MPEL, LVS, MGM, WYNN. They are very predictable…They do good when economy is good.

  8. Tim says:

    I think these small pharma plays are a mixed bag that could require a lot of patience. I own a similar, but smaller pharma that I bought back when I was trying to be my own “gumshoe” and guessed wrong and got a “close but no cigar”. I decided to hang with it anyway since it was a small slice. My research showed it had similar drugs in the pipeline- so what the hey! It sat there for about four months, then it just doubled in a few days on a huge buying spike. I haven’t found out why yet- but not complaining. At least now I don’t have to gumshoe on my own anymore. especially since my track record sucks, even though I do occasionally pull one out of the dirt. Keep up the good work real gumshoe!

  9. Bruce says:

    First of all, with regard to Leeb. If I remember correctly, and I am pretty sure I do, his “personal Finance” Newsletter had a miserable record its last couple years of publishing. So he moved on to something else. Nice work if you can pull it off.

    With regard to “emerging pharma” companies, they are a real crapshoot. I made some pretty good money on Dendreon DNDN when I bought some just before their first FDA review. Then, rather than walk away with some profits, I bought some call options on DNDN because I KNEW it would explode when they got their next FDA approval for their prostate drug. Well the FDA rejected it, and my profits evaporated.

    I also lost a little money on Arena this year. They also had an anti obesity drug that some were touting as a “slam-dunk”. Well…it didn’t pass review, so that didn’t work out either.

    One conclusion I have come to is that if these “emerging ” drug companies really had such a promising thing going, why wouldn’t a large company like Pfizer or Lilly come in, buy them up, fire all employees except those absolutely necessary, and reap the resulting profits ? the answer is that NOBODY knows how these drug approvals are going to play out at FDA.

    I love these newsletter guys.

    On a serious note though, I do like Dan Sullivan of the Chartist. At least he invests in exactly the recomendations he makes, and there is no hiding or switching or recommendations that “disappear” if they go bad. His long and successful record is out there for all to see.

  10. I may be able to add a few useful observations. First, an oral version of an injectable insulin IS a big deal. Second, getting the substance through the gut, unharmed by the stomach acid is the key trick. Third, I can relate from my own research that it is definitely possible to do. So the down side? I can confirm some of the BIG players have been working on this for many years. The main hurdle has been to get a solidly protected patentable version, actually, rather than the task itself. From my experience, the FDA tends to hold up approval of these break-throughs by smaller firms until one of the Big guys has a competitor drug to launch (let’s say I’m cynical after seeing this coincidental dual approval scenario play out over many years). So I would say just play this by the charts, but not on the fundamentals that they will make a zillion dollars or even that they will be bought out by some Big Player. Fact is, if it weren’t for the trial costs, our own obscure dinky research firm could launch a product (but let me emphasize that I have NO DOG in this race — just providing some information that might be helpful, I hope).

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