by Travis Johnson, Stock Gumshoe | May 11, 2015 9:40 am
We’ll start off the week with immortality, a common-enough teaser topic in this era of biotech miracles — the pitch is from Michael Robinson[1] for his Nova-X[2] Report, and it’s all about the tremendous advancements that will erase the “expiration date” from our bodies. Sounds appealing, yes? Particularly for those who happen to be in their 50s, 60s and 70s, with a comfortable amount of money in the bank?
Probably it’s not so much a coincidence that this demographic (wealthier white dudes in or near retirement[3]) is also the core target audience for investment newsletters. But I digress… what is the story from Michael Robinson, and is the stock of any interest? Let me sift through the clues for you and I can at least name the stock for you — after that you’re on your own unless some of our biotech investing cognoscenti decide to chime in, trying to estimate the value of a pre-commercial biotech stock makes my hair start to fall out.
Here’s how Robinson catches our eye:
“Breakthrough Work from Two Nobel Prize Winners, 14 Ph.D.s, and Two M.D.s from MIT, Harvard, Penn, Scripps, and Johns Hopkins, Has Revealed Shocking New Insights into Disease, Aging, and Death Itself. Could We Soon Know…
“How To Live Forever
“When you think of the end of your life, what do you picture?
“Will you leave the world in a few short years, having made a difference?
“Will your family remember you as a strong provider? A loving parent or grandparent? As someone who paved their way for a better future?
“Or will the inevitability of death rob you of the opportunity to provide all the things you once planned on leaving behind?
“If you still have goals and dreams you want to make a reality, then you need to read this letter to the very end.”
Laying it on a bit thick, no?
So what is the actual science here? More from the ad:
“After decades of experimentation, recent human clinical trials, and two Nobel Prize-winning genetic advancements…
“Doctors have discovered an ‘Immortality Gene’ hidden in our DNA.
“And they’ve developed a treatment that could allow us to switch it on.
“This treatment could require as few as four injections a year.
“Besides unlocking our ability to stop aging[4], these injections could allow us to wind back the biological clock in every one of our cells, and keep them young indefinitely.”
And all of this is apparently closer than you would imagine!
“Clinical tests have already shown that these injections make it possible to reverse the effects of age-related diseases.
“At the Dana-Farber Cancer[5] Center in Boston, doctors used them to shrink a patient’s cancer tumor by 70%.
“In a 76-man study in Leeds, England, just four of these injections a year dropped patients’ cholesterol[6] levels by 77%.
“The treatments that achieved these incredible results are now being pushed through the FDA[7]’s four-phase approval process.
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just click here...“In as little as 24 months they could be distributed to medical facilities across North America…”
Michael Robinson then takes a small leap to say that he’s pushing this idea to you not necessarily just to make himself a bucketload of cash, but because he wants to make sure everyone’s rich enough to buy these treatments. He thinks if you invest in this idea and get rich, then you’ll be able to afford these “immortality” injections in a few years when they’re approved… since at first, they’ll probably only be available to the wealthy.
“… the amazing fact is that right now, the windfalls from investing in the same small lab that’s bringing this incredible new therapy to the world could pay for your treatments for life.”
Or, I suppose, you could be like everyone else and hope to just get a little boost to your retirement fund from a nice trade or two so you don’t have to move in with your kids or rely too much on Social Security[8]. We’ll see. You can set your own expectations for just how much wealth this (heavily marketed) idea is going to rain down upon you.
How about some more specific clues so we can see if the Thinkolator has an answer for us? Here are a few tidbits from the ad:
“Doctors at the Spanish National Cancer Research Centre successfully switched on the immortality gene in a group of mice, extending their lifespan by 40%.
“At Harvard, doctors repeated this trial with even better results. Lead researcher, Dr. Ronald DePinho, described what they witnessed as the “Ponce de Leon Effect,” referencing the Spanish explorer who searched for the fountain of youth….
“In a 24-week clinical trial, doctors stimulated very low levels of the “immortality gene” in 36 men between the ages of 60 and 85.
“After six weeks, the men’s vision had improved by 20%.
“At 12 weeks, symptoms of erectile dysfunction were disappearing.
“And 24 weeks in, they had a 14% increase in the measurable strength of their immune system.
“By the end of the trial, the men had literally aged backward – on a biological level – between five and 20 years….
“We all have this same ‘Immortality Gene’ hidden inside our DNA.”
That “Immortality Gene” is apparently something scientists have learned about from a handful of animal species who live almost forever — a few jellyfish, crustaceans, some giant tortoises, etc. And if we all have this gene, we just have to “turn it on,” right? I’m not even an electrician, let alone a geneticist, so I don’t even know if that’s the right metaphor — but here are some details about this “switch” that is being teased:
“Through a new process called RNA Therapy, doctors can now switch on or off any gene in our DNA….
“In January of 2015, doctors at Stanford used RNA therapy to reverse 25 years of aging in just a few days. They took 60-year-old human skin and muscle cells and made them 35 again! ….
“RNA therapy has already been proven effective in stopping nine different forms of cancer. It works by shutting down cancerous cells’ ability to replicate….
“… in a clinical trial, after the very first injection, RNA therapy removed every measurable trace of the Hepatitis C[9] virus in 43% of the participants.”
OK, so apparently we’re being teased about a biotech stock that has something to do with RNA therapeutics — there aren’t all that many of them, but let’s check the clues to see if we can name the specific company…
“How the company at the center of this story could pay for your treatments for life.
“They’ve formed strategic partnerships with Stanford, MIT, Harvard, the Mayo Clinic, and Scripps.
“Their network of doctors includes M.D.s and Ph.D.s from Penn Rockefeller University and Massachusetts General.
“They’re working with two Nobel Prize winners, a senior scientist from the Human Genome Project, and no fewer than 12 senior Ph.D.s and M.D.s leading an army of doctors, geneticists, and biologists….”
And he says this company is poised to make a splash in several important multi-billion-dollar markets, like anti-aging, cancer, cardiology treatments and hemophilia — he even throws some numbers around, implying that if they could “just” get 5% of those markets and advance their other research programs they’d be “tapping into” a revenue stream of close to $30 billion. Lots of squishy language in there about the money — which is good, because when you’re this far from large-scale commercial products you’re really just making stuff up.
One more bit of clues for you:
“These are only some of the most advanced RNA therapies.
“There are at least 15 more in the development pipeline, covering everything from big conditions like lung and liver disease, to rare genetic conditions like Amyloidosis and Porphyria.”
So who is it? Thinkolator sez we’re probably looking (again) at Alnylam (ALNY), which was a huge winner for the Oxford Club[10] after they started touting it as the “fountain of youth” company[11] and saying that the “first person to live to 1,000 is already alive” in ads that began running about two years ago. The stock is up 300% or so since those ads started running in the early summer of 2013 — and it has gone from an “extremely early stage” $2 billion company to a “early clinical stage” $9 billion company.
I still don’t know much about the science of this, and I try to avoid trading in individual biotech stocks (don’t want to risk getting too wealthy overnight, after all), so I’ll leave the discussion to the many biotech traders in these parts, or to Dr. KSS[12] if he wishes to chime in. This looks to be a pretty news-heavy year coming up for ALNY — they will have data on most of their clinical-stage programs over the next 6-9 months, nothing is in danger of getting approved just yet… but they’re getting closer. They have replaced their prior strategic plan of “5 in 2015,” which aimed at having five compounds in advanced clinical trials in 2015 (that has been reasonably successful, depending on what you mean by “advanced” — there are five clinical trials underway currently), with a plan to have three marketed products by 2020 (it’s more involved than that, of course, you can see their latest quarterly presentation here [13]for more of the detailed aspirations).
Of course, reading the tea leaves about the potential success of a drug (or a handful of drugs) in five or ten years is not in any way in my wheelhouse — ALNY has had a steady stream of cash coming in from partnerships and stock sales over the years so they’re in decent financial shape, and they haven’t had any really big, expensive long-term clinical trials that they’ve had to pay for yet, but looking at the financials for ALNY is almost pointless other than to determine that they probably won’t have to raise money in the near future … the stock’s movement depends on sentiment about their current clinical trials and whether they continue to advance the RNA therapeutic story and make dreams of future dominance come into somewhat sharper focus.
So with that, I’ll let you get started on your researchification — please let us know if you think ALNY is worth our time and money, just chime in using the friendly little comment box below.
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While Alnylam has made real progress with treating transthyretin-mediated amyloidosis, we need to keep in mind that this is an ultra-orphan indication, and in no way gets RNAi into the mainstream. $ALNY seems remaindered in fine tuning its methods and generating new ideas, but is making insufficient progress toward getting those to the clinic and having real streams of revenue.
For me, $ALNY are overpriced and are set to underperform. From where I stand, the entire RNAi space is imperiled or precarious: it hasn’t made good on any of the dizzying claims and lofty promises it was making two years ago, and no single play in the space is poised to reward shareholders. I have a position in $ARWR, but am a fan of its work even as I accept profit potential here is limited. Benitec has grossly underperformed by not keep promises. $RXII is a perma-laggard with an uninteresting agenda. Bio-Path and Dicerna are not making the grade in my view….they are dallying in projects that incite only mild interest. The upcoming Galapagos IPO might offer investors a way to play RNAi. Overall, however, I suggest readers avoid the RNAi space til RNAi players actually DO something instead of promising, east of the sun, west of the moon, to get something done.
Dr KSS,
Any thoughts on MultiVir. $MVIR
MVIR is a clinical-stage gene therapy company developing a pipeline of novel product candidates for the treatment of multiple oncological indications.
2 of the of MultiVir product candidates has completed Phase 1 clinical trials as a monotherapy, and MVIR plans to advance both product candidates into Phase 1/2 clinical trials that include a randomized, controlled portion in combination with standard cancer therapies.
Here is more info – http://seekingalpha.com/article/3146266-ipo-preview-multivir
http://www.multivir.com/#!prodpipeline/cee5
Thanks
Hi Doc
can you elaborate on Galapagos which have been heavily teased by Bill Patalon Money Morning services?
thanks
This happens to be an incorrect think-o-lator selection.
Speaking of profits, while off subject I would just like to point out that a frequent mention and travis favourite ALTIUS Minerals ALS is up over 10% today which is a nice move for any stock. Haven’t checked if there is any specific news that could be moving the stock, but nice to se along time holding making a positive move.
It has been touted by Stansberry last Thursday and started moving immediately. With any market correction it will come down again and than some shares will be purchased by me!
It’s up 15% just since last Friday’s open, and challenging resistance around $12.00. If you haven’t already purchased some shares, you might not want to wait too long…
We do need to re-evaluate the Thinkolator solution here. I agree with MRTV that it could be wrong, because the company in question is not (yet at least) in the Nova X portfolio. Its possible Michael Robinson is giving away one of the stocks from the other Moneymap newsletters, and not his, if people join Nova X. Its also possible it is an avenue of research from one of the few healthcare related stocks in the Nova X portfolio. Bottom line is Robinson is a savvy evaluator of technology companies (although not all are winners), and I have made a killing on some of his best recommendations in the past 18-24 months. I trust so little his picks in the pharma or biotech space that I don’t even bother to read the write-ups from the newsletter. I am too busy with my regular job to look now, but will try to provide more insights later
OK even I am a sucker for these kinds of spiels, so I did a little more review and confirmed that MRTV is right. The only suggestion I will make is to rethink how one could take advantage of successes in the RNAi space without being 100% exposed to the success or failure of individual drugs. This implies a scale much larger than $ALNY, and in fact how could $ALNY possibly distribute this rumored immortality drug without help.
I have always scratched my head about “live to 200 years” discussions. Yes, people are more active and staying healthier, and perhaps 70 really is the new 60. But the several people I have known who lived to age 100 and longer (yes, small sample) have little mobility and are largely bed-ridden. “Dial back” time further? Yes, perhaps. But seriously – who wants to keep living so they can spend 50+ years in bed?
You’re missing the point. Extending lifespans is to “square the mortality curve” so that good health lasts virtually indefinitely and then you quickly die off near the end. There’s no bedridden misery for a decade or two. People that fall into that trap are largely suffering the consequences of poor lifestyle and dietary choices as well as being side-effect damaged tools for Big Pharma. The Baby Boomers are little wee bit more demanding than the Greatest Generation all slowly dying off in their beds. Generation X even more so and the tech-savvy Millenials? Hold onto your hats!
And life extension aims to lengthen the actual curve itself, but that’s another topic for another day.
For a little history on the search for the Fountain of Youth, check this out:
Seems some never tire of the search for eternal youth.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/26/magazine/my-search-for-the-fountain-of-youth.html?_r=0
My guess would be that the two Nobel Prize winners are Elizabeth H. Blackburn and Carol W. Greider, who were awarded the Nobel in Physiology or Medicine in 2009 for their work on the role of telomerase in cancer cell replication. Telomeres are the ends of genes, little protective nubbins that keep the ends of genes from getting damaged as they bang around in the process of cell replication. Telomerase protects the telomeres. Targeting telomerase in cancer cells is a way of preventing cancer cells from replicating. Blackburn and Greider were working with Geron at the time, and Geron did develop an agent that targeted telomerase, so I wouldn’t be surprised if the stock being teased was Geron, about which I know absolutely nothing else. Telomeres protect not only the ends of DNA strands in cancer cells, but in normal cells as well, so protecting telomeres might be seen as a way to “live forever.”
Shortened telomeres is just one of many pathways of aging that need to be dealt with and lengthening it has yet to prove itself out, though it is tantalizing to think of lobsters never getting cancer (even in contaminated waters) as they don’t have their telomerase enzyme shut off as in the case of mammals.
But cancer is so overrated that if was completely eradicated it would only add three years to lifespans. Like the high cholesterol ballyhoo, It’s mostly a MSM fad obsession at this point, i.e. facts be damned, lets all sing kumbaya and do something feel-good that ultimately results in nothing more than providing full employment to career non-profitists. Combating the dredges aging is far, far more important to evolving human civilization in terms of downstream effects.
And the noval bioagent that was originally discovered by Geron has been licensed and is being sold by TA Sciences as a telomere-extending dietary supplement. Independent verification is still questionable.
Just want to reiterate that the Think-o-lator is wrong on this one. It is a partner of ALNY.
Could be, the hints were all over the map on this since he’s teasing RNAi generally and hinting at lots of studies done by different folks with different technologies. I suspect if they’re talking a more established, revenue-producing company then they’re teasing Genzyme, a major partner of Alnylam, which would mean they’re teasing Sanofi (SNY), which owns Genzyme (and also owns about 10 million shares of ALNY).
Genzyme does generate a little over $2.5 billion in revenue, which was one of the possible hints in the ad, though that’s dwarfed by Sanofi’s overall business (Genzyme is their fastest growing division, but it’s only about 10% of revenues).\
The ad isn’t really just for the Nova-X report, it’s for this special report about immortality that they’re selling for $5, so I don’t know whether the stock would be in the Nova-X portfolio or not (and oh, by the way, once you’ve bought $5 report we’ll give you a free trial of Nova-X, and once the free trial is up we’ll charge your credit card $79 to buy a subscription… though you have to read the small print to see that).
winner winner chicken dinner
One of the Oxford newsletters is touting ALNY today. Included is a nice graph with random lines on it that clearly indicate (clearly I say) that the stock is about to break out from the “$112 resistance level” and move aggressively forward as various trials are accomplished this year… so maybe it will…the stock has doubled in the last 12 months so maybe there is some profit taking sales going on. I would be if I had bought it last year. I’d take the money and buy some new knives and look for more fish to cut and wrap. I’ll look at this ALNY fish again later…check in to its news updates, but today I’ll put some money into a $2 share, low-tech company that has an actual and practical product that is building sales volume.
Oh, I would be interested in the $2 lowtech stock (what is it?), if you would be so kind, or are you speaking rhetorically???
This could be helpful in explaining just a bit of the difficulty in why RNA structures haven’t panned out quite as fast as might have been previously thought…and that there’s been a missing link necessary for implementation. Can ya dig it?
http://www.xconomy.com/national/2014/11/17/new-research-could-finally-remove-rnais-commercial-limitations/
You may be interested in looking at Hemostemix (HEM on the Toronto Exchange). It is well into Phase 2 trials for Critical Limb Ischemia, the loss of blood flow common in diabetic patients. Patients are treated with injections of stemcells derived from their own blood at labs in Israel where the technology was developed. HEM owns 48 Patents in the US and recently applied to the FDA to conduct Phase 2 trials in the US. Trials are currently underway in Canada and S. Africa. The CEO is Dr. Burchardt who left his position as VP at Pfizer to lead HEM. The company also has a successful history treating heart patients. The original name was Theravitae and changed to Hemo. when it went public last November. Last trade at $0.95 CAD with a market cap of $63 M.
This all seemed familiar to me and so I looked up some old data dated February 2006 and Dave Lashmet was teasing about this technology (RNA interference) for Stansberry & Associates’ Diligence news letter. At that time I sleuthed out (and later Penny Sleuth?) several companies being talked about. Sirna Therapeutis Inc (which was later bought out by Merck), was one, Isis Pharmaceutical was another, Alnylam Pharmaceutical was the third. So the technology has been kicked around for a while. Another guy that contributed his two cents was Jonathan Kolber, the Editor of The Emerging Capital Report. Sirna had an alliance with Glaxo Smith Kline before before they were bought out by Merck. More recently, Alnylam bought out the Merck’s wholly owned subsidiary Sirna Therapeutics, Inc. (“Sirna Therapeutics”), comprising intellectual property and RNAi assets including pre-clinical therapeutic candidates, chemistry, siRNA-conjugate and other delivery technologies. Anyway, some information if anyone wants to go back further. This is as complicated as some penny mining stocks! …S
Good perspective Steve, thanks.
Mr. Travis, I always read your articles about particular articles or teasers issued by the various newsletters and their contributors. As yet I have never encountered favourable comment on any of the ones I looked into. How’s that. Is it not possible that you could find one reasonably worth a second thought?
Because of this I have yet to make the plunge and acquire any shores or bonds or whatever in the Stock Exchange. I feel so discouraged.
I find some of the stocks I write about that are teaser ad targets to be reasonable or interesting, and even end up buying them sometimes (though that’s quite rare) — but that doesn’t mean I’m going to endorse the crazy hype-filled boosterism of the teaser ads, I still try to focus on the risks and the unknowns. In my experience, people have an easy time falling in love with an exciting idea — they need (and I need, too) some doubt to be seeded in their heads so they remember that the marketing pitch for the company is not a balanced interpretation. My real goal is to give you something real to research and make a rational decision about, rather than a stock to buy. For many teaser stocks I only end up researching the stock for an hour or two as I work to identify it, so I also am not usually in a position to really make a definitive decision about it.
If you’re new to investing, you need to learn about the core fundamentals before you start chasing after speculative “hot tips” as that’s not how you succeed. The core fundamentals are asset allocation, position sizing, keeping fees minimal, keeping taxes minimal, consistent saving and allowing time to compound in your favor. Individual stocks play a very minor role, mostly because “a rising tide lifts all boats” in terms of broad asset classes, sectors or industries which you can get plenty of low cost exposure to via diversified funds.
The best way to build you telomeres currently is to take Astragalus, available cheap on Amazon. Have a happy day!