Oxford Biomedica Share Discussion Threads

[harry s truman] 26/4/2024 00:15

Pleased you sorted it out and hopefully it's of some use.

Regarding the results on Monday and more importantly the reaction to them, then I'm hopeful that they will wake a lot of people up (not just the analysts of the covering brokers).

If you go back a year then we had just one broker rating OXB as a hold. After the interims it was 5 rating OXB as a hold. It's only just gone back to 4 with Stifel recently taking OXB off the naughty step, but the big show at the interims plainly put a lot of the analysts in "we'll wait and see" mode.

Can't really blame them. New CEO says £41m loss in '22, bigger loss in '23, but it ends at that and we save £30m per year from now on and by 2026 we will have at least doubled '23 revenue and be earning better than 20% EBITDA on that. It's a bold claim isn't it?

You all know I'm sold on the message, but even I admit that's quite a turnaround. Reassuringly, they have said a couple of times since that they are on track and hitting the targets. RBC seem convinced and are nudging ever closer to £8 with their 12 month target. Stifel are coming around to the idea but have a target of less than half that.

It's up to OXB now to convince the doubters on Monday.

I've convinced myself that Stuart has told us (without saying as much) that OXB's fixed costs for the business (UK, Boston, France, everything) is somewhere a little over £130m. I base that guess on bits from many releases and presentations, but I also think the "broadly breakeven" on £126m to £134m means that the actual cost is somewhere in that £8m spread where £126m is a small loss and £134m may even be a tiny profit.

The tantalising prospect here (if that guess is correct) is that anything Stuart hasn't put into that forecast (because he can't do "we're talking to and we might get" as a forecast) will change this year radically. OXB have already told us that they will no longer put legacy milestone payments into their forecasts - but we do still have a lot of legacy contracts of the royalty and milestone type. If one of those drops a milestone payment on a trial stage or an approval, then that's a big thing in a year which at the moment is "broadly breakeven".

Seb seems to be able to sell sand to the Arabs, but something late trial stage or commercial supply is worth a lot of money to us. Same goes for our regular guessing game about Serum and such. If we hear about one of those on Monday and suddenly it looks like we could be profitable again this year, then nobody in the market at the moment (including RBC) is forecasting that.

If what OXB suggested in that webcast is true (that we are the only pure CGT viral vector CDMO, with all the other major players simply doing CGT as just a small division of a much bigger business) then what happens if the predictions regarding the market size (see quote below) come true? Everyone else is going to see their CGT business unit stretched to capacity whilst OXB is going to see the whole company stretched to capacity. The gearing at that point would be phenomenal for OXB's revenue / earnings.

(quote)

Market Overview of Global CGT CDMO market: According to our latest research, the global CGT CDMO market looks promising in the next 5 years. As of 2022, the global CGT CDMO market was estimated at USD 4129.71 million, and it’s anticipated to reach USD 20489.61 million in 2028, with a CAGR of 30.6% during the forecast years. A contract development and manufacturing company (CDMO) is a company within the pharmaceutical industry that provides drug development and manufacturing services. Pharmaceutical companies partner with CDMOs as a way to outsource drug development and drug manufacturing. Cell and gene therapy (CGT) involves living cells, tissues, viral vectors and non-viral gene modification components. Its R&D technology and production process are more difficult than those of traditional biological drugs. CGT CDMO, as the upstream of CGT pharmaceutical companies, can help cell therapy companies overcome many difficulties in R&D and production while reducing costs, to improve R&D efficiency and enhance the commercialization success rate.

(unquote)

[boadicea] 25/4/2024 19:42

Solved - or at least circumvented.
The OXB share information is not displaying in Firefox (blocked as a perceived security risk or by default settings?). However, Opera displays it as HST describes.

It also displays on my Samsung Tablet using the native browser but Chrome doesn't like it.

[steeplejack] 25/4/2024 19:07

The information OXB provide is like a simplified level 2.It’s useful but not essential.I don’t pay for ADVFN’s level 2 service because i don’t consider myself a daytrader or a trader of any description really.I spent a great deal of time staring at level 2 screens in my time and i can’t say i miss it!


It would be a pleasant surprise if OXB pulled a surprise rabbit out of the hat on Monday to help propel the price through this stubborn calendar year high of 220p.With US treasury yields hitting a 5 month high today,companies with strong cash flow attract interest rather than the riskier alternatives.Yet,quite apart from the obvious ‘special situation’ status that i believe OXB occupies,we have the clear shortcomings of a UK listing.That OXB should be a FTSE 250 constituent in short order seems more than reasonable.However,its a tough ask for a company to propel itself from small company status to the FTSE 250 without something ‘special’; for the market to get excited about and a steady eddy CDMO might not fire the market’s imagination like say,a British Biotech of old.Ridiculous of course,we all know what happened to marimastat.I worry that the UK market might not have the gumption to speedily recognise how undervalued OXB is ( due to liquidity concerns amongst other things) but ultimately with IM in partnership etc,a revaluation seems inevitable.

[harry s truman] 25/4/2024 18:30

Steeplejack,

The last time they updated their website that page appeared. I'm sure it was just a coincidence but as the pipeline page disappeared, that share price information page appeared - which made me wonder if it was some kind of sweetener for the loss of the other, as obviously it will cost OXB money to give us that data.

I look occasionally because it's there, but if I'm honest I haven't found a use for it as I simply tend to buy shares and hold them.

Obviously that "today" link only works during market hours and if you press the white + in the blue circle above it marked "Detailed share information" that also gives you a lot of live information.

As for why it doesn't work for boadicea, it only works for me on a desktop. I don't think the browser on my phone is good enough, so if I click "today" on my phone then what I see at the bottom of the page isn't the graphic with those lines of order depth.

When I previously filled an ISA, the ISA filled and I didn't see the trade but I noted on the contract note that it hadn't gone through LSE.

Went to this link

Typed OXB in the white box and you can see the order books for alternate exchanges there too - which you can cycle through. Most trades seem to go through LSE though so I'm guessing the link on OXB's website is most representative.

One trading day left now of course and then we get to see the roadshow.

[brucie5] 25/4/2024 17:30

looks like a positive finish.

[steeplejack] 25/4/2024 16:33

Try again boadicea.I had trouble at first but it loaded after awhile.Very useful Harry.I'm beginning to wonder whether there's anything you don't know about Oxford Biomedica!

[boadicea] 25/4/2024 16:27

HST - Unfortunately all I get is "Investis Charts" and "Exchange information" in a large white space, neither of which activate a link. Rather odd.
Perhaps it's because you are certificated and on the register whereas I use a Nominee platform. Or maybe they're updating the page today?

[harry s truman] 25/4/2024 14:59

boadicea,

If you go to



And then click on "today" (rather than "history" which is the default), isn't that a snapshot of the orderbook?

(at the bottom of the page).

[boadicea] 25/4/2024 14:35

Unfortunately the order book (which I cannot see) must be fairly unsupportive on the bid side and it looks like a delibertae attempt was made to knock the share price back with a single swipe (time 13:33:33) from 219.5p to 215.5p with a single sale of 4759 shares (appearing as 17 parcels on the trades page, lines 53 to 69). Looks like an attempt at price control - or am I becoming paranoid?

Otherwise, the chart in general looks in pretty good shape for a recovery bowl formation. This might be a more stable development than a spikey surge attracting short term traders who will subsequently hold us back.

[harry s truman] 25/4/2024 10:50

If you want a shot in the dark Gareth, then I'm pretty certain that on many past years once we got within spitting distance of the results it all calmed down. It's almost like everybody has bought their tickets at that point and is just waiting for the ride to start.

So might be that again. If so then it wouldn't surprise me at all if tomorrow is dead.

(Now I've written that, we'll likely have two record days, but what can you do...).

All the planets are lined up for Monday being a very good day. The worst I can foresee is the press headlines concentrating on the '23 loss rather than the '24 onward forecast, which would of course be the complete opposite of what they did when we posted a huge earnings / profit year but said we were coming to the end of the AZ contract. That one is in the lap of the press gods.

I still think the very long notice of the results was to try to give them time to get something completed first. Of course if they didn't manage it then we'll never know, but I think a better than not chance that Frank is going to announce something to coincide with our biggest publicity day of the year.

[gareth jones] 25/4/2024 09:17

It's a public holiday where I am (Freedom Day) not sure if that's got anything to do with the lack of buyers?

[dominiccummings] 25/4/2024 09:07

Where are the buyers today? Come on.. let's ave yer!

[dr darkstar] 24/4/2024 16:36

Not today then.....

[dr darkstar] 24/4/2024 11:07

Close over 200/221 should complete an ascending triangle reversal pattern and then a push significantly higher can be expected

[harry s truman] 23/4/2024 19:23

But with a bigger threshold they have more time before declaration or more to buy whilst staying under it - that's all I meant (but didn't type).

I've noticed before that the big trades (100k and 325k today) are usually marked "off book". Whether that means they just did it manually because it's unusually large / outside of the NMS I don't know.

A lot of these things we never find out. Maybe time will tell...

[supernumerary] 23/4/2024 19:01

Yes, I believe so, but I didn't specify a threshold, merely implying that this sort of volume is likely to lead to a declarable interest or at least a transition through some relevant threshold.

It might have been a sale, but the price has been going up, and that doesn't usually tend to happen when there's a seller of that size around. Note the time of the trade - advfn has now moved it back to its correct time of 14:40 when the bid/offer would have made it a clear buy.

I've been struck by how closely the sells and buys are tracking each other over the last couple of days, which implies that either there's a large seller who's matching the buys then showing it as a consolidated trade at end of day, or a buyer matching the sells. The latter looks more likely to me, but I claim no expertise in this area at all!

[harry s truman] 23/4/2024 18:37

If they are not British registered, isn't it 5% for a declaration rather than 3%?

I'm pretty sure I read that somewhere once.

Also it might have been a sale. 6 US institutional owners completely went last year (see list below from fintel) and all those sales had to go somewhere. Maybe just more of the same - but a really strange time to do it.

OWSMX - Old Westbury Small & Mid Cap Strategies Fund
QCSTRX - Stock Account Class R1
SSGVX - State Street Global Equity ex-U.S. Index Portfolio State Street Global All Cap Equity ex-U.S. Index Portfolio
ARHBX - Artisan International Explorer Fund Institutional Shares
FSISX - Fidelity SAI International Small Cap Index Fund
IXUS - iShares Core MSCI Total International Stock ETF

[supernumerary] 23/4/2024 17:31

And another big trade - 325K shares - on top of the 250K yesterday. Listed as a sell, but looks like a buy to me. Has to be a TR-1 sooner or later.

[philh75] 23/4/2024 13:26

Should be able to Harry, a quick scan of the index and there are a few between 300/400m market cap, I believe we needed 650 when we entered last time. Bar is a lot lower. It could well accelerate our trajectory as you say once we are back in.

[harry s truman] 23/4/2024 12:47

Perhaps Phil, but I would have thought that on Monday they will make a very clear distinction between which new programmes are new work won by the sales team and which came as part of the ABL purchase.

If they don't do that then at the H1 results in September it might look like the rate of new work was tailing off.

I'm just passing time now and focussing on Monday morning, which of course we are all waiting for.

The big loss for '23 has already been telegraphed, but the interesting part is going to be the forecast for '24 with Q1 already closed.

My target for this year is still to get back into the FT250. I think they can achieve that on what they have forecast already, but they may need to post proof at the interims first. If something else new / big / half expected comes in on top of what we know then I think they will breeze it.

[philh75] 23/4/2024 11:44

Or it could be Frank just wanted to maximise the number of programs he could say they had, and most of them were coming in over the last two months.

[harry s truman] 23/4/2024 11:10

I don't understand how Numis justify their view. I know what their view is, as it was quoted in The Times, and they say (in many more words) that they don't think that OXB can do what their forecasts / projections say in this economy.

Then we have what OXB have told us:-

The cash position at 31 December 2023 was £103.7 million.
IM are putting in Euro 10m to fund the ABL transition.
I'm assuming that converting some of Boston to a US Lentivector hub isn't going to be cheap, but there were millions of that already spent last year.
£126 to £134 million in revenue this year with broadly breakeven EBITDA.

That's not a 180p per share valuation of £180m market cap on 100m shares vs £217m market cap today, which has long had me wondering where Numis are getting their ideas from as it doesn't seem to be OXB.

My theory floated here that Frank gave almost 2 months notice (when we normally get 2 or 3 weeks) was that it was either a Frank thing or that he was waiting for something which he would like to happen before the results.

I appreciate that's a bit like forecasting that it will either rain or go dark, but there is some precedent here from the interims that Frank likes to put on a good show.

So, if there is anything in that idea then 3 days for something to happen before, but it could also be signed now - ready to come out as a headline on Monday.

Yes this is a glass half full thing, but just like there could be a black swan event (with any company) there could also be a white swan event which changes everything for the better.

For the white swan event then what could we predict which we have already had OXB tell us half the story of?

Well whatever Serum want and the coded recent RNS about a new partner preparing for commercial supply would be 2 easy starters.