 Well, 6 weeks tonight and we will know if OXB made it back into the FT250 this year or not (don't worry, I'm not about to do another advent calendar).
I suspect the downside / upside possibilities would be something like this:-
Downside - OXB are unable to announce anything partner related in the next 6 weeks (either not happened yet or happened but not allowed to say) and we remain smallcap through the Christmas doldrums. For that I would expect us to end the year something similar to today / maybe a little more if the NY tips are favourable.
Upside - OXB can announce something (maybe favourite for this at the moment being a client name and contract value for the previous commercial myeloma CAR-T announcement) leading to a change of guidance (commercial manufacture and supply is of course for the life of the drug). I think correct timing there would see us back in the FT250 with the good publicity that brings, but also we would be back with a lot of institutions who could once again buy or had to buy (trackers), which is quite a different Christmas scenario.
I know which we would all prefer, but it needs something good from Frank in the next 6 weeks to swing it imho. |
Somebody pinching your nuts? |
Ooh look, a squirrel.... |
Liontrust own 7.64% of OXB but in the post-covid crash redemptions sold the same % of every holding they had.Frank's job here is to sell OXB in a market which our current leaders don't really believe in (well, for the masses anyway). |
From the SCLP thread:
inanaco10 Oct '24 - 13:52 - 13029 of 13029
its becoming ingrained ...........
One of the UK’s top asset managers has blamed fears of a tax raid in Rachel Reeves’s upcoming Budget for sparking withdrawals of £1.1bn from its funds.
Liontrust Asset Management has become the latest company to criticise the Government for knocking investor confidence by raising the prospect of significant tax changes.
The business said it had suffered net outflows of more than a billion pounds in the last three months amid growing concerns around the Oct 30 fiscal event. |
35k traded as I type takeiteasy. That and the volume yesterday suggests to me that whoever was causing the excitement Monday / Tuesday has their shares now.
Appreciate that there will be other big buyers at other times, but my mindset at the moment is that 6 weeks tomorrow is the last reshuffle date of the year. For OXB to be readmitted then I'm guessing we all agree that something has to happen between now and then to make sure that at close of play on the 22nd of November, OXB's market cap is over that threshold (which would be about £580m today). We are currently c£406m.
It could happen as OXB is currently poorly viewed / valued on about 3x sales for this year, but it very much depends upon what Frank can release before then and of course the timing of that is plainly out of his hands.
If Serum fessed up about what they want a big bioreactor for 10 years for, then I think the "right" message there could do it in days, but what are the odds?
Previous years then post results has seen a lot of activity by the analysts and of course following these last interims we have seen very little reported about that. |
Charging over the offer to buy 12 shares...they can only keep the games up for so long :) |
Jez,
I think he's making the point that biotech is like oil exploration - most will go bust but those who hit big really hit it big (greed and fear bringing them in / driving them out).
CDMO is regular very well paid money, which is great but doesn't normally attract the same people (boring and speculation rarely being in the same sentence). |
Similar to the non-execs who get paid in shares Phil, if it's a part of ordinary business then nobody cares. What the people who write the rules don't want is people abusing their position of trust for gain. I would imagine there's quite a lot of self-policing involved here as my guess is that the UK regulator looking at this will be an office of 3 people, with one working from home, another self-identifying as a giraffe and a third pondering the enormity / futility of it all whilst becoming a chain-smoker.
I would imagine OXB these days will be so busy that "technically" they are always going to be in a closed period for insiders - but I think if the "new" deals they know of in the pipeline are what could be considered as expected ordinary business for our company, then they would be OK buying twice per year after the updates.
With all of them not buying, that suggests to me that there is something they know of which is not covered by the current guidance range and so it is price sensitive insider knowledge.
The tricky part is guessing what it might be. Malaria (an old favourite) is of course a name which everyone in the market would be immediately attracted to, but that starting in the next 6 weeks?
If something does happen (naming names with new CAR-T or whatever) and we make the 250, then I think we will have a brilliant end to this year. If not then it will happen soon in 2025 as even with no news released, Lucy or Frank saying £180m+ sales this year and no more lossmaking years is worth it on its own. |
Cousinit, English please,not even market jargen, sounds interesting but a simpler format would be appreciated. |
If management is restricted from buying or selling shares because of undisclosed deals in the background, this would imply that there are material developments in the works that could impact the stock price. However, the granting of share options typically follows different rules. Share options are often part of incentive packages that are not affected by blackout periods, so even if management cannot currently trade in the open market, the options can still be granted as part of long-term incentive plans. |
I suspect this is all part of becoming 'boring'. The more boring the market perceives the underlying business to be, the higher the multiple applied to the earnings.
When there is jam, only announce it when it is already on the knife and starting to be spread. Then the same multiple can be applied rather than an element of hope value which may not materialise.
If the management tean are deemed inside due to the number of undisclosed deals in the background, then they aren't being too restricted due to the share options being granted... |
You know I believe the company to be exceptional in its field gutterhead, but once again it looks very much like it's all going to hinge on news (or no news) to swing it (or not).
Whilst I appreciate that's a blindingly obvious statement, it just represents my view that only so much can happen in a little over 6 weeks based upon market sentiment alone.
My market knowledge is little and maybe it can happen given the right circumstance (which basically is a big buyer deciding the time has arrived and a lot of traders seeing the opportunity to join in), but I think news is the more likely trigger in this short timeline.
Why am I slightly reserved / less than bullish on news in the next 6 weeks? Because after 2 "show and tell" presentations from Frank, we had one where he kept quiet on new names - and I'm sure that wasn't by choice.
So there was some great stuff in the interim presentation - but no name or detail to tease the market. It's great that the guidance was maintained, but that wasn't news.
I thought the market cap cut-off date was the end of November for the last review of the year. That link says it's close of play on Friday the 22nd.
If we are not £6 or better on close of play that Friday then it's another chance missed and we will stay in smallcap until at least the 1st review of 2025. If that happens then we have all suffered worse - it's just a delay to the inevitable once Lucy first forecasts real numbers for 2025.
So what are the hopes? OXB told us about FDA review dates in this quarter. If something we partner with gets approved before the 22nd November then the chances are that we are off the confidential / confidential / confidential news embargo at that point.
Failing that one there is the partner name / contract size for the myeloma CAR-T deal announced in March - or something else completely new to use.
I'm still slightly perplexed by Geovax being happy to announce OXB successes as their clinical trial vaccine manufacturer whilst OXB have said nothing. |
paying more than offer for small buys...says it all really.. patience.... |
That’s certainly how the trend looks. We could quickly pass and leave 400p behind.
Harry’s hoped for 250 admission might still be possible.
Exciting times |
In my view there are quite a few keen buyers here and limited supply . The buyers appear to have been limited at £3.85 recently, but at some point the dam is going to break and the shares could spike higher .
All IMO .
Tuco. |
Watched it all and was fascinating to hear the inside track. The story of luck from a national standpoint that oxb had just completed oxbox and could help, and the sheer goodwill from Oxford uni and oxb and others to kick the process off before the funding was secured. The fact that we were burned is difficult, but if the government address this with some standby funding it might be a good long term outcome alongside our commercial work.
Thanks for sharing Harry. |
I listened and agree it was most informative.... but I have no optimism that the government is listening... |
I realise almost nobody will listen to all of this (it's an hour and threequarters long), but James Miskin and the University partners testifying the the pandemic committee.
I listened to it all and found it well worth the time. A lot of very nice OXB references in there and many other bits of background information from that time.
Something I've mentioned many times here (regarding our market fall from grace being triggered by a government political decision to abruptly stop the vaccine work at least a year earlier than anyone expected) - drag the slider to 11:30 and hear it from a much better source than me. 11:45 relevant too. As I say, if you have time then I'd recommend listening to the lot. |
Not 100% sure of your numbers there but their opening shot at the interims was this:-
Client portfolio is maturing and now includes 37 clients and 48 programmes as of September 2024 (September 2023: 24 clients and 41 programmes), representing a growth of 54% for clients and 17% for programmes year-on-year.
I'm sure it's to do with the way OXB report half year and then post period in the same release (as noted by me before - making their quarterly reporting hints a bit of a farce) but my honest opinion about the orderbook is this:-
Whilst I think all work is great - as it's all paying work for us and the partner takes the trial risk these days - I'm much (much, much) more interested in late P3 and commercial and would happily swap multiple upstream process development for a single late stage P3 any day of the week.
As we both know (re the "is it Rocket?" chats) OXB have had one late stage P3 for the last 2 years. As of the interims that is 4 and it doesn't include those going the P2b BLA route. That is brilliant. Even more brilliant is the commercial deals going back to 2 (so Novartis + 1 new mystery myeloma CAR-T).
My thoughts on that last line vs a total for everything is a bit like the Manchester City Chairman asked about his star striker setting the bathroom of a club owned house ablaze whilst launching fireworks out of the bathroom window. His words were to the effect "As far as I'm concerned as long as he keeps scoring goals for Manchester City like this, he can burn down a bathroom every week".
Priorities there being the lesson. If half those P3 trials get licenced then we will be laughing.
Meanwhile OXB are currently at the flowery cactus show
Lots of potential customers there for Seb's team. |
Harry, yes your words were not lost on me and there are many reasons for programmes to be lost. But, it isn't very reassuring to see the pipeline contract. |
Plutonian,
Please note what I wrote - never lost a customer to another vector supplier (i.e. to a competitor).
I understand that every single time a trial fails to bring the hoped results or (worse) one of our partners gets "good enough" results but can't find the funding to take it further, then that's a customer lost (or certainly at least a programme). But I'm pretty sure you knew I meant that.
The upside to this of course is that OXB's number of programmes is also equally likely to be doing better than it looks each 6 months, because there are going to be programmes (particularly at early stage) where it either doesn't work or the go / no go decision is no. We never see that in the running total growth. |
Anything to do with programmes completed or failing endpoints or trials ?Or the demise of Homology work ? |
I'm not sure the "never lost a customer" line is still true. We lost at least 3 programmes between April and September. Did someone go bust?
OXB Pipeline:
Sep 2022:25+1+2=28
Sep 2023:39+1+1=41
Apr 2024:46+3+2=51
Sep 2024:42+4+2=48 |
Morning Phil,
I know you will remember, but in 2 or 3 webcasts now Seb has made a little presentation on "why we win", which I'm guessing will be a core part of his corporate sales pitch. It obviously covers more than one single point, but a very big point (perhaps the biggest single point) is that OXB has this proven track record now of delivering what we promise to deliver - to quality and on time.
The part which was of great reassurance to me was when he told us that whilst we have had plenty of customers come to us after trying someone else first, OXB have never lost a customer to another vector supplier. Never is a pretty good record.
Drifting sideways into my observation (wild guess) of the day, I'd say that with only 3,444 shares traded at 10am on ADVFN, our rumoured big buyer is now a big holder. |
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