York Pharma Share Discussion Threads

[roorontev] 02/6/2008 10:44

LOL....;-)

[wetdream] 02/6/2008 10:25

handycam,

£12m revenues for Abasol in 2008....
seems a tad optimistic!

[handycam] 30/5/2008 09:51

Type 'york' in search box. Returns with headline '£4.5m loss'.

[ursamajorra] 30/5/2008 08:25

I am going to buy some more.

Not just yet though,`cos i think i will get them cheaper than today!!

[nobbygnome] 30/5/2008 08:06

Good find HC! They are correct in that if Abasol is approved then of course the price is 'deeply discounted'. Essentially the current price assumes non approval because the marketed products must have a value of around this level taking into account the rapid growth in sales. Of course the other products in phase II etc also have a value as well. So clearly YRK is a buy for those who think Abasol will be approved.

There will be a certain irony if it is actually approved in the one month when the company say it won't be ie June since they have said it will be in the second half of the year.

Nobby

[wetdream] 29/5/2008 17:15

handycam,
thanks. Although hardly 'objective', the comments seem reasonable to me.
sadly, I guess that means not much action for the next six months or so.

[handycam] 28/5/2008 11:36

If a royalty agreement is signed, then a fundraising will be avoided.

[wetdream] 28/5/2008 09:25

..'better than management expectations'...blah,blah
..'ahead of management expectations'...blah,blah

seems to me we can forget the last 2 years, and pretend that YRK have just come to market at 50p (IMHO the fundraising price).

[wetdream] 28/5/2008 09:19

zzzzzzzzzzzz

[topvest] 28/5/2008 08:02

Interesting update - sounds like Abasol is close, but then again it was 2 years ago!

They will definitely need more cash in H2 by the looks of things.

Derms acquisition looks quite handy.

I would expect another transformational acquisition in H2 with a fundraising to tide the company over until Abasol makes it to approval.

[smelleroo] 28/5/2008 07:15

very interesting - abasol registration expected in h2?

smell

[wetdream] 16/5/2008 10:17

Cash call @ 50p?

[smelleroo] 12/5/2008 07:39

FT REPORT - FUND MANAGEMENT: Biotech outflows belie industry hype

By Steve Johnson
Published: May 12, 2008

Biotechnology is hailed as the industry of the future on an impressively regular basis.

Biotech was caught up in the euphoria of the fin-de-siècle technology boom. When that died away, the completion of the human genome project in 2003 offered the prospect of an era of personalised medical care.

Since then, the well-publicised failure of the world's pharmaceutical titans to develop suitably robust proprietary drug pipelines has prompted speculation they would instead take the easy route and vacuum up the fruits of biotech companies' labours, if not swallow entire biotech outfits outright.

And all of this has occurred against a backdrop of ageing populations and a concomitant rise in healthcare spending.

But whatever the merits or otherwise of these arguments, few investors appear to be listening. Across Europe, biotech funds have seen their assets under management shrivel from €12.15bn (£9.5bn, $18.7bn) at the end of 2001 to just €3.17bn as of February, according to data from Lipper Feri.

Net outflows jumped to €911m last year, the worst showing since 2002, and a rash of closures has seen the range of funds ploughing this furrow narrow from 59 in 2002 to just 46.

In the US, by some distance the world's pre-eminent biotech market, sentiment is no better. Healthcare and biotech funds suffered net outflows of $6.4bn (£3.2bn, €4.1bn) in 2006, $5.4bn in 2007 and $633m in the first quarter of 2008, according to EPFR Global, although remaining assets under management are healthier at $55bn.

Many of those involved in the industry seem resigned to this apparent disconnect. Paul Cuddon, biotech analyst at broker KBC Peel Hunt said in a refreshingly honest research report in January that stronger returns could probably be achieved at lower risk elsewhere. "We believe investors should invest their cash in alternative sectors," he concluded.

Zhining Xu, an analyst at Seymour Pierce, confessed that last year had been a "disaster for biotechnology in the UK," with the broker's own Drug Discovery index underperforming the wider market by 36.1 per cent. Fund managers are equally downcast.

Andrew Baker, chairman of the International Biotech Trust, warned of the "indiscriminate selling of biotech stocks" in the fund's half-yearly report last month, while Andy Smith, manager of the Axa Framlington Biotech fund, accepts that "attention has waned from biotech, particularly in the UK and continental Europe".

Interestingly, Mr Cuddon is now more upbeat about the biotech sector than in January, but only because valuations have fallen so far in the intervening months.

"We have gone from a negative to a neutral stance. A lot of the companies we were negative on have fallen and fallen significantly," he says, citing typical slides of 20 per cent.

"The first half of 2008 has been appalling. So many companies have been failing late stage trials, which doesn't do anything for investor sentiment."

The underlying performance of biotech stocks has not been especially poor. In the US, the Nasdaq Biotech has eked out small gains every year since 2003, although it has lost 3.6 per cent so far this year.

In the UK, the FTSE Techmark Mediscience index has delivered identical returns to the All Share index since the lows of 2003. European biotech funds have also delivered positive returns every year since 2003, according to Lipper, save for 2006, when they lost 5.8 per cent, and the first four months of this year, when they fell 4.7 per cent.

But investors are losing faith. Sector commentators point to a toxic mix of new drugs increasingly failing at late-stage trials, and a perceived tougher line from the US Food and Drug Administration, the gatekeeper to the world's most lucrative healthcare market.

"Regulatory approval is becoming harder to get from FDA and the diseases, such as cancer, are more difficult to treat," says Mr Xu. "Gene and cell therapies are too novel and the FDA is too nervous to approve them in the short term."

Axa's Mr Smith paints a similar picture. "There have been some absolute disasters with drugs not approved or drugs not working," he says. "A lot of companies are close to running out of cash and that was not what investors signed up for in the first place. They thought 'let's help develop a life-saving drug and make a bit of money at the same time'.

"Investors really need to see a demonstration of regulatory and commercial success." Mr Cuddon also cites a rash of late-stage failures at UK biotechs such as Renovo and Amarin, arguing: "We need a couple of success stories to prove they are doing great science and can be successful."

He sees the problems in the UK market, where most participants are small, as particularly acute.

"It takes 10-13 years to get from an idea to actually having a product and very few companies have completed that process in the full view of public investors."

Instead, companies with valuable intellectual property get acquired by larger foreign rivals, generating a one-off payment for shareholders but denying them access to long-term revenue streams from a blockbuster drug. "Until this ends, a lot of people won't invest in UK biotech any more. The number of funds has gone down hugely. It's a shame to regard success as being acquired by a foreign company but it costs £50m to fund a Phase III trial. and I don't think people are confident enough in biotech to fund that."

Montreal-based Michael Sjöström, who manages $3bn in biotech funds for Pictet, says emerging markets and commodities have taken attention away from biotech in recent years, although he reports modest inflows since the credit crunch. But at least "it is somewhat easier to find investment opportunities when everyone else is not scrambling for the next breakthrough."

But hope has not been entirely extinguished. "The market will turn," asserts Mr Xu. "It is and will always be a very risky sector."

Mr Smith believes any takeover of a large biotech outfit such as Amgen of the US could "light the blue touchpaper", prompting share prices to "rocket".

"If pharmaceutical companies want new products they have to get them from biotech companies," he states.

[topvest] 10/5/2008 08:32

Yes Nobby that will help; already exercised mine a year or so back..unfortunately taper relief has disappeared so this wasn't a smart move!

[wetdream] 09/5/2008 18:46

Presumably the MHRA doesn't compensate companies for loss of patent life due to their excessive bureaucracy?

[nobbygnome] 08/5/2008 09:20

P.S.

So just another thought. Assuming we get Abasol approval (and hence the price is above 50p) the company will get over £2 million next Feb from the exercise of the warrants, which will be a nice funding boost.

[nobbygnome] 08/5/2008 09:18

Exercise price is 50p and they expire in feb 09. The problem is it is very difficult to buy any number; I know because I have tried!

Nobby

[smelleroo] 08/5/2008 09:10

nobby,

please could you advise me where i could find some detailed information on the york warrants i.e. exercise price?

TIA

smell

[nobbygnome] 08/5/2008 08:55

Yes it is a long term medical condition I have..........

Seriously though the recent price action suggests good news is just round the corner. The MHRA is a lamentable organisation but even they would struggle to take longer than 3 years for an approval!

Nobby

[roorontev] 08/5/2008 08:31

Nobbygnome - 1 May'08 - 22:53 - 2390 of 2394


I feel an approval coming on.......

How long is it now you've had this feeling 18 months,2 years?....LMAO...;-))))

[topvest] 03/5/2008 09:01

Interims are still a month away. Abasol approval is certainly what we need, but we have been saying that for several years now!

[m4p] 03/5/2008 00:16

up she goes again lol lookin good

dyor as always

[wetdream] 02/5/2008 11:24

There shouldn't be time for any rumours.
Once the letter's received - out comes the RNS. IMHO no news is as price sensitive for YRK as Abasol approval (or not..)!