I also hold a tiny position in Vitality Biopharma (VBIO). I don’t usually talk about these two pot plays on this board because I consider them purely speculative. I do not recommend either IIPR or VBIO as investments. Neither company has much of a track record. They’re both sideways plays on growing interest in medical marijuana. If you’re interested in either one please do your own research and tread with considerable caution.
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This is a great thread. I am glad to see a lot of companies that I already own being mentioned. The following is mostly being typed out here to help sort some of my thoughts on some of these companies and their stock.
From duma’s list of 5, I already own SQ and BOFI and had been closely looking within the past few weeks at adding some medium/long-ish term call options to my holdings. Also, Teladoc is on my watch list.
Bear mentioned TTD, which I already own, along with Talend and Teladoc which are two of the top few on my current watch list.
Pure Storage (Ticker: PSTG) sounds like one that I need to do a good bit of research on, as it was mentioned several times in this thread. I have seen the company name bandied about, but have yet to look at it closely at all…a really quick look shows that the 2019 and 2020 calls could be of some interest (caveat emptor, of course).
Ant mentioned Arista, Hubspot, Square, and TTD, all of which I already own, and Talend, which is high on my watch list.
qazulight’s observation about indoor growing technologies is something to keep in mind for the future. I would guess there are likely some impressive innovations in that space that have occurred that have yet to be deployed in open markets. Several years ago, a home in my parents’ quiet subdivision was found to have quite an operation going on inside.
Now for some other items not relating to possible 2018 doublings; Good observation/point from ant:
BTW - we might need to think about what constitutes a double in the situation of a capilisation event should companies bring home overseas profits and make one off payments back to Shareholders.
Although Apple definitely isn’t a candidate to double, a cash repatriation “holiday” or temporarily-lowered tax rate would be a huge event for Apple shareholders, regardless of how Apple ultimately decided to deploy that cash (maybe a combo of buy-backs and a special dividend, perhaps with the buy-backs first to then have fewer shares to pay the dividend to). This could also aid Ubiquiti Networks in buying back shares (another company I own which I also doubt has “double in 2018” potential).
From blueCollarTim FCEL Fuel Cell Energy:
Tim, if you’re interested in fuel cell technology for vehicles, be sure to read up on Nikola Motor Company https://nikolamotor.com/ . They are still private, so we can’t invest, but their rate of “reservations” for their fuel cell trucks in the first period reservations could be made was apparently far, far greater than the reservations for Tesla’s recently-announced semis (despite the fact that Pepsi reserved 100 Tesla semis), per the Tweet linked below (140 for Tesla vs. 7,000 for Nikola…and gotta love the name battle).
https://twitter.com/william_sw/status/942132375139569664
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Maybe one of the smaller biotechnology stocks will be bought out and double. Blue comes to mind.
Flygal
No position in Blue
IMO a potential double in 2017 is FMI. On a recent interview their CEO said there are 70 targeted immunotherapy treatments approved and over 630 in late stage trials. If FMI becomes the gatekeeper to direct those treatments this could be big. Since they are approved by CMS for reimbursement about (40%)of their patients will be covered and I believe it’s just a matter of time until health insurers get in line. Each announcement of reimbursement should be a substantial catalyst. Furthermore Roche has a substantial position in FMI and might buy the rest (with a substantial premium, I hope).
Rob
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I was remiss in crediting bulwnkl for bringing this idea to the board. # 33682
Thanks to him.
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/best-precision-medicine-stock…
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/fda-approves-foundation-medic…
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I was remiss in crediting bulwnkl for bringing this idea to the board. # 33682
Thanks to him.
I almost responded as such earlier when I first saw your post MONYMAN3. The 9+% bump today for Foundation Medicine (FMI) has been nice…although there has been a whole lot of volatility subsequent to the announcement a few weeks ago. Latest in the future options available are for August 2018. I currently hold some January 2018 positions, but would be very enticed by some January 2019 or 2020 calls…but Roche may suck FMI in fully well before that time.
Dumaflotchie:
any reason why EDIT over CRSPR or Intellia or …?
Hey Justice!
This prior post from the NPI explains it:
http://discussion.fool.com/crispr-cream-tinker-et-al-32911374.as…
This is a VERY high risk sector…way way early but with incredible promise.
Seems that EDIT has some patent leverage at this early time but that may just be a mirage.
You can see from that post that there are many CRSPR companies but EDIT and SGMO seemed most interesting.
IMO, caution would be advised here…great technology but very early and while the low cost as compared to CAR-T is appealing…there is very little hard data…so these stocks will trade for some time on hype alone.
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Double in 2018?
ATVI Activision Blizzard
BLUE Bluebird Bio
CRSP Crispr Therapeutics
RLGT Radiant Logistics
TracyK
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SSW
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any reason why EDIT over CRSPR or Intellia or …?
I’m not Duma, but a few thoughts. Edit is co-founded by Dr. Feng Zhang Ph.D. who is on the board. Dr Zhang is tied to the approved patent that went to the Broad Institute (Harvard and MIT).
CRSP and Intellia are aligned and licensed their technology from the UC Berkely group, while they were first to file, they lost the award of the Patent to Broad for various reasons. While that is still being disputed in the courts, it seems unlikely that it will get overturned.
That doesn’t mean that CRSP and NTLA won’t also be able to pay and get a licensing agreement from the Broad Inst, but it is a little less clear at the moment.
Pipelines:
https://www.intelliatx.com/pipeline/
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thanks JDC
Besides the regular names/culprits the one I think could double off the beaten track
EXEL - has two more drugs coming out next year and their first one was a superhit and generating cash flow for them to buy out some other company
PEGA - I think they have had issues with cloud transition and this year that will get completed so I feel they could be a double
MZOR - Looking now at MDT taking on sales this is another double even though the P/S is quite high but
Then their is AYX and EBIX whihc has been buying a lot of companies and broadening their rev and their P/E is very reasonable
Rajesh
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ATVI
ALNY
TWNK
FNMAS
in no order.
Square, sure, maybe.
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I have two candidates:
One is TWOU, a cloud-based SaaS that allows colleges and universities to deliver online degree programs. They’ve got 49 domestic grad programs at 23 universities (MBA at U of Denver, UC-Davis, and Rice, Berkeley cyber security, UC-Davis MBA, Yale Physician Assistant program, Harvard Business Analytics Program, USC Master of Education in School Counseling; Fordham Masters in Social Work; etc)
Most recent quarter with 35% revenue increase YoY, anticipate 35-40% growth in 2018 … http://investor.2u.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=1047591
Secondly, and more long-winded… is spark therapeutics, ticker: ONCE.
while there is much bally-hoo about CRISPR, I have to say, show me the clinical data! Many of these companies frankly have none (I’m looking at you Editas)!
Financially, these companies pose a unique issue- once you treat the patient, they may be cured! Great for patients, not so great for the bottom line, particularly for those of us that like recurring & growing revenue! Ultimately, they will have an initial surge in revenue treating all of the addressable market, then regress back to the incidence rate of XYZ disease amongst the population.
So in order to survive as a gene-editing company, you’ll need to do at least one of the following:
-have a platform for many rare diseases (and either be better, cheaper, or have first mover advantage)
-target more common genetic disease (sickle cell, hemophilia, etc)
Lets talk Spark (taken from a prior NPI post):
They have 3 irons in the fire:
-rare genetic disease of the eyeball
-rare genetic diseases of liver-mediated disease (say, hemophilia)
-neurodegenerative disease (in pre-clinical, so we wont discuss)
For the eyeballs:
In October 2015, we announced positive top-line results from our pivotal Phase 3 clinical trial of voretigene neparvovec, the first successfully completed randomized controlled Phase 3 trial of a gene therapy for genetic disease in the United States. The trial of 31 subjects met with statistical significance its primary endpoint, the bilateral multi-luminance mobility test, or MLMT, change score (p = .001), as well as the first two of three secondary endpoints, specifically full-field light sensitivity threshold testing, or FST, (p < .001) and the assigned first eye MLMT change score (p = .001). Statistical significance was not achieved for the third secondary endpoint, visual acuity (p = .17). To date, we have not observed any product candidate-related serious adverse events and no deleterious immune responses in either the Phase 3 trial or in earlier Phase 1 trials. Based on these positive results, we intend to submit a Biologics License Application, or BLA, for voretigene neparvovec with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, or FDA, as the first step in executing our global regulatory and commercialization strategy…
The Phase 3 trial demonstrated a statistically significant improvement of vision in subjects that were progressing toward complete blindness. On average, subjects in the intervention group demonstrated an improvement of 1.9 light levels on the MLMT one year post-administration. Specifically, nearly two-thirds of these subjects achieved the maximum improvement measurable on the MLMT. Similarly, on average, these subjects achieved a 100-fold improvement in light sensitivity as measured by FST. Further, visual field in the intervention group nearly doubled versus a slight decrease in the control group. In August 2016, we announced positive one-year follow-up data from the Phase 3 trial on the nine control subjects that crossed over after one year and received voretigene neparvovec. Eight of the nine subjects improved as measured by the MLMT, with all eight responders achieving the maximum improvement measurable. The average improvement among all nine subjects was 2.1 light levels. As measured by FST, eight of the nine crossover subjects improved, with the average improvement of all nine subjects being nearly 200-fold. There was one serious adverse event in one eye among the nine subjects that was determined to be related to the surgical procedure rather than voretigene neparvovec. This subject exhibited foveal thinning and a reduction in visual acuity after the surgical procedure, which did not return to baseline. Voretigene neparvovec continues to demonstrate long-lasting effects as measured by both MLMT and FST. Specifically, a cohort of eight subjects that participated in our second Phase 1 clinical trial, and that would have met the eligibility criteria for the Phase 3 trial, continue to experience durable improvement over four years from time of administration, with observation ongoing. Further, in the continuation of the Phase 3 trial, the original intervention group (n = 20) that received voretigene neparvovec demonstrated sustained benefit two years post-treatment as measured by the bilateral MLMT. The average improvement for these eight subjects of 1.9 light levels seen at year one was maintained at year two. (links here: http://discussion.fool.com/forget-crspr-here39s-gene-therapies-d…)
Remarkable results: 93% Gain in functional vision of Phase 3 participants at 1 year with 72% achieving maximum improvement with no product-related adverse events. 3-year data (n=20) and 4 year data (n=4) from Phase 3 with no statistically significant signs of waning effects. >150 fold improvement in light sensitivity, and visual field measures doubling… for a rare disease without a treatment.
Luxturna (voretigene nearvovec) was just approved by the FDA.
Hemophilia B
-no adverse events reported, no thrombotic events noted, no bleeding events noted. (N of 13)
-durability for hemophilia B now out >1 yr in 5 pts, 1 of which >18 months.
- ten participants went from 111 confirmed bleeds to four over a 58 week period post treatment.
- in 10 participants, the number of factor 9 infusions dropped from 675 in the year before treatment to 10 in the 58 weeks post treatment.
On hemophilia, and why Spark could be a game-changer:
The current standard of care for hemophilia B is either prophylactic or on-demand FIX protein replacement therapy, in which frequent intravenous administrations of recombinant FIX are required to stop or prevent bleeding. Prophylactic therapy for hemophilia B, which has been shown to lead to the best outcomes, is practiced only by some adult patients in the United States due to the significant expense, patient inconvenience, concern about lifetime insurance caps and concern about the risk of blood-borne disease transmission from plasma-derived products. We believe that an average adult patient with severe hemophilia B who treats only in response to bleeds uses, on average, $100,000 of FIX concentrate each year. The cost to treat an average adult patient with severe hemophilia B prophylactically has been estimated to reach up to $300,000 or more each year. A gene therapy treatment could offer patients the benefits of prophylaxis without the need for frequent factor infusion. This treatment is partnered with Pfizer.
Spark has a hemophilia A treatment (there are many more hemophilia A patients than B) - and Spark’s recent drop was likely due to BioMarin reporting positive results. I’m not positive how this pans out. When looking at patient oriented outcomes - number of bleeding episodes, need for infusions, etc - both drugs work well. This may be a race for first mover, and price & insurance company approval may play a role here. Regardless, the hemophilia A market is now a crapshoot, but certainly proof of concept for Spark.
So whats their strategy?
Establish a franchise of gene therapies for IRDs (inherited rare disease). The RPE65 and CHM genes are two of more than 220 genes that have been identified to cause IRDs. We believe our capabilities and know-how will allow us to develop treatments for a number of these genetic conditions. In connection with our development of SPK-CHM for choroideremia and other potential product candidates for additional IRDs, we anticipate utilizing technology similar to that developed in our voretigene neparvovec program while leveraging our clinical experience to optimize the clinical trials to best evaluate the safety and efficacy of the particular product candidate
Basically, they want to plug and play for inherited rare eye disease… and likely for hemophilia / other liver mediated disease… and there’s no shortage of potential genetic diseases to battle:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_genetic_disorders
expected sales of Luxturna are $400m in 2021, and a possible price tag of >1 million for a one-time dose. I like the plug and play system, but then we run into the problem of, “great we cured all of these cases, now where is our next meal / recurring revenue coming from?”
Let’s compare ONCE to EDIT - editas has no clinical trial results. ONCE has a clinically proven platform with at least a few trials under their belt. ONCE is 2+ years ahead of EDIT. Yet somehow, ONCE is valued at 1.8b and EDIT at 1.1b.
Long TWOU, strongly considering ONCE.
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while there is much bally-hoo about CRISPR, I have to say, show me the clinical data! Many of these companies frankly have none (I’m looking at you Editas)!
To be fair to them, they are all in the discovery, pre-clinical stage. I believe you will see some IND’s filed in early 2018 and some trials started then
Let’s compare ONCE to EDIT - editas has no clinical trial results. ONCE has a clinically proven platform with at least a few trials under their belt. ONCE is 2+ years ahead of EDIT.
Or possibly more. Though there is overlap in the type of disorders they are not exactly targetting the same genetic defects:
https://ois.net/allergan-makes-a-play-in-gene-editing/
But I am not sure if that is a danger to what Editas is trying to treat (LCA Type 10 vs Spark LCA Type 2).
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I’m considering impinj (PI) at it’s current price (<$22)
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At the end of November I had four good-sized positions up over 140% (Shopify, Arista, Square, LGIH), and a smaller position in Kite had been acquired at up over 250%. Now I’m trying to figure out what those stocks will do for an encore next year. Which positions will big winners in 2018? I think all of those four will be up in 2018, but certainly NONE of them will be up 100%!
Which of my other stocks could be up 100% in 2018? No chance, in my opinion for Nvidia, or Splunk. They won’t double. I think Hubspot and Talend will do well, but they won’t double. The same for Wix.
Okay, so which of my holdings are possible doubles? In my opinion, the most likely would be Alteryx and Nectar, but as a small biopharma Nectar could also collapse, so it stays a small position. I’d have to say that Nutanix is a possible, at least.
Do any of you have candidates you’d like to propose for a possible double? I’d be glad for some suggestions.
(By the way, I never expected any of my positions to double this year either.)
Best,
Saul
I was a big fan of this thread towards the end of last year.
Perhaps it is time for a similar thread looking forward to 2019?
Also, a review of some of the ideas from this thread could be instructive. I don’t have time today, but perhaps later in the week if someone doesn’t beat me to it.
-volfan84
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TTD could double in 2019, depending on where it finishes in Dec.
Currently about $120, if it hit $200 it would be about $8.8b market cap on (my) projected 2019 revenues of about $700m. That would end 2019 at about a P/S of about 12.5, which is about the P/S it has today, and that assumes TTD can grow 50% y/y in 2019. So maybe not quite a double, unless it starts to get valued more akin to the MDB/ZS/AYX of the world, in which case it would be an easy double.
TWLO is very similar, I think. Y/Y comparisons will get tricky with SEND being part of their revenue mix during 2019, but I see them being able to keep their P/S, and if they grow 55-60% y/y in 2019, the math says the stock could appreciate 60%. Not quite a double, but really good.
Not a ton of under-the-radar tech growth stocks. I think Saul’s SaaS/Cloud trend has been adopted broadly by a chunk of the market traders, so likely the biggest winners will be new companies we aren’t tracking right now.
Wildcards are NVDA and NTNX, for completely different reasons…they could double or stay flat…nothing will surprise me there.
Very speculative, but I kind of feel the winds of change pushing the sails of cannabis stocks. NY gov announcing plans to make adult-use legal. This seems to have bipartisan support in govt. I think most existing cannabis stocks are buyout plays. The board of directors for Acreage Holdings looks like a political powerhouse. Medmen are being run terribly on financial side, but the footprint/locations and apple-store-like retail presence could be a winner. I am more interested in the US-focused cannabis stocks than in Canada, but that is just me. Most of these stocks are OTC. I may dip my toe in the water, but would be hard for me to put a sizable allocation to any of them.
Biotech? Always the next big cancer-killer and/or gene therapy winner out there…likely a bunch of winners there, but that is not my forte. I understood Illumina, but they got so big that I no longer saw oppty of doubling.
Chinese ADRs? Hard to trust now after seeing how politics/trade can destroy value, and there is the constant fraud concerns. My opinion changed largely when I saw how plugged in TTD was to top Chinese companies…so TTD becomes my pseudo play on China growing into the largest economy on the planet. Happy to leave it at that. But, yeah, wouldn’t be shocked to see a BZUN double in 2019 from these levels, but not playing the game. I soured more on IQ after I saw the China govt crackdown on Tencent regarding video games. If they will go after a titan, then they can easily squash a smaller fry like IQ if they release a film or tv show that the govt deems inappropriate for Chinese population consumption. That is too much an unknown for me. So, yeah, TTD.
So as far as doubles, they sure would be nice, but I will happily take 50-60% if I somehow was lucky enough to get it, and will ride TTD/TWLO mostly for 2019, until I do find something better.
I made a lot this year, despite the Oct-Dec craziness, and will be happy if 2019 is anywhere near that. I think 2020 is my next big year and gives enough time for some newer more unknown stocks to cross my path before they blow up too much.
Dreamer
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I’m with you when it comes to TWLO and TTD, Dreamer.
However, maybe we should start a new thread for the 2019 candidates so things don’t get mixed up?
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