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Post by stevil on Feb 8, 2016 18:05:09 GMT -5
Regardless of why scripts have been low to date, if MannKind or their next partner determines how to inform doctors how to prescribe it, Afrezza will become a blockbuster. If not, I don't see how one could consider investing in biotechnology companies. I wonder if the cholesterol injection (drug name escapes me right now) would have faced similar issues had it come out 10 years ago, or however long ago it was that Mevacor, Pravachol, Lipitor, and Zocor were all on the market. I'm wondering if the timing was just off because there are so many branded RAAs that it needs to compete against from a few different, powerful companies. It wouldn't be the first time a new drug completely disrupted the market. See- Lipitor, among many others. (although I linked an article awhile back showing how Lipitor took an additional several hundred million dollars after approval before it finally caught traction) It's confusing to me why, or maybe how, Afrezza can be unsuccessful if it works as well as we've heard and if patients would demand it if it were available. I almost think the success of Afrezza hinges nearly 100% on better testing results. A better label clears insurance barriers, gets docs more excited, and gives a bigger platform to market the drug. It's not like we haven't had human insulin before. It's not like we haven't had inhaled particulates before. It's not like a drug hasn't completely disrupted the market before. This is truly a bizarre story to say the least. Every little thing that could go wrong, has.
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Post by stevil on Feb 7, 2016 22:46:00 GMT -5
True, but I'd like to add that it'd put a huge bullseye on our back. It'd make the outstanding share number much lower, and thus easier to drive back down with less risk to the upside if things ever turn around (due to having to return fewer shares if they get called in). I really think it would be catastrophic to do so when the short interest on this stock is so high.
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Post by stevil on Feb 7, 2016 15:51:05 GMT -5
That's unfortunate.
Wise men learn more from fools than fools from the wise. -- Cato the Elder
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Post by stevil on Feb 7, 2016 15:43:10 GMT -5
Ya, that was kind of what I was eluding to ^ what me said.
I don't think anyone will want to buy this stock at a higher price, nor would shareholders be happy if they allowed the shorts to depreciate their money even further.
Someone wouldn't be too bright if they paid several dollars per share for this stock right now... They'd lose that value in no time.
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Post by stevil on Feb 7, 2016 15:25:56 GMT -5
For me it's not even the dreamboat being half full or half empty. When the water is overflowing onto the boat and you don't have a plan to get it out so you can stay afloat, it doesn't really matter how you want to look at the situation... if you want to say the boat is almost full or not fully full. You're still going to sink if you don't fix the problem...
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Post by stevil on Feb 7, 2016 15:22:23 GMT -5
I'm sure we'll get the price reduction eventually, but how low are we going to go is going to be the big question? We need to go low enough to convince insurers we're cost effective compared to existing RAAs. Do we have to go lower than what humalog/novolog costs? If we did undercut the big guys, will they just lower their prices? Part of me wants to see a nice insulin price war because that'd be great for diabetics. My belief is they won't drop the price on novolog/humalog at first since they see us as a failed product anyways. But if scripts picked up, then they'd lower their prices to try and hold their market share. For those of you who know I sold, nothing like having 20 years of capital losses to carry forward I'm still sitting on the sidelines until bankruptcy is off the table and then I'll probably jump back in. Ya, they likely won't lower their prices until it hurts. Because lowering their prices too soon only means less revenue for them anyway. There's a point where it becomes beneficial for them to do that and that wouldn't be for a while. Now, that's not to say they wouldn't be proactive and just lower their prices for 3-6 months as that would be all it would take for them to screw us over. It all depends on how serious of a threat they perceive us to be. 3-6 months of lowered pricing is better than many years or permanent lost market share. I'm sure they've got someone in an office somewhere crunching those numbers....
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Post by stevil on Feb 7, 2016 14:59:16 GMT -5
Not sure what you mean... We don't have to speculate because Matt gave us this information when he said they weren't going to do it.
My guess is they don't want to raise the SP for the shorts to knock it back down. It's probably the fastest way to devalue our company at this point. It could go well, but it could also be disastrous. They probably figure it's better to just leave things where they are at the moment since the short interest is still so high.
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Post by stevil on Feb 7, 2016 14:45:57 GMT -5
I'll let others speak to the technical details of that. However, Matt said that was not an option they were considering in this last CC.
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Post by stevil on Feb 7, 2016 14:29:58 GMT -5
haha thanks! I appreciate it
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Post by stevil on Feb 7, 2016 14:23:26 GMT -5
I apologize if it's been mentioned previously on this board. I know the "use the search function" crowd might come out in full force on me, but I'm wearing some armor... So do your worst I was wondering if anyone knew how far along in the development we were in all the other applications we have? I assume we already have the formulation down, we just need to do animal testing and human trials before FDA approval? How close to the finish line are we with all of these other applications? I would assume that they've been developed simply because most of those drugs have been already developed in other formulations... so wouldn't that also streamline the testing process? The therapeutic effects should already be fairly well known as well as the adverse effects and recommended dosages?
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Post by stevil on Feb 7, 2016 14:18:07 GMT -5
Come on guys! This thread is all just an exercise in mental masturbation. Matt could not have been more clear. MNKD is not going BK! His statement was definitive. Of course he cannot say what will or will not happen a year from now - nobody can. Debt is currently being re-negotiated. Overhead (cash burn) is being appropriately adjusted. There is simply no justification for this ongoing speculation. Let's try to be reasonable and a little more positive, please. I'm not trying to infuse negativity into the board, just reality. Matt said that "at this time" BK was not an option and would be a last resort- he never said MNKD wasn't going BK. While it's very possible that the debt will be restructured and operating expenses reduced (my guess is there will be more layoffs... since that's the easiest thing to control. Still don't understand the Hakan severance/retirement package, but that's another issue for another day) There absolutely is justification for the ongoing speculation. Money doesn't grow on trees and won't fall from the sky. While I agree with you that it may be mental masturbation to keep dwelling on the "how" we'll stay alive or "what" will eventually become of us, it very much is a topic that can and should be discussed. But it is all speculation at this point because Matt did not outline his plan for how he would get us to the lands of profitability. We're casting our sails to the winds of the diabetes clinics and the milestones from our recent deal as well as the hopes of making more TS deals. But it's a very real issue that as of now, we do not have enough money to successfully run this company past 6 months. For the record: I don't want BK or a sale. I would love for Al to step up and keep funding this. But there are so many extra variables that go into all of this- As Al has admitted to not knowing beforehand. So it's not a foregone conclusion that he will keep stepping up, or that it will lead us to success even if he does. So my arguments are more negative than my hopes because I don't think it's as likely as other people on here who keep saying Al will keep writing blank checks. No one has heard from him in months and no one really even knows how much he has left in his piggy bank even if he did want to keep funding us.
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Post by stevil on Feb 7, 2016 13:48:42 GMT -5
Not a bad analogy when our company is similar to our country- our expenses > income. Our budget is not balanced. Adding $80 mil from Al would not change that equation. It would only prolong the inevitable- another cash infusion or BK. Unlike our nation, we are currently in the black, but we won't be after 6 months unless we start turning a profit or somehow dilute. People keep making the assumption that all we need is time. That very well may be the case, but it also may very well not be the case. I would contend that we need a lot of time and a lot of money, but that's required just to have a chance to make MNKD into what we hope it will be. We still don't even know if time + money is really all it would take. All that we know for certain, right now, is that we only have about 6 months of operating budget left.
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Post by stevil on Feb 7, 2016 13:20:19 GMT -5
From the 2015 annual report, the debt to 2019 is $80 million. Are bankruptcy prognosticators trying to say in a worse case scenario that Al would not increase the amount from the Mann Group and lose his $billion investment? I'm assuming I'm one of the "bankruptcy prognosticators", but I have no idea what Al will do. He's already had a paper loss of $800 million or so. In theory, it makes sense to spend $80 mil to "save" $800 mil, but at what point do you stop throwing good money after bad? Infusing another $80 mil doesn't solve the problem long term. It's similar to what Congress (thanks Nylefty ) is doing by raising the debt ceiling every year. You can't just keep kicking the can down the road. Eventually changes need to be made because over $1 billion was needed to get us to where we are now. Sure, we're light years ahead of where we were $1 billion ago, but how much more do we really need? We still need a significant chunk to market Afrezza as well as instill confidence in the market that we're not just going to survive, but actually thrive. That may require $500 mil or more, who knows? So $80 mil will keep us alive (trusting your research) until 2019 if we spent no more money on anything else, but will we be better off by then? I guess it's worth the risk, but it still doesn't take into account cash burn or any additional expenses that would need to be funded to get us over the hump. Al publically stated he had no idea how much money it was going to take to bring a drug to market and he grossly underestimated that figure. He hasn't spoken up about his plans, so no one really knows.
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Post by stevil on Feb 7, 2016 12:43:55 GMT -5
I'm not super familiar with secondary offerings... How does dilution work? If we're a $400 mil market cap company now, offering 400 mil new shares at $1 would drive the market cap to $800 mil, but there would then be 800 mil shares. So wouldn't the SP stay at $1? (assuming all shares get bought...)
In any case, you're assuming that 400 million shares would be bought. That might be an improbable assumption. Even if the reward is high, 400 million shares is an awful lot and all this company has shown it can do so far is lose money. It hasn't shown that it knows how to be profitable yet. Sure, we see some of the roadblocks, but can they execute to overcome them with $400 mil more? I'm not sure that'd even be enough, although I'd love to see them be able to try...
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Post by stevil on Feb 6, 2016 19:07:58 GMT -5
Perhaps you need to translate your excitement upon learning this to something I can understand. Sugar (glucose) is stored in white fat. Leave it there for goodness gracious. We don't need any additional glucose released into a diabetics body. Ok. Where did I go wrong? haha you didn't go wrong and this medication should also help diabetics (in theory) by lowering insulin resistance. Smaller white adipose cells in leaner individuals, (compared to larger adipose cells in the overweight/obese) secretes more adiponectin, a hormone that helps with insulin sensitivity. So the leaner a person is, the more adiponectin gets secreted, the more sensitive they should be to insulin. Converting the bigger fat cells into smaller cells (by converting them to brown fat that will get metabolized as heat) would be a way to help this process without having to change diet or exercise. As long as the person kept the same lifestyle in regards to activity and didn't change their diet, they would lose weight simply by taking that drug. How cool would that be? One more thing. Supposedly it would also lower blood glucose by signaling to the liver to stop gluconeogenesis. There are numerous health benefits to lean body mass and obesity is quickly becoming the leading cause of death (through CVD, diabetes, and other diseases) As of now, smoking is the only thing you could do that would be worse than being obese.
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