DNDN - Sector: Healthcare---Industry: Biotechnology & Drugs

[Melf Elf]

aiy aiy aiy , the business of business will make you cracy no? 

Ain't it the truth!

there are a lot of folks short on this stock

Recently, several of us have been discussing heavy short interest on stocks such as NVEC, OVEN, TZOO and EYET.  Here's my take on heavy short interest: if the chart is bearish, the shorts are right, even when the short interest is 40%+ of the float.  Heavy short interest isn't going to help the stock until the chart does something bullish, forcing a short squeeze.   Until it does, the shorts have no motivation to cover.

TZOO might be my favorite example of that.  I've been watching it, waiting for it to do something bullish so I could get long it for a short squeeze.  Never happened.  Despite heavy short interest, TZOO closed below 32.60 support and a Bear Channel on June 27, and it has been down ever since.  On Friday, it closed at 24.79, a 52-week low, and anyone who shorted the break of the Bear Channel on June 27, despite what was already heavy short interest, has a 24% paper profit as of Friday's close.

On the other hand, if a chart is shaping up for a bullish breakout, heavy short interest can add fuel for a rally because shorts have got to cover their shorts or get squeezed, sometimes mercilessly.  Recent example of that is Cumulina's mentioning last weekend of the heavy short interest in EYET, which already had rallied for 8 days in a row (19%).  It was ready to break out of a Symmetrical Triangle on Monday, August 15, at 13.47.  It did, and rallied another 16% in two days, helped in part by short-covering.

As of July, 22% of the float in DNDN is short.  17 days to cover.  That's as of July 15, I think.  What we won't know until the next report, however, is how much of that was covered on the rally to the July 21 high.  Regardless, I don't think that heavy short interest in DNDN will help the stock until it acts bullish, technically, motivating shorts to cover.  On Friday, for example, anyone who shorted the gap up open at 5.82 for a day trade had a nice little trade by the 5.60 close.   

but ( if in the business sense) when we lease a manufacturing facility for a year, and we are going into september , october, which are really good times for the pharma stocks, the technicals ( thanks elf ) might have to take a back seat to the ticker.

They might, Tony, but I think we'll see that played out in the chart.  Friday, the market responded to the "good news" about the manufacturing facility by gapping the stock up at the open into the Bear Channel by four cents, which was the high of day, (that was the initial emotional respose) then by "selling the good news" for the remainder of the day with the stock closing at the low of the day, and and by closing it below the prior day's close (that's how the market responded to the gap up into technical resistance).

If, after digesting the "good news" over the weekend, the market has a change of heart and really does perceive it as good news, DNDN will get back inside the Bear Channel and start acting bullish,  doing something like taking out the neckline (horizontal blue line) of the mini Inverse H&S pattern at 5.88-5.89.  It's a very weak pattern in terms of width (only 11 days), but it measures to 6.39 if it gets taken out.

Bottom line: DNDN, technically, has got an uphill battle to fight here.  Literally.  The Bear Channel is rising each day.  The Ichimoku Kumo (cloud) now has risen above price, so that's additional resistance.   It really needs to close above 5.88-5.89 (blue line), which would look alot better.

[vclaudio]

CTIC is a good opportunity ... long, high risk but high rendering too

waiting for the response of FDA for Xyo and Pix

if apporved, it's a $20 stock

[vclaudio]

Rumors On CTIC in Italy market..... there is a voice of spin-off ? is this a good or bad news for you?

[vclaudio]

any comment?

well ....

Rumors On CTIC in Italy market..... there is a voice of spin-off ? is this a good or bad news for you?

[therman]

I am long with a small position, bought at 2,67.

NEWS:

http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/050824/sfw030.html?.v=25
Cell Therapeutics, Inc. (CTI) Plans to Submit Marketing Applications for Potential Approval of XYOTAX(TM) in the United States and Europe
Wednesday August 24, 7:00 am ET 
Would Be First Submission Exclusively Targeting Survival in Women With Lung Cancer


SEATTLE, Aug. 24 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Cell Therapeutics, Inc. (CTI) (Nasdaq: CTIC; Nuovo Mercato) announced that it has decided on its strategy for seeking registration and approval for XYOTAX. In the United States, CTI plans to submit a New Drug Application (NDA) and seek approval for XYOTAX as first-line monotherapy for women with advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) who have poor performance status (PS2). The filing in Europe will also seek use as monotherapy in first-line PS2 patients with NSCLC, but is not expected to be limited to women; however, additional input on the statistical interpretation of non-inferiority will be needed from the scientific committee of the European Medicines Agency (EMEA) prior to submitting a Marketing Authorization Application (MAA).

therman

[vclaudio]

Yesterday it was been the double bottom, it could give it the force in order to a  reaction

[stockpicker]

I still think that DNDN is the real deal. Here's an interesting piece:

Prostate Drug Promise Vs. FDA Rigidity
Dr. Scott Gottlieb, Forbes/Gottlieb Medical Technology Investor,
02.18.05

NEW YORK - Encouraging news that a new cancer vaccine may be saving
the lives of patients with prostate cancer seems too hard to ignore,
even for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. The drug agency has
kept the medical product off the market for more than two years,
arguing that the proof of its value wasn't convincing, even as
evidence continued to accumulate that the new product was saving
lives.

The treatment, developed by Seattle-based biotech company Dendreon
(nasdaq: DNDN - news - people ), works by priming the body's immune
system to recognize special markers on the surface of prostate
cancer cells and harnessing the body's natural immune cells to seek
out the cancer and destroy it.

When the company first submitted its evidence to the FDA almost
three years ago, asking for permission to sell it, the FDA said no.
When the agency looked at all of the patients enrolled in the
company's trial, the vaccine didn't show an overwhelming benefit in
the short-term study of more than 100 prostate cancer patients. But
when Dendreon looked at a smaller subgroup of the patients in the
trial, those with a certain less aggressive form of prostate cancer,
the results looked great. The FDA, however, does not
allow "retrospective" analysis, which is statistically impure and
can lead to cooked results. So Dendreon was asked to do a new trial,
studying the vaccine just in patients who had the less aggressive
form of the cancer. There was evidence that the vaccine worked for
certain patients, but the FDA wanted more convincing data.

It turns out, however, that when Dendreon continued to follow the
patients in the original study for another two-and-a-half years, the
results continued to get better--for all the patients, not just
those with the less aggressive cancer. Thursday evening, Dendreon
announced that 34% of those who received Provenge in that original
trial were still alive after three years, compared with 11% of those
who took a placebo. The median survival, meaning the time by which
half the patients had died, was 25.9 months for those who received
Provenge, compared with 21.4 months for those who took the dummy
vaccine.

That 4.5-month increase in survival is almost double the 2.5-month
benefit shown in clinical trials of Taxotere, a drug that is the
next best thing for patients like those in the Provenge trial whose
cancer has spread beyond the prostate gland and is no longer being
controlled by hormonal therapy.

Dendreon's vaccine product seems on track to win approval, the
question now is whether the FDA will wait for the company to finish
the trial it has underway or approve the product based on the
mounting strength of the results of that original trial. If the FDA
sticks to its rules, it will wait for the new study to finish, and
patients will pay a significant price: denied access to a largely
safe product that looks to be a real advance in cancer care.
Dendreon has said it will wait for the results of its ongoing trial
before filing for approval with the FDA.


------------------
The writer of this article, Dr. Gotlieb (he wrote this in Feb 2005,
even before the excellent data of the 9902A announcement), has been
nominated as the #2 in the FDA several weeks ago.
If approved, DNDN could easily be a $30+ stock, but this is going to
be a VERY bumpy and long (at least a year) road.

[dha]

http://yahoo.reuters.com/financeQuoteCompanyNewsArticle.jhtml?duid=mtfh13552_2005-09-14_17-20-29_wen9062_newsml

[ScottishTrader]

Has anyone been watching this one lately??

Only found the thread just now, and read through it in its entirety.  Still provides a very compelling case as I'm sure Michael will attest.  But no posts since August 20?  And solid upward movement too

Now a big spike on news that they are seeking FDA approval, DNDN looks set to rip now.  Perhaps David's revised target of $10.26 is a realistic goal now, certainly the original goal around $8 should be achieved with ease.  That is unless UBS attempt to mess with things again.  And if there is still a large short position out there the squeeze could well be on...

I am going to keep a very close eye on this one at tomorrow's open

[stockpicker]

I will step up to take another credit for being the first one to bring DNDN to the table on 3tocksonfire. Here is how I view DNDN now:


The current approval of Provenge is for ADPC (the late stage of
Prostate Cancer). There are 40,000 new patients a year (in the US
ALONE) at this stage. Provenge will be sold for $40-50,000... so ...
the market size is $1.5-2 Billion. Assuming that the manufacturing
costs are much higher than standard drugs (due to the nature of
Provenge, the patient's white blood cells have to be sent to a
remote lab for the special "cassette" process) - I would assume
gross costs of $10K (20%), so I'll discount the mkt size accordingly
to ~around~ $1.4 Billion.

DNDN has no partnership (yet) with a big pharma, so as with other
biotechs, we can asign a price/sales multiple of 8-15, so a
potential market cap of $12 billion is not out of the question.
Today's $7 close represents a mkt cap of around $400MM -- so go do
the math for the upside potential.


Now consider the following:

1. DNDN's next trial, the P-11, checks the effectiveness of Provenge
for early stage prostate cancer - mkt size which is 5 TIMES bigger
than the current indication

2. Provenge is NOT a chemotherapy... the only reported side effects
are fever and chills for one day after the treatment

3. So if one has to chose between a chemotherapy (Taxotere, the
current leading drug with 11% chance to survive over 3 years) vs
Provenge, with 45% chance to survive over 3 years, what would he
chose?

4. DNDN has Neuvenge, which acts similarly to Provenge in much
earlier stage in its pipeline as well as another drug candidate that
they test together with DNA.


So despite the vicious short attack from UBS I keep my DNDN
position. As mentioned many times before, the DNDN ride is going to
be VERY bumpy - but an exciting one. With a short position of over 14,000,000 - a short squeeeeeeze seems more likely than not.

Enjoy!

[ScottishTrader]

Thanks for your reply, stockpicker,

I'd applaud if I could (where did the applauds go ) for hanging in there where other's (including David) did not. 

As a relatively new member, I'm starting to realise that it is very easy to get caught up in short term moves here on 3SOF, but if you have a little look at some of the older trades, there are some great stocks with great fundamental stories that could be easily held a LOT longer.  no doubt DNDN is one of them.  It's just funny how if no-one has posted on the thread for a while it gets buried (Doesn't mean its gone away though!)

I think it might be time for me to spend an evening going through all the older threads to catch up

Joy.

Good luck for tomorrow matey

[bigdogs99999]

I have held DNDN for a good while.  After the last "good" news, I doubled my position only to get burned by the UBS downgrade a few days later.  I have since moved back to my original position (my biggest holding dollarwise still).  I think it important to pay good attention on the entry point unless you are truly looking long-term.  The short position is huge, probably naked in part, and this stock beyond anything I have seen seems to get manipulated.  So careful if you trade short-term.  If you want to look up in 2010 and retire, this is the stock I am betting on for that opportunity.  Management clearly thinks approval is going to happen.  It is building the manufacturing facility as I write.  Dave

[KCScott]

I'm still learning TA - This looks like the Cup - possible handle formation in the next few days?




Thoughts?

[Michael]

Only found the thread just now, and read through it in its entirety.  Still provides a very compelling case as I'm sure Michael will attest.  But no posts since August 20?  And solid upward movement too

Hi Scotsman and Stockpicker

I have to admit that Dendreon does not have my attention these days. As I said in my last mail DNDN is executing their business plan and we can just sit back and wait for the PPS to reflect this.

DNDN is a bit like religion either you are a beliver or you are not. I am a believer and I am confident that they will get FDA approval and that the UBS' of this world will turn around in a second and suddently find DNDN the most sexy stock around - it is just a matter of time.

For now we have most of the Analysts betting against us and I could see DNDN falling back. As said before I don't care. Until now DNDN has fulfilled all my expectations and I don't see any reasons for selling DNDN. This is going to be a great investment.

[ScottishTrader]

Thanks very much for the comments, bigdogs and Michael, I can fully understand why you are so confident in this one.

Having seen the pps fluctuations these last few days, it looks like someone is messing with the stock on a short term basis.  My real question with this one is as bigdogs mentioned, finding an appropriate entry point.  With yesterday's long red candle, it doesn't show any sign of a turnaround yet, but with the recent posittive news, I wouldn't expect it to lose all of the last white candle.  I may try to get in between 6.50-6.70.  Do you think it can go any lower?