Ken,
Good points.
"Never underestimate the ability of a bad management team to destroy good prospects for any company." Assuming there are/were good prospects, anyone doubting your words would be wise to check the CYTO thread. ( I must admit I bought some in recent months on the theory that the market has more than discounted for management's inept performance, but so far I too appear to be inept!).
We are indeed fortunate at LGND to have a fine management team, whose capabilities are demonstrable.
Unfortunately, once you move beyond clear cut extremes such as LGND and CYTO, judging management teams is really difficult, especially for individual investors who have little, if any, opportunity to meet with them. Most must rely on material written by company lawyers, PR people or company-friendly WS analysts. Fortunately, we have some posters on the LGND and a few other threads at SI which have been helpful in this regard. For me, getting comfortable with management is the most difficult aspect of investing. I guess that is probably one of the reasons why I like to accumulate stock in a company over time; you get to see how management performs (not stock market performance which is driven by a host of non-company related factors) with some of you money before you take too big a position. Unfortunately, sometimes the market will run up before you get a full position, but that is the price one pays to avoid having too much exposure to the CYTO's of the world.
Ken, if you or anyone else has a good way of getting an early read on management teams in the biotech sector, I would welcome hearing them.
Regards,
wtd |
