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Biotech / Medical : Ligand (LGND) Breakout! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Webhead who wrote (29194)	8/18/1999 1:19:00 PM
From: Edwin S. Fujinaka	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 32384

The CBS Marketwatch preliminary to the story you posted was also interesting. I thought it was worth posting on it's own: By Jeff Clabaugh, CBS MarketWatch Last Update: 10:09 AM ET Aug 18, 1999 NewsWatch Ligand; biotech bomb or beauty? It's a case of a company that hasn't turned a profit despite its own expectations, and a case of a stock that's caught in the tug of war between long and short investors. Ligand Pharmaceuticals (LGND: news, msgs) makes the Company Spotlight at The Online Investor website, but writer James Hale says it is both a controversial and complicated biotech. Ligand has two products in the market already. One treats cutaneous T-cell lymphoma. The other treats AIDS-related Kaposi's sarcoma. Both target a fairly small patient population and delays in Medicare reimbursements for its Kaposi's sarcoma treatment put a dent in sales. The latter of which caused Ligand to push back its profitability target to 2000 earlier this week. Unlike most biotechs, the company has also borrowed heavily to fund research and development, company acquisitions and products. And its stock has been bouncing back and fourth in the 5 to 16 range. But Hale sees a lot of positives. For one thing, Ligand has a list of partners that read like a Who's Who in the pharmaceutical business, including Glaxo-Wellcome, Pfizer and Abbott Labs. It also has as many as three dozen compounds in various stages of clinical trials and is developing drugs that treat everything from diabetes and osteoporosis to obesity and inflammatory diseases. Hale says if Ligand and its partners can bring a fair share of them to market, the payoff should be huge, and the company's diverse list of drugs in the pipeline reduces some of the risk most biotechs have. Read the full story. (Note: The full story is contained in the previous post)