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Biotech / Medical : Biotech Valuation -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: scott_jiminez who wrote (981)	4/18/2000 11:19:00 AM
From: biowa	Respond to of 52153

Scott, groupthink. You know if you didn't feel the need to be so antagonistic, you might be an interesting contributor. And who knows, you might learn something from us, while we're learning from you. That said, you raise some excellent discussion points among your jibes. Perhaps the problem in perception/reality for many of us, including myself, is that our academic training makes us believe that markets will operate in a similar rational fashion to bench science. We are also fully ensconced in the 'science-envy' of the culture and cannot fathom the idea that non-science savvy investors would 'perceive' biotech stories in a not-so-different light than dot.com stories. First, you're off base on at least three points here: 1 Many of us here come from a completely non-science academic background (V1 and PeterS, for example). I, myself, have a PhD, but also an MBA from a good business school and have spent a number of years on the business side of biotech. 2 Actually, financial science teaches us that the best assumption is that ultimately markets and investors do operate in a rational fashion. And to study what causes irrational behavior. 3 Much as we complain about ST moves, we are fully aware that many investors "don't get" the science. And we capitalize on that. In the cozy little world of SI we may decide upon certain immutable 'truths' about biotech investing. But the chasm between these 'truths' and the investors who will eventually drive the share prices of biotechs is enormous. And that's the secret. Because eventually, perception will chase - if not catch up to - reality. Our advantage is that by understanding the probable truth we own the equity before everyone's perception catches up. That's why I try to follow a more LT perspective, because you're right that in the ST truth will not win over perception. That's also why I suck as a ST trader <g>, and should only trade oft-repeated patterns. And if we don't think this will repeat itself, our heads our buried even deeper in the sand than is initially apparent Oh, I for one hope it does. That way we can keep making money at it. biowa