Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Strategies & Market Trends : Value Investing -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Madharry who wrote (3335)	2/25/1998 4:06:00 PM
From: Stewart Whitman	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 78481

Armin, I bought DURA towards the end of '93 and still hold some. The stock is very volatile - not for the faint of heart (you have been warned). Maybe I should have sold, but the longer term outlook has continued to look good to me. The company specializes in sales of respiratory drugs. Typically they'll purchase drugs that are approved but that are non-blockbuster (i.e. below $500 million sales) from the larger pharmaceutical companies (e.g. Roche), and then sell them with their own sales force. For the larger pharma, the drugs are not cost-effective, but DURA can get a lot of money from them. The company is also developing their own drug delivery system for various drugs (each drug/delivery system must be approved by the FDA, but most people I talk to consider the risk of non-approval very low). These drug/delivery systems are the 4 or 5 products in the pipeline (so they're not actually brand new drugs, and there's going to be existing competition). DURA does most of its development "off-balance" sheet - in this case, that means they fund a separate company to do R&D. Currently, the off-balance sheet company shares (which are callable and include other privileges) are traded as SDCOZ. It's been easier for Wall Street to see the value in the sales organization because the R&D is done off-balance sheet. This is also the reason their profit margins are so large. The "R&D" charges have come occasionally as non-recurring charges for setting up, and buying out the off-balance sheet company. Some people don't like this - they say it's fancy accounting, etc.. In the short term, DURA's going nowhere (IMO)., but I'm pretty sure that the longer term growth picture is still intact. Can't say that I think its a "value" stock, but I really like the company and its prospects. Stew