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Strategies & Market Trends : Stock Watcher's Thread / Pix of the Week (POW) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Stock Watcher who wrote (2673)	2/11/1999 2:36:00 PM
From: Andrew H	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 52051

Looks like a good bet to me, news is still only out on a few wires. I think this will gap up big in the morning. Last time the stock went to 84. At 23, it is just about where it was before the news hit yesterday. Now we have independent verification by a US govt. agency. What could be bigger news than a possible cure for cancer? I would look for the stock to rise in the last hour of trading in anticipation of tomorrow. Still I only have a small position because there is certainly some risk. >>Comments EntreMed Doubles as U.S. Docs Replicate Drug Results (Update1) (Adds analyst comment, updates shares.) Rockville, Maryland, Feb. 11 (Bloomberg) -- EntreMed shares more than doubled, erasing yesterday's losses, after the U.S. National Cancer Institute said it succeeded in duplicating controversial research showing the company's experimental endostatin compound can shrink tumors in mice. Reports of the NCI's success came after company shares plunged as Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. ended its role in the development of a similar EntreMed anti-cancer compound called angiostatin. The NCI findings help to allay skepticism about the company's technology, analysts said. ''This basically adds credibility,'' said Alan Auerbach, an analyst with Van Kasper & Co. in San Francisco. ''It had been made so well known that the NCI was having trouble, there was definitely an issue of credibility. I think that this diminishes disbelief.'' Auerbach has a ''buy'' rating on the stock. EntreMed shares rose 13 3/4 to 26 5/8 in early afternoon trading. The company, which reported about $38 million in cash in the third quarter, still faces the task of successfully completing lab work on the two compounds before either will be able to move into human trials. The end of support from Bristol-Myers, the world's biggest cancer drugmaker, makes that task more difficult, analysts said. '' There is still a lot of uncertainty in this program,'' said Carl Gordon, an analyst with Orbimed Advisors. The NCI research ''doesn't nearly outweigh the exit of Bristol-Myers on the angiostatin collaboration.'' The NCI results were first reported in the Boston Globe. Folkman's Lab An NCI spokesperson today confirmed that scientists from the institute, who had traveled to the Harvard laboratory of endostatin's discoverer, Judah Folkman, were able to produce the same kinds of potent cancer shrinking effects in mice that Folkman had first reported over a year ago. The scientists are now working to produce those results at National Cancer Institute facilities in Frederick, Maryland, NCI officials said. The NCI news may help quell speculation that Folkman's results had been a fluke, speculation which fed on the NCI's announcement in November that it had not yet succeeded in its efforts. The company's shares fell 24 percent on reports of the NCI's difficulties. While Folkman and EntreMed maintain that the difficulties were technical and stem from the newness of the protein compound, skepticism has persisted even after an independent Harvard team said in January that it had been able to produce tumor shrinking effects with endostatin. Rollercoaster Yesterday, EntreMed shares fell 47 percent on the news that Bristol-Myers withdrew from an agreement to help develop angiostatin because it no longer considers the drug a good candidate for human tests. EntreMed shares soared last May when a New York Times feature reported that angiostatin, along with endostatin, might represent a cancer ''cure.'' ''It's just been a rollercoaster,'' said Auerbach, who has maintained his ''buy'' rating since last February. '' And with this stock especially.'' Human Testing EntreMed said it expects to begin human testing of angiostatin by the end of 1999. EntreMed has an agreement with Covance Inc., one of the world's leading drug development companies, for the large- scale production of endostatin which it plans now to expand to include angiostatin. NCI said yesterday that it has begun sending out letters to hospitals and cancer centers to notify potential trial leaders that a study is in the planning stages -- seen as a further sign that the compound is on its way to the clinic. The NCI will run human trials on both angiostatin and endostatin if the compounds reach that stage. Investors in EntreMed have had a wild ride, as the company's shares have rocketed and plummeted on each breath of news about the two compounds. At yesterday's low of 12, the stock was below its closing price on May 1, the last business day before the New York Times ran its front page feature on the protein compounds, citing months-old data. On May 4, shares in EntreMed quadrupled. ''There are many different approaches to cancer,'' said Orbimed's Gordon. ''I haven't seen evidence that what EntreMed has merits the disproportionate attention they've received.'' Angiostatin and endostatin are the fruits of years of research by Harvard University's Judah Folkman, a leader in a burgeoning field of medical research called angiogenesis. Compounds such as endostatin and angiostatin are aimed at blocking the angiogenesis process -- the rapid growth of tiny capillaries -- and shrinking tumors by strangling their blood supply. Other angiogenesis researchers are trying to find ways to boost the natural phenomenon, in order to help heart patients to grow healthy new blood vessels<< --------------------------------------------------------------------------------