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Biotech / Medical : VVUS: VIVUS INC. (NASDAQ) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Greg22 who wrote (18674)	2/11/1999 4:34:00 PM
From: VLAD	Respond to of 23519

Gregg, The market is a funny thing. I believe that your typical uneducated investor has the type of mentality as demonstrated by Joe Kernan on CNBC. Last year he was talking about Vivus and Viagra and how the short sellers were having a field day on Vivus stock. He made the simple analogy of "pill.....suppository.....pill......suppository" as if the entire picture was this simple. And I do understand how your average investor on the Street would not be attracted by Vivus with the belief that the choice is just that simple. Of course we would all rather take a pill over a suppository if it were safe, had no significant side effects and worked well. This false perception is what is hurting Vivus more than anything else. The only way that Vivus stock will show significant apprecation is when either 1)they prove a successful niche in a global market or 2)Wilson can finally get his head out of his ass and sign up a domestic partner so we can once again see some serious MUSE sales in the United States. There are over 6 million shares out there short and hedged that investors want to cover as low as possible. If you watched the trading over the past few weeks you can see just how manipulated the stock really is. Bear Sterns held down the share price from breaking 3 the day of the conference call and over the past week they have made sure not to let the stock trade over 2 19/32. Unless some buyers step in, they will continue their slow cover at the 2 7/16 to 2 1/2 range and in fact it wouldn't surprise me if tomorrow they push the share price down another 1/16 and try to cover at 2 3/8. How many companies do you know of that are in dire straights and manage to restructure themselves to profitability in 6 months, preserve cash, and beat earnings by 7 cents a share and then drop in share price by 20% when it is already trading at all time lows? We have 4 big factors working against us: 1)Poor management (but this situation has changed). 2)Competition with the most publicized most hyped and best selling drug in the history of pharmaceutical sales. 3)No marketing arm in the most lucrative market. 4)Manipulated stock. There are things Vivus can do to remedy most of the above points: 1)We have an excellent CFO as compared to the last guy. There really is nothing left for Wilson to screw up unless he is unable to get the domestic partner signed. The impression is that he doesn't want to give the product away and will sign when a favorable deal is offered. If this is true then there is nothing more to do than just watch the Viagra safety profile deteriorate and monitor the success of MUSE in international markets where effective marketing exists. 2)Viagra's hype and safety profile seems to be more defined as time goes on. More patients have coronaries and die and the new domestic prescription numbers have shown no significant increase over the past 6 months even in light of Pfizer's multimillion advertising campaign. 3)We all know the only way this factor will change. 4)Vivus can help itself by announcing a share buy back and issuing more effective press releases.