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

To: Zebra 365 who wrote (20743)	4/18/1999 2:13:00 AM
From: VLAD	Respond to of 23519

<<Such an attempt to manipulate the share price....>> Zebra, There would be nothing illegal to do such a thing. The purpose of doing this is to add value for stock holders while the shares are still cheap. It is also a message to the manipulators of Vivus that they will fight them by doing the most effective thing a company can do when under a constant short attack ie remove as many shares as possible from the float. I'm not advocating that Vivus approve/announce a share buy back just as a ploy with no intention of ever buying back a single share. I also don't think Vivus should buy back any shares if they feel that their cash position still needs building. But with $4M being added to the balance sheets in Q1 and for sure another $4M just in milestones in Q2, we know that Vivus' cash position is improving significantly. Also, if Vivus knows that in the very near future that additional significant milestones will be received from eg a domestic partnership agreement or a Japan partnering agreement, then Vivus MUST buy back as many shares as possible while they are still this cheap. They can even do this BEFORE making an announcement (I believe they are required by law to announce such decisions no later than 6 days from the time they are made). Just as a reminder to any one who forgot: "The Company repurchased 336,700 shares of its common stock for $7,716,000 in 1997" That is an average of $22.91/share "The Company repurchased an additional 1,663,300 shares of its common stock in January and February 1998 at a cost of $23,584,000" That is an average of $14.17 In other words so far Vivus has repurchased 2 million shares for $31,300,000.00 which is a cost average of $15.65/share.