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“JPM2020 The S&P 500, Nasdaq & Apple Soar To New Records” – Vista Partners Daily Market Recap For January 13, 2020

By John F. Heerdink, Jr.

The 38th Annual J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference kicked off today in San Francisco. It is the largest and most informative healthcare investment symposium in the industry, bringing together industry leaders, emerging fast-growth companies, innovative technology creators, and members of the investment community. It is officially held at Westin St. Francis in San Francisco & brings thousands of investors from around the world together. The hundreds of companies presenting run the gamut, from start-ups to those with more than $300 billion in market cap, and encompass the entire global healthcare landscape, including pharmaceutical firms, healthcare service providers, profit and not-for-profits, and medical device companies.

There are now many other healthcare and biotech events and conferences that are held during the same week that is estimated to bring in approximately +60,000 people from across the world. I met with 12 management teams from biotech companies today and looking forward to digesting the shared knowledge and reporting back to you.

The S&P 500 & Nasdaq closed at record highs today. The S&P 500 ended at 3,288.13, +.70%. 1o of the eleven S&P 500 sectors finished in the green with the materials, +1.4% & the information technology, +1.3% leading the way as Apple (AAPL) soared to a new high of $317.07/share before closing at $316.96/share, +2.14%. The Nasdaq Composite ended at 9,273.93, +1.04%.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended at 28,907.05, +.29%.

The Russell 2000 also rose by +.72% ending at 1669.61.

The “fear gauge” Vix (TVIX) ended at $42.16/share, -5.26% and traded in a range of $42 – $44.20.

Economic Reports

On Monday the Treasury Budget Report for December confirmed a deficit of $13.3B vs. a deficit of $13.5B in the same period a year ago while the over the last 12 months is $1.022T.

Investing & Inspiration

“As long as you enjoy investing, you’ll be willing to do the homework and stay in the game.” -Jim Cramer

“I rarely think the market is right. I believe non-dividend stocks aren’t much more than baseball cards. They are worth what you can convince someone to pay for it.” -Mark Cuban

Michael Marcus taught me one other thing that is absolutely critical: You have to be willing to make mistakes regularly; there is nothing wrong with it. Michael taught me about making your best judgment, being wrong, making your next best judgment, being wrong, making your third best judgment, and then doubling your money.” -Bruce Kovner

“The policy of being too cautious is the greatest risk of all.” -Jawaharlal Nehru

“The only true test of whether a stock is “cheap” or “high” is not its current price in relation to some former price, no matter how accustomed we may have become to that former price, but whether the company’s fundamentals are significantly more or less favorable than the current financial-community appraisal of that stock.” -Philip Fisher

“I learned to avoid trying to catch up or double up to recoup losses. I also learned that a certain amount of loss will affect your judgment, so you have to put some time between that loss and the next trade.” -Richard Dennis

“The four most dangerous words in investing are: ‘this time it’s different.” -Sir John Templeton

“Money doesn’t make you happy. I now have $50 million but I was just as happy when I had $48 million.” -Arnold Schwarzenegger

Tomorrow

We are due to receive the Employment Situation Report for December & the Wholesale Inventories Report for November tomorrow.

On a trading basis here are 3 ideas in healthcare to check out again today which may become even more interesting if we see a pullback tomorrow as the annual JPMorgan Healthcare conference comes into focus next week.

  • Acorda Therapeutics (ACOR) which closed at $1.96/share recently when we originally highlighted them after they recently announced a $276M exchange of convertible senior debt that moved maturity out to 2024.  Shares of ACOR spiked to $2.77/share last week and closed at $2.42/share today.

 

  • IsoRay, Inc. (ISR) closed at $6888/share today. On November 12th, 2019 ISR reported its record Q1 fiscal 2020 financial results and  CEO Lori Woods said, “These are exciting times for Isoray. We are very pleased by the continued progress we have made and the accelerated growth we have achieved. These results speak to the momentum we are realizing from the strategic direction and changes we have implemented to chart a new course for Isoray. Clearly, the strategies we’ve employed and the steps we have taken to establish Isoray’s leadership role in the prostate brachytherapy industry over the past year are resulting in accelerated organic growth and market share gains. A clear example can be seen in the trailing twelve months where our net new physician customer count increased 26% versus the previous twelve month period. We still have work to do and we will remain focused on our goals for growth and profitability.” Revenue for the first quarter of fiscal 2020 grew 48% to a record $2.32 million versus $1.56 million in the prior year comparable period. The revenue increase was driven by 51% growth in the company’s core prostate brachytherapy business. Prostate brachytherapy represented 90% of total revenue for the first quarter of fiscal 2020 compared to 88% in the prior year comparable period. Non-prostate brachytherapy revenue in the first quarter of fiscal 2020 was comprised primarily of sales to treat brain, gynecological, colorectal, and other cancers. Gross profit as a percentage of revenues increased to 53.4% for the three months ended September 30, 2019, versus 33.5% in the prior year comparable period. First-quarter gross profit increased 136% to $1.24 million versus $0.52 million in the first quarter of fiscal 2019, largely attributed to increased sales and significantly lower isotope unit costs compared to the prior year comparable period, continued leverage of the fixed cost components within costs of sales, and more efficient isotope usage. The lower isotope unit costs are related to the previously discussed supply chain change made at the end of the calendar year 2018.

 

  • Neubase Therapeutics (NBSE) closed trading at $6.57/share last Thursday and expects several data points to be released in the 1st half of 2020 with regard to their gene silencing platform that is initially targeting HD and ALS. Today NBSE closed up again at $7.40/share, +2.78%.

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