The sector seems to be a little weaker than the market although the moves are relatively small, so there is probably not a lot one can read into it. That being said the momentum higher has clear paused and perhaps reversed a little but given the volume and small moves the market appears to have […]
February 20 Biotech Update
As much as I have disliked this recent move higher in terms of not trusting it, you have to respect how well the sector is climbing the wall of worry. My hunch is that we are going to start to see another round of bubble trouble pronouncements. Clearly the sector is not a cheap as […]
February 13 Biotech Update
Market seems pretty benign but the sector appears a little heavy. As I have been saying the only thing we can have confidence in about the market is the lack of confidence. Yesterday it looked like the sector really wanted to move higher but this morning appears to be sending the opposite signal (perhaps we […]
February 9 Biotech Update
A good start to the week with the markets a little week but the sector outperforming. This is not totally surprising given the underperformance last week in that there should be some sort of bounce back. It is certainly positive to see but I wonder about of the staying power and whether this is simply […]
February 6 Biotech Update
Well, I can honestly say that on Wednesday I did not think the sector would be looking this good on Friday. The economy seems to be improving, the macro (outside of the Greek noise) seems benign, and the sector seems to be shrugging off the hep-C discounts. I am a little surprised but you also […]
February 4 Biotech Update
So it looks like the sector wants to go lower. While there can be any number of explanations the proximate cause is the GILD report, so I want to go over that in detail and trace out what it means and does not mean. 1. Why is GILD down? I think this is the simplest […]
February 3 Biotech Update
It has been a bad start to the week for sure. The macro is getting better and biotechs are significantly worse. We are treading into very dangerous waters. Catalysts are going to slow dramatically. The market has to digest a lot of secondaries. And headlines out of Washington are putting pricing once again into the […]
January 30 Biotech Update
I want to write this quick to get it out as I spent the morning taking the children to the dentist, so I have a late start. The market is bad (again) but this is really nothing new. This churning is really giving gristle to the bulls and bears. Bears are going to argue it […]
January 27 Biotech Update
A bad start for the market in terms of earnings, economic data, and price action. It appears that FX and the capital spending decline coming from oil prices is creating a significant headwind. Despite the gap down, biotechs were basically unchanged if not higher. That is quite the odd scenario as risk off should hit […]
January 26 Biotech Update
It has been a mixed start to the week both in terms of the macro background and also stocks within the sector. It seems like both are looking for new leadership (to the upside or downside) and I still lean towards the next move being higher but it remains a low conviction view. On the […]
January 23 Biotech Update
It has been sort of a mixed bag with the sector despite some decent macro tailwinds with the European QE program. I am not saying the sector has been bad but I would have expected it to take more of a leadership position in the move higher whereas it seemed more to have been dragged […]
January 21 Biotech Update
The markets recovered nicely yesterday and there seems to be some slight follow through today with the rumor that the ECB is going to do 50B Euro/month QE. That would be on the low end of the “surprise” estimates and I am not sure how that would be perceived. Ultimately I expect some volatility and […]
Revisiting the Bubble Debate
With this week’s moves in the market and with the JP Morgan Healthcare conference finished, I think its time to bring up the debate again about whether or not biotech may be in a bubble. While most are familiar with the outstanding sector performance, lets just put it into context a bit. Since the March […]
January 16 Biotech Update
Well, this morning started a little better but I am much more interested in how the market ends as we were due for at least a short term bounce. Ironically, the new focus on the Swiss currency has removed it from oil which is doing well (perhaps investors burned by the Swiss need to cover […]
January 9 Biotech Update
A weak start to the day but there seemed to be a lot of volatility, so it is hard to get a sense of exactly where the market wants to go. I suspect the early pressure is lower but a late day rally would signal that bulls are once again in charge- meaning that the […]
January 6 Biotech Update
A good start to the day with the market slightly higher but as always we need to see how they end as yesterday was a rough day and odds are more selling is on its way. That being said the sector held up exceptionally well and was a clear outperformer. I suspect the excitement heading […]
December 30 Biotech Update
A drifting day in the market but with a negative bias to start. It is hard to read too much into the movement as the volume is low and there is little news out there. I am going to spend the next couple of notes previewing 2015 to a certain extent. I will start with […]
December 29 Biotech Update
The sector has recovered from the brutal sell off in no small part related to a recovery in GILD. As I noted last week, the sector needs GILD to stabilize/recover to move higher and so I am not surprised to see biotechs move higher in sympathy with GILD. Why is there such a relationship? GILD […]
December 23 Biotech Update
The sector is certainly having problems. As I noted yesterday, you should be biased towards raising cash (and going short if you are interested in running more of a market neutral book). Even ABBV who is the hep-C “winner” cannot catch a bid as the market is reasonably discounting not the fact that ABBV will […]
December 22 Biotech Update
It was a weak start to the sector and I suspect that may be a popular start to these notes as the sector seems to have lost some control of pricing power. I am going to spend today talking about the ABBV/ESRX deal as it has significant implications not over for the hep-C market but […]
