IMUGENE LIMITED (ASX:IMU) - IMU - A Sykes Summary, 53240777, page-21 - HotCopper | ASX Share Prices, Stock Market & Share Trading Forum

Originally posted by davybabyk: ↑

Thanks himanth

You ask a good question.

@Paulfool made a good point last night in reply. Even a 100 bagger can drop 70% along the way.

If you have great skill at picking the cycle you can do incredibly well selling on a high and picking up again low. I don’t have those trader skills though so for me it's really a matter of deciding when to get in long term and when to bail out for good.

So you ask "how much of a fall in SP from this point on would make you consider selling your holdings? "

Answer - it depends entirely on the reason for the fall.

For example: in November 2019 after lazing around at the 2 cent level for a very long time, IMU briefly spiked to 5 cents on completion of the CF-33 acquisition then promptly slumped back to 3 cents before recovering to 4 cents. I certainly never considered selling when it fell because the 5 cent spike was clearly just a brief taste of better times to come. I'm sure some here with trading skills, however, absolutely saw what was happening and sold at 5 then bought back at 3 cents again, increasing their holdings for free or buying what they sold and keeping a handy cash profit. @slick and @Steini I bet you managed to pull that off. If you did - good job!

Then in March we had the Covid panic mini crash and the share price slumped from 4 cents to 1.8 cents. At this point, that doesn't sound like much of a fall, but for long termers like me with an average buy in of well under 2 cents it was certainly uncomfortable to see the share price nearly cut in half in a few days. Most of my paper "profit" just vapourised.

The percentage SP loss was well over 50% but I never considered selling because the slump bore no relation at all to the long term prospects of Imugene. It was not about poor test results, delays, loss of key personnel or looming insolvency. The research programs were on track, the results to date looked great, the team was strong and a recent CR had left Imugene incredibly well funded. Even a general Covid related economic crash was unlikely to harm their fundamentals. Imugene was not selling holiday time shares or running an airline! So why worry? The sell off was just general market fear. So I bought a handy extra parcel at 1.8 cents and even recommended it to my adult children - one of whom also bought in.

I would only sell if something happened which I felt had a major negative impact on Imugene's long term prospects.

Insolvency - massively unlikely now. They are cashed up very well and they could raise much more very easily now if they wanted to.

IP loss - their products seem well protected by patents. No patents have been challenged.

Loss of key personnel - always possible, but they have a very deep bench. Even Professors Wiedermann, Kaumaya and Fong have collaborators/teams who would continue their work. A deliberate exit by the CEO for unexplained reasons would cause me concern, or a string of resignations from the SAB - but none of that seems likely.

A major failure in Her-vaxx would cause me to at greatly reduce my holding - because Her-vaxx is their most advanced drug candidate (leaving aside B-vaxx) and it is one of the key foundations of their B-cell platform. A major failure in Her-vaxx might call into question their whole B-cell immunotherapy approach. A major failure would be: unexpected toxicity/side effects, for example. However at this point that looks massively unlikely because Her-vaxx has shown zero toxicity or serious side effects in Ph1 or Ph 2 so far.

A major failure in terms of the effectiveness of Her-vaxx is less absurd an idea than an unexpected toxicity - but again, at this point, we have enough data showing effectiveness that it would seem very unlikely. The Ph 1 trial showed very promising effectiveness at the recommended dose level. The Ph 2 interim results looked excellent and were described by the company as "exceeding their wildest expectations." They are now have the PFS data they need and that report is still being compiled, but the company has expressed considerable excitement about it - so I can't see the results as being bad.

As a (thank God) non shareholder I watched the spectacular implosion of Prana Biotech when it its clinical trial came back with poor results in Alzheimers in 2014. Anyone new to biotech investing should look very closely at the PBT story as a lesson in the perils and "binary outcome" nature of clinical trials. From around $1.27 a share they fell instantly to 20 cents and today the remnant, rebranded as Alterity (ATH) sits at just 2.6 cents. A sorry tale of woe indeed.... https://www.copyright link/companies/the-biggest-biotechnology-blunders-of-2014-20141229-12euxxBack in 2014 I myself was new to biotech investing, and believe me it made me think twice. There are many who buy into biotech in the development phase but actually sell as a matter of strategic defensiveness before the clinical trial results come out. They are happy to take modest profit on the hopeful rise ahead of results, and bank that profit. They forgo the possible SP boom of a good result, rather than risk the doom death dive of a bad trial result. It's an entirely rational way to go.

Personally, I never seriously felt tempted to do that with Her-vaxx. The original Phase 1a trial in breast cancer had shown nil toxicity and encouraging indications of effectiveness. That predated the Imugene involvement. So I didn't expect the Phase 1 to give any toxicity issues. It didn't and it also showed very encouraging signs of effectiveness - so the Phase 2 trial seemed like a good bet to me as well. There was also the reassurance that Her-vaxx was never a "shot in the dark." It targets the same receptor as Herceptin. The clinical success of Herceptin itself validates what Her-vaxx is trying to do. Her-vaxx has the same target - but a potentially better way of attacking it. I admit to some anxiety ahead of the interim results but we already had very good reason to expect that the results would be wonderful - and they were.

Caution: I think the happy/excited vibe of the CEO tells us that the data in the Her-vaxx Ph 2 is still very good, so I am not really worried at all about the final PFS data due out soon. However, it is still, in the end, a relatively small sample size and there have been drugs which lookedgood in Ph 2 but then showed no statistical benefit in a large Phase 3 trial. Having said that, I think the field is so hot that a good final result in Phase 2 will lead to a partnership deal for Her-vaxx. IMU does not have the cash to run a Phase 3 on its own, or the mfg and marketing capability to bring a drug to market without help. They need a partnership, and I think a good Ph 2 result will bring a big one. (I think the company believes that also, or they would be taking advantage of the high SP and market excitement to do another CR to keep their cash reserves at the current very healthy levels. I think @supertramp said the same thing recently).

About PD1-vaxx I have a similar assessment. The PD1 inhibitor approach is totally validated already (Keytruda, for example) - so we already know that the basic approach is sound. Also, even ahead of the Phase 1 trial we knew that the b-cell therapies seem to free of toxicity - thanks to Her-vaxx and B-vaxx. So the Phase 1 trial - aimed at testing for toxicity and determining the optimum dose - did not worry me. To that extent, PD1-vaxx was largely "de-risked" by it's predecessors.

A Phase 2 trial in PD1-vaxx will also be heavily "de-risked" by the Phase 1 trial. If the Cohort 3 results are at least as good as Cohorts 1 and 2, then we will have "bazzing" data on effectiveness and we can reasonably expect an extremely good result in the Phase 2.

The above comments explain why I feel that the market has always consistently over estimated the risks Imugene faces, whilst underestimating the likelihood of success.

CF-33 is more of an unknown - but we do at least know that oncolytic virus therapy can be effective. We also know that CF-33 was astonishingly good in lab and animal studies. The uncertainty is around what happens when it is introduced into the far more complex environment of a human body. eg will the human immune system just wipe it out before it can do its thing? On the plus side, we know that CF-33 is based on the Vaccinia virus - one of the best understood and best researched virus candidates of all.

More importantly, from an investor point of view - I don't think we even have to worry about CF33 yet. There is no reason to expect that CF-33 will fail to get IND approval. Clinical trial results will come much later. Way before then we will know if Imugene has nailed a deal on Her-vaxx, and possibly PD1-vaxx too - or alternatively whether a takeover bid is mounted. By the time we have to worry about a CF-33 clinical trial result, Imugene may have been bought out or it will (if all goes well) have nailed one or more very lucrative partnership deals.

Right now - barring the Zombie Apocalypse - I don't see a serious reason why Imugene would fail, but I watch it every day and if things change - as they always can - I won't let emotion cloud my judgement.

Meanwhile - let the show go on.OMG! As I write this, I see they have just dropped another bombshell Ann. Gonna post this now and go read it!!!

lololol

When not tragic, Life is just a comedy...

Cheers

Dave

Expand

My gosh Davy, what an excellent post. This is how it's done! Hat doffed

(20min delay)
Last 5.2¢		Change -0.001(1.89%)		Mkt cap ! $382.1M

Open	High	Low	Value	Volume
5.3¢	5.4¢	5.2¢	$216.1K	4.106M

No.	Vol.	Price($)
31	1854997	0.052
39	5099678	0.051
52	4172179	0.050
17	2263068	0.049
20	996329	0.048

Price($)	Vol.	No.
0.053	382882	4
0.054	3593651	7
0.055	1701991	16
0.056	2970606	12
0.057	803139	8

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