Tuesday, November 19, 2013

AMD versus Nvidia

I have a new article at Seeking Alpha:

Advanced Micro Devices Versus Nvidia: Is There Anything For Investors In Their Final Battle?

As stated there, I own AMD stock. While I don't own NVDA, I have owned it in the past, and like the company.

For details on the latest quarter results, and Q&A with analysts, you can see my notes at OpenIcon:

Nvidia Q3 2013 results and analyst call

AMD Q3 2013 results and analyst call

This is an epic battle, with a surreal sense since both companies make the chips that power computer games. I don't see an obvious winner. Both companies have beaten-down stock prices, but AMD's is more downtrodden than Nvidia's.

There are already 13 comments at Seeking Alpha. I write about both IT stocks and biotech stocks, and I have noticed that there are a lot more comments on IT stocks. It appears a lot of IT guys who are investors are members of the Seeking Alpha community.

They are a sharp bunch. They will fill in many details about AMD and Nvidia. They will pounce on any errors I made. The shorts will challenge my pro-long details, and the longs will challenge my pro-short details. It is a debate not dissimilar to what you see at sites like www.anandtech.com when someone reviews an AMD or Nvidia gaming card. But generally more polite, less sarcastic, and more fact driven.

I've been covering and investing in and out of Nvidia and AMD for a long time. For a long-term, historic view check out my numerous links to old article and analyst conference summaries at:

Openicon AMD
Openicon NVDA

Wednesday, November 13, 2013

Inovio and Dendreon Q3 analyst calls

I own stock in both Inovio (INO) and Dendreon (DNDN). Both reported Q3 2013 results on Tuesday.

You can read my notes on the results and analyst conferences at:

Inovio Q3 2013

Dendreon Q3 2013

Inovio had a good quarter on many fronts, probably justifying the huge leap in its stock price in the past year. It is a development-stage vaccine company, but is in partnership with Roche and apparently has the ability to make vaccines for just about anything, including cancer. Nevertheless, it has not yet had any FDA approvals,  and the risk of failure should be taken into account if you are thinking about investing.

Dendreon continues to struggle. Although Q3 revenue from Provenge was disappointing, they said that October was the best month for enrollments in 2013. So could Q4 come in at $80 million of revenue? No guidance was given, but between the approval in Europe and the

Dendreon's failure to capitalize on the first FDA-approved immunotherapy for cancer, Provenge for prostate cancer, had cast investor doubt on the entire immunotherapy for cancer field. In response to a question from an analyst, Inovio's CEO said if its therapy works and gains approval it would not have the high Cost of Goods Sold (COGS) that has plagued Dendreon. Inovio's therapy is more like its anti-viral vaccines, whereas Dendreon's therapy requires extracting blood from patients, activating T-cells, and then re-infusing the patients. Even at $100,000 per therapy Dendreon is losing money.

I am busy, busy, busy, so I don't know when I'll be able to write up these companies for Seeking Alpha. My last articles on them need updating, but there is still good background material in them:

Inovio's Price Spike and the Future of DNA Vaccines [August 17, 2013]

Dendreon Revenue and Cost Trends [August 13, 2013]

Keep diversified!

Thursday, November 7, 2013

Agenus Recommendation

My first Seeking Alpha article in a while, Agenus Valuation After Positive HerpV Vaccine Results, was selected by SA as a Small-Cap Insight article.

If you read it, be sure to check out the other recent Agenus articles.

My article has plenty of warnings about risk. Before my first buy of AGEN I not only read a variety of opinions at Seeking Alpha, but also listened to an analyst conference and checked SEC documents. In addition, AGEN represents only 1.25% of my portfolio holdings, which I think is enough for a risky small cap stock, despite my overall positive opinion of it. If it goes to a higher percentage on its own, that is different. My portfolio limit for a single stock is 10% of the portfolio. About half of my portfolio consists of biotech stocks.

Also, I am a long-term investor. I am making no predictions about the short-term (under 3 years, but particularly in the next few months.) All predictions are probability-based, and could be wildly wrong.

Happy hunting, and Keep Diversified!