No me parece una buena inversión, IMnotsoHO, por varias razones:
EMPRESA
-Questcor ha tenido, tiene y volverá a tener problemas con la SEC (securities and exchange comission)
"Why is the SEC involved? Usually the SEC gets involved only when a company has made an improper claim to the public or illegal insider selling took place.
The worst part is that just a couple of weeks before this revelation, insiders such as CEO Don Bailey were selling millions of dollars worth of stock on the open market. It's not yet known if this was done with knowledge about the expanded investigation. However, the timing seems too coincidental, especially with the disclosure that came with the earnings report."
-Las malas prácticas de marketing a las que aludes como si nada, atentan directamente contra la primera enmienda y hay investigaciones en curso de la fiscalía general de varios estados (Filadelfia y Luisiana al menos) que ya les causaron escozor (pandoro creo que decís vosotros) en la cotización el año pasado, y lo volverán a hacer en el futuro, en USA hay cosas con las que no se juega,
"The decision immediately raised questions about a fundamental premise long asserted by the FDA and the US Department of Justice that off-label promotion is prohibited by law, which has been the basis for numerous settlements with drugmakers over the past decade."
-Lo del etiquetado que también mencionas de pasada, es, pues eso, en palabras de su CEO, nada que no haya hecho antes cocacola (con dos agallas macho, da igual que esto sea un medicamento),
"It's possible that part of the problem is that Questcor doesn't even disclose all of the active ingredients in its drug. According to a report by Citron Research, this practice is illegal. Questcor has defended this practice by saying doing so would be like Coca-Cola revealing its secret formula. Of course, Coca-Cola's soda isn't a prescription drug, and Coca-Cola doesn't fall under the same marketing rules."
-Y poca cosa mas, ah sí, varias denuncias del Phrma code por soborno y prácticas deshonestas de los visitadores médicos,
"Houston neurologist Staley Brod ranks at or near the top of the first (and most important) group, they said, with Questcor paying him $2,500 – an even higher rate than its other speakers receive – every time he tells another doctor about its forgotten MS drug. Because Questcor sets no caps on the amounts that its speakers can earn (and counts even casual one-on-one discussions as legitimate engagements), they said, Brod has collected more than $6,000 a day – scoring six figures over the course of a single year – as a result of the lucrative side job that the company has given him.
“I’ve been in the pharmaceutical industry for a long time, and I’ve never seen any drug company pay a doctor more than $50,000 or $60,000 a year in speaker fees,” said a former Questcor insider who left due to concerns about the “culture” and the “ethics” of the company. “Normally, the legal department would cap those fees with a flat daily rate. You’re supposed to have caps … But Questcor never did.”
According to the official PhRMA Code – a compliance program widely adopted throughout the pharmaceutical industry – drug makers should carefully select the members of their speakers bureaus, closely monitor the extent of the work that those doctors actually perform and then strictly limit the fees that even their most prominent speakers receive. While Questcor claims that it has achieved “substantial compliance” with the PhRMA Code, however, the company has yet to join other drug makers by formally agreeing to trinc the guidelines set forth under that restrictive program. In fact, former insiders say, Questcor has bluntly informed its entire sales team that the company trinc only the “spirit” of the PhRMA Code – which prohibits fancy dinners with physicians and nice gifts of any kind – and noted that its sales reps enjoy more latitude as a direct result.
To date, records show, at least 58 different pharmaceutical companies have officially endorsed the PhRMA code. Notably, experts point out, that group includes both industry giants and small drug makers alike. Moreover, they add, it also includes virtually every company – besides Questcor – that markets an MS drug of any kind.
“QCOR can’t survive under the Pharma Code,” an apparent sales rep declared on the company’s CafePharma message board in December of last year. “It would make them honest -- and that’s not how the MS market was built.”
-Y alguna que otra cosilla antiestética en algunas donaciones interesadas a la CDF (chronic disease fund) altruísmo posiblemente motivado por que esta organización es la encargada de cofinanciar el pago de "determinados" fármacos en los programas de medicare, medicaid y tricare (socialización de costes a cargo del contribuyente, beneficios para la empresa) ¿qué pasará con el obamacare? pues mas de lo mismo seguramente, compra, compra, que financian los paganinis.
"The Plano, Texas-based CDF has quickly become one of the country's largest medical charities, its annual receipts surpassing those of better-known groups such as the Susan G. Komen Foundation, which is dedicated to the treatment of breast cancer, or the March of Dimes, which focuses on preventing birth defects. Regulatory filings suggest that Questcor and the CDF owe some of their success to one another.
From 2007 through 2012, the Chronic Disease Fund's tax returns show that it pulled in donations of more than $900 million, mostly from drug companies like Questcor. The CDF has made a rich man of the charity's founder and president—46-year-old Mike Banigan. Over the same stretch, the CDF paid more than $35 million for "data-processing" services to a firm that's one of many health-care companies that share offices with the charity and are owned by Banigan. In a section of its 2012 return not shown on its Website, the charity says that last year it bought the data-processing business outright from a Banigan-related trust, for an $18 million lump sum, plus monthly payments of $1 million that could add significantly to his take."
Pero vamos, nada grave si lo comparamos con el verdadero talón de Aquiles de la exitosa y lucrativa (para algunos) farmaceútica, que no es otro que su
PRODUCTO
así en singular, porque sólo tiene uno
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Aunque en el enlace ponga products, al entrar vemos que sólo hay uno (our product, mi tesoro),
el maravilloso ACHTAR, que debe ser muy bueno a juzgar por los 28.000$ que cuesta cada vial
¿O no?
Pues no, es simplemente un fármaco de 50 años de antiguedad (el i+d de questcor es comprar una patentes barata) que no es mas que un corticosteroide mezclado con nosequé guano (exactamente cuales no lo sabemos por "problemas de etiquetado") de la pituitaria del gorrino (el nombre del gorrino no lo sé tampoco, aunque me apostaría que procede de restos dudosos de subproductos residuales de mataderos del medio oeste (ya tenemos película),
es lo malo de no etiquetar correctamente, que cualquiera se puede poner a especular (no sólo se especula con acciones)
En fin, un medicamento nada espectacular, que resultó por casualidad ser efectivo para tratar espasmos infantiles de carácter epiléptico, una enfermedad rara, y por lo tanto con pocos "consumidores".
¿solución?
en 2007 la compañía aumento el precio de 1650$ a 23000$ (28000$ en la actualidad), en un mercado cautivo de una enfermedad rara infantil.
¿Ética? de que agallas me hablas sorge, show me the money (reward que decís vosotros antes de poneros todo dignos para abrir hilos en el principal).
En fin, siguiente estrategia de espectra, digo questcor, aumentar el mercado a todo tipo de pacientes
"Before long, Questcor began marketing the drug for multiple sclerosis, nephrotic syndrome and rheumatologic conditions, even though there is little evidence that Acthar is more effective for those other conditions than alternatives that are far cheaper. And the company did so without being required to prove that the drug actually works. That is because Acthar was approved for use in 1952, before the Food and Drug Administration required clinical trials to show a drug is effective for a particular disease. Acthar is essentially grandfathered in.
Today, only about 10 percent of the drug’s sales are for infantile spasms. The new uses, Mr. Bailey has told analysts, represent multibillion-dollar opportunities for Acthar and Questcor, its sole maker.
The results have been beyond even the company’s wildest dreams. Sales of Acthar, which accounts for essentially all of Questcor’s sales, totaled nearly $350 million in the first nine months this year, up 145 percent from the period a year earlier. In the same period, Questcor’s earnings per share nearly tripled, to $2.12. In the five years after the big Acthar price increase in August 2007, Questcor shares rose from around 60 cents to about $50, in one of the best performances of any stock in any industry."
Colorín, colorado este cuento de especulación se ha terminado.
Que cada uno haga con su dinero y con su karma lo que le salga del Nardostachys grandiflora, pero luego no nos pongamos todo dignos.
Estamos hablando de ganar dinero con el sufrimiento de los niños (nunca creí que pudiera escribir esta frase sin que me diera un ataque de risa, pero esta fruta guano de farmaceútica lo merece)
Un poco mas de coherencia y un poco menos de hipocresía.
La ética ni está ni se la espera. Y la sarracena murió con Nietzsche,
viva el superbonus.
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Disclaimer:
Yo tengo acciones desde hace tiempo y a largo en una biofarma del nasdaq, Repligen, no me gusta nada este tipo de inversiones porque me hacen investigar mucho a la compañía antes de poner un solo euro en ella, pero es el precio que hay que pagar por una inversión (que no especulación, digan lo que digan los gurús) ética.
"The price of freedom is eternal vigilance".
(L.H.Courtney, atribuída a Jefferson, Lincoln y Paine)
Eso es ser un auténtico libertario, aunque el mercado este intervenido por autenticas mafias farmaceúticas, poder elegir entre el bien y el mal (ser libre), y a ser posible elegir el bien (además de libre serás justo), pero claro todo esto es mucho trabajo para que luego el inane de montoro se lleve la cuarta parte (lo del diezmo era en la edad media).
Invertir no es pecado, ni ganar dinero tampoco, siempre que nadie salga herido, o alguien no pueda ser curado.
