*None of this should be taken as financial advice. The information here is for education purposes only.
*Disclaimer: I have positions in UBX, AGE, and MESO.
Juvenescence Ltd is a major longevity company that invests, partners, and develops rejuvenation medicines and therapies. The company also happens to be backed by billionaire and patron saint of longevity investing, Jim Mellon.
Some of the companies in Juvenescence’s portfolio include:
Juvenescence Ltd raised $168M in a Series B round in 2019 and is valued at $500M. An IPO was in the works but is likely postponed due to current macro factors.
In my research into Juvenescence Ltd I discovered a wonderful podcast, The Simple Biotech Podcast — by James Ruhle, that featured a recent interview with the CEO of Juvenescence. In the episode, CEO Dr. Gregory Bailey explains his approach to investing in longevity companies.
The podcast was especially informative for those of us coming from non-biotech investing backgrounds. I have written a summary of the main takeaways from the interview annotated with my own thoughts.
Dr. Greg Bailey believes that biotech investing more closely resembles mining investing than traditional tech investing.
I like the Biotech is Mining analogy.
There’s a vast expanding landscape of exciting biology research that has yet to be tapped. It just needs someone with the bravery to invest the money to drill down to see if translates to beneficial human use.
Tech is about finding products that “work” in society. Biotech is about finding products that work in humans.
Said another way:
Biotech is risk management in uncertainty of the emergent behaviour of collections of cells.
Tech is risk management in uncertainty of the emergent behaviour of collections of humans.
Dr. Greg Bailey uses the following five rules to vet longevity investments:
This is a simple but powerful framework for evaluating longevity biotech companies.
Rule #5 should really be listed first in my opinion. As my favourite author wrote,
“In order to succeed, you must first survive”.
–??? (Bonus points if you know whose quote this is. Write it in the comments!)
There is no sense in vetting the science or IP protection if the company does not have enough money to survive. A biotech startup is equal parts science and money management.
I recall one video of a longevity investing conference speaker joking that Unity Biotechnology was “not so much a drug development company than a finance management company”.
Cash is king.
Dr. Greg Bailey thinks that a Juvenescence IPO would attract retail much the same way as Beyond Meat (BYND).
He is on to something here.
Longevity biotech ticks many of the key boxes that are common in retail crazes like cryptocurrency, Clean Meat, Electric Vehicles, cannabis, or the 90’s Dot-Com bubble.
Within the first two minutes of the Netflix documentary Inside Bill’s Brain, Bill Gates shares his number one fear:
“I don’t want my brain to stop working”
Neurodegeneration is something that I have also recognized as a major gating function for super-radical life extension. That’s why I have included companies such as Denali Therapeutics and Alector on LongevityMarketcap.com. There have been a number of high profile AZD drug failures but I am optimistic progress will be made. Biogen shares this optimism as shown by their massive investment in Denali Therapeutics last week.
The brain is tricky. We can repair damage in other tissues willy-nilly but at what point will repairing the brain change what makes you you? These are treacherous waters to be sailing the Ship of Theseus.
Oh. My. Lord.
Today was quite the treat for chart watchers. Unity Biotechnology, senolytics drug developer, started off the day continuing its gains from last week. Despite momentum indicators signalling a local top, the price started to climb around noon New York time spiking to +40% on the day.
On NO news.
Was there an announcement forthcoming? Data leak of their osteoarthritis trial? Nope. Nothing. I will update a thread if I find some more information.
The stock eventually pulled back with a mere 15% gain for the day. Note the top was called out beautifully by a triple 9 TD sequential on the 15 min scale.
What does this mean for tomorrow? I have no clue. If there is a fundamental reason behind the move (clinical data, investments, news) then more upside is likely warranted. If this is just algo-malarky then downside momentum is going to continue. The pump was nice but mind you it was followed by a 22% drop from the top in ~30 minutes.
Without more information I am going to sit this one out. I am just glad that I already added more to my UBX position last week.
Please pray for the homies that FOMO’d in at the top.
Long term the trend for UBX looks bullish. Today it broke through key resistance levels from 2018 / 2019.
In my newsletter last week, I wrote on AgeX
And indeed the stock bounced HARD off the trend line with a +40% rally on Tuesday last week. I ended up buying on the retracement @ $1.29 / share. But it looks like we may approach the trend line again this week, but this time without any momentum reversal indicator. This week will be critical.
Since the stock is down 75% from its highs AND Juvenescence Ltd already admits to owning around 50% of the company, I doubt it will go to zero. Most likely some deal will be brokered if it comes to it. AgeX is said to have some valuable patents and IP.
Here’s the weekly view of rapalog / mTOR drug developer resTORbio. You can see the it used to be a $20 stock but ran into a “light switch moment” (halted trial, failed endpoint). This cratered the stock to crater 86% in day, prompting even Aubrey de Grey to cry out for an end to the carnage.
The stock has seen a resurgence now that boosting immunity in older adults (especially re: respiratory disease) is relevant. It has been quietly digging itself out of a hole.
Momentum indicators are murky in the short term. Long term looks okay so long as we don’t break trend. I don’t have enough confidence to make a decision either way.
This recent IPO’d CD47 immuno-oncology company backed by The Longevity Fund is seeing a bit of a correction already. However the IPO hype phase for biotechs can last for many more months.
The IPO price was $19 and the stock closed at around $30 on the first day. I don’t have an expertise in cancer immunotherapy (yet) so I can only rely on technicals and heuristics. A 50% drop from the first day closing price — so $15 — would get me interested in buying.
The company currently has a marketcap of $1.6 Billion.
Here’s the historical chart for Mesoblast on the Australian Stock Exchange:
Mesoblast has been taking out multi-year highs recently and there is plenty more upside available.
Switching to the NASDAQ chart:
I don’t see any major warning flags anywhere yet. I bought in @ $15.61 / share on the move breaking above the April swing highs.
I wouldn’t be surprised to see the stock continue moving higher until we collapse the wave function on their remestemcel-L Covid-19 trial outcome. Some data is expected in September.