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As Covid program advances, Enanta’s new CMO says it’s not ‘limited to antivirals’; With all eyes on Gilead-partnered cancer drugs, Arcus brings medical chief on board

Expect some pipeline adjustments at Enanta Pharmaceuticals in the coming years, because new CMO Scott Rottinghaus thinks the antiviral biotech can expand…

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Expect some pipeline adjustments at Enanta Pharmaceuticals in the coming years, because new CMO Scott Rottinghaus thinks the antiviral biotech can expand its horizons while also figuring out a way to address the yearslong Covid pandemic with an expected Phase II launch later this year.

“I would like to take a look at what we have as possibilities coming out of the lab. We have such a strong discovery program,” Rottinghaus told Endpoints News. “I don’t think we need to be limited to antivirals here at Enanta; we can take a broader look at some other therapeutic areas.”

Scott Rottinghaus

For now, though, the former hematology and nephrology clinical development leader at Alexion, which last year was swooped up by AstraZeneca, is returning to his roots in the infectious disease field.

In undergrad at Kansas State, polyomavirus structural proteins consumed Rottinghaus’ attention. Then it was vaccine work on measles and influenza during medical school and residency at Mayo Clinic. A stint working on HSV came next, as an infectious disease fellow at the University of Alabama at Birmingham in the mid-aughts. Antimicrobials and vaccines took center stage during an eight-year post at Pfizer, including a clinical lead role on bacterial infection med Tygacil.

“Big Pharma in the past decade has lost some interest in anti-infectives, which is what caused me to kind of move away as opportunities knocked. When I heard about the opportunity at Enanta, it was actually a fairly easy choice for me,” the CMO said.

In his telling, Rottinghaus is “very excited” or “really excited” about the work ahead, making it clear four times in the first minute of an interview on day three in the new C-suite post.

Covid-19 and respiratory syncytial virus are “right at the top of the list,” he said. Following Phase I data on its once-daily oral drug late last month, Enanta will meet with the FDA “in the very near future” to agree on a Phase II program for EDP-235, a 3CL protease inhibitor. That trial is slated to be global in scope to “move it forward as quickly as possible,” the new CMO said. Enanta is also in the midst of suing Rottinghaus’ former employer, Pfizer, over the Big Pharma’s Covid drug, Paxlovid.

Beyond Covid, Rottinghaus will dig into a Phase IIb testing EDP-938 in adults at high risk for getting infected with RSV. In May, the drug flunked a mid-stage test in otherwise healthy adults with community-acquired RSV.

— Kyle LaHucik

Dimitry Nuyten

→ Things look a little hazier for Arcus Biosciences and Gilead’s CD73 candidate quemliclustat after analysts voice their disppointment with the latest update on a drug that “exceeded expectations” at AACR in early 2021. Dimitry Nuyten has now taken command of Arcus’ clinical development as CMO and presides over a pipeline that, alongside quemliclustat, includes a clutch of cancer drugs like domvanalimab and etrumadenant at the heart of the $725 million deal with Gilead. The ex-medical chief at Nektar and Aduro Biotech, Nuyten has also been VP of global product development for oncology at Pfizer and a group medical director for Bristol Myers Squibb.

Mathai Mammen

→ The big names in J&J’s leadership structure are gradually peeling away as head of R&D Mathai Mammen packs his bags to “pursue other opportunities outside of the Company,” according to a statement that provided few details beyond his interim successor, chief innovation officer William Hait. Mammen’s sudden departure late Monday follows that of ex-CSO Paul Stoffels, who’s now reshuffling the deck at Galapagos as CEO, and it comes nearly a year after J&J first announced that Joaquin Duato would replace Alex Gorsky as CEO.

Winselow Tucker

→ Eli Lilly’s Stephen Fry will retire at the end of the year as Loxo commercial chief Eric Dozier is set to replace him as SVP, human resources and diversity. Fry started as a systems analyst at the Indianapolis pharma in 1987 and has held his current role since 2011, while Dozier is also a longtime Lilly vet who’s held such roles as general manager, Puerto Rico and chief marketing officer for Japan. At the end of this month, Winselow Tucker will leave Bristol Myers and succeed Dozier as Loxo’s chief commercial officer. Tucker joined BMS from Novartis in 2019 as SVP and general manager, US hematology and was elevated to SVP, intercontinental in January.

Simba Gill

→ Simba Gill will only be CEO of Evelo Biosciences a little while longer, becoming chairman of Evelo’s board and heading back to Flagship Pioneering “to help launch, grow, and guide bioplatform companies” as an executive partner. Both appointments will take effect when a successor is named. As founding chief executive, Gill shepherded Evelo to an IPO in 2018 and into Phase II trials with its lead program in psoriasis and atopic dermatitis. With the bear market hitting the sector hard, Evelo cushioned the blow with a $79.2 million direct offering in late May.

Howard Davis

→ Bristol Myers partner PsiOxus Therapeutics, an Oxford, UK-based cancer biotech once backed by Neil Woodford, has lined up Howard Davis as CEO. Davis jumps to the top spot here after helping launch Third Harmonic Bio as COO; the Novartis and Biogen alum has also been a principal at Flagship. Priya Mande, the interim chief for the last year, will become PsiOxus’ COO and UK president.

Chris Frankenfield

→ Xilio Therapeutics propped open a window into some early data with XTX101 for solid tumors, and in the same release, the biotech shared the promotions of Uli Bialucha to CSO and Chris Frankenfield to chief legal and administrative officer. Both execs arrived last year, with Bialucha originally joining Xilio from Immunitas Therapeutics as SVP of research and Frankenfield coming from Blueprint Medicines to take on the role of general counsel.

Timothy Hunt

→ Timothy Hunt will take over as CEO of The Alliance for Regenerative Medicine on Sept. 6, replacing Janet Lynch Lambert. Once part of ARM’s Gene Editing Task Force, Hunt had just taken on the role of chief culture and corporate affairs officer at Xilio in October 2021. He was also chief corporate affairs officer at Editas Medicine from 2016-20 and a public affairs exec with Biogen.

Mike Nohaile

→ Concurrent with its $35 million Series C haul, San Francisco’s Prellis Biologics has welcomed Mike Nohaile as CEO. Nohaile leaves his CSO post at Flagship’s Generate Biomedicines and his Big Pharma background consists of multiple roles over a 14-year period at Novartis (including four years as global head of molecular diagnostics) and Amgen (rounding out his tenure as SVP of strategy, commercialization, and innovation). Prellis teamed up with Bristol Myers and Sanofi in separate antibody deals earlier this year.

→ Grounded by the FDA with a clinical hold on its CAR-T drug BEAM-201 for relapsed/refractory T-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia and lymphoma, Beam Therapeutics has installed John Lo as chief commercial officer. Big Pharma connections abound with Lo, who led the hematology franchise during his eight years at Novartis; worked on such drugs as Tagrisso and Imfinzi at AstraZeneca and was the pharma giant’s head of global marketing and market access; and became SVP of worldwide hematology for Bristol Myers in 2019 after the Celgene buyout.

Jason Damiano

→ The Appian Way: Los Angeles-based Appia Bio — developing off-the-shelf CAR therapies with invariant natural killer T cells (iNKT) and teaming up with Kite in a deal worth up to $875 million — has rolled out the welcome mat for Jason Damiano as CSO. Damiano wraps up a three-year run at Unity Biotechnology as VP of biology, and from 2016-18 he was director of therapeutic antibody discovery and translational medicine at Achaogen. Ex-Kite and Lyell CSO Margo Roberts has sewn up a spot on the board of directors at Appia Bio, a company chaired by Nobel laureate David Baltimore and led by former Tenaya president JJ Kang.

Douglas Warner

→ Looking to regroup with its tomivosertib/Keytruda combo in NSCLC while swiftly sliding $EFTR into a penny stock morass, eFFECTOR Therapeutics has tapped Douglas Warner as CMO. Warner breaks away from Amgen after an 18-year run that ended as executive medical director, group product area lead. Along with tomivosertib, he takes charge of eFFECTOR’s early-stage studies of zotatifin in solid tumors and Covid-19.

Kenneth Truitt

→ Kenneth Truitt has signed on as CMO of Aquestive Therapeutics, which changed CEOs three months ago as it tries to get in the good graces of the FDA with the seizure drug Libervant and its epinephrine oral film AQST-109. Truitt, whose first day at Aquestive is Sept. 6, spent 16 years at Daiichi Sankyo before his appointments as medical chief of ImmusanT in 2018 and Venthera a year later. Meanwhile, Humanigen COO and CFO Tim Morris has joined Aquestive’s board of directors.

Caroline Germa

→ Big Pharma vet Caroline Germa has been named EVP, global medicine development and CMO at Chinese antibody biotech Transcenta. Germa’s CV reads like a who’s who of the industry: After six years at Eli Lilly, she was clinical lead for breast cancer med neratinib (Nerlynx) during her four years at Pfizer. She then jumped to Novartis in 2011, where she rose to senior global program clinical head for ribociclib (Kisqali) and canakinumab. She then left for Bristol Myers in 2018, staying there for a year before joining AstraZeneca as VP and head of the early development clinical group for oncology.

PJ Ramtin

→ PJ Ramtin has settled in as SVP of business operations at Spruce Biosciences, which is developing tildacerfont for endocrine disorders such as classic congenital adrenal hyperplasia. Ramtin joined Spruce in June after three years with BridgeBio as VP, commercial operations and VP, business operations. Earlier, she was oncology business director at Regeneron and had two separate stints at Genentech.

Vikram Lamba

→ California CAR-T player ImmPACT Bio has had itself a year with $111 million in Series B funding, the addition of board chair Sheila Gujrathi and a growing C-suite that now includes ex-Zosano Pharma chief Vikram Lamba as CFO and head of business development. The Bayer vet had been CFO of diagnostics company ChromaCode since April 2021. ImmPACT Bio has also appointed a chief technology officer (Sylvain Roy) and COO (Venkat Yepuri) in the last few months.

Joy Zhou

→ Tucked into its Q2 report, natural killer biotech MiNK Therapeutics mentioned that Joy Zhou has been appointed head of CMC. Zhou is the former head of drug product development, cell therapy at Takeda who recently led MS&T (manufacturing sciences & technology) at Rubius Therapeutics; early in her career, she was a scientist at Pfizer and J&J. Just before the bottom fell out of the sector, MiNK went public in October 2021 with a $40 million IPO.

Nicholas Pachuda

→ Peter Thiel-backed peptide drug design biotech Peptilogics has enlisted Atul Deshpande as chief strategy officer and promoted Nicholas Pachuda to COO. Deshpande joins the Pittsburgh-based company from Immediate Therapeutics, where he served at the helm of the company as CEO. Prior to that stint, Deshpande was chief strategy officer and head of US operations for Harbour BioMed and global operations head for the Dupixent franchise at Sanofi.

Pachuda joined Peptilogics in 2020, starting as SVP of portfolio and development. Pachuda hopped aboard Peptilogics after a gig at J&J, leading external innovation for the company’s orthopedic device franchise.

Sabine Sydow

→ German CDMO Rentschler Biopharma, which was slapped with a Form 483 for multiple production issues in June, has brought aboard Sabine Sydow as chief of staff and Falk Nuernberger as corporate general counsel. Sydow formerly had a 16-year run with vfa bio, having served as head. Meanwhile, Nuernberger served as general counsel Europe of Viatris and has had stints at MediGene, Sandoz and Actavis.

→ Early cancer screening and detection-focused biotech AnPac Bio-Medical Science has ushered in Yuyang Cui as co-chairman of the board and co-CEO of the company and Jiawen Kang as a member of its board of directors. Cui and Kang’s appointments come as AnPac has re-shuffled some of its board and exec team. AnPac relieved Aidong Chen from his duties as co-chairman and co-CEO and removed Sheng Liu from its board. In addition, the company has re-designated Chris Chang Yu as CEO and chairman of the board.

Joseph Damasio

→ Bioengineering company Biostage has pulled in Joseph Damasio as CFO. Damasio formerly served as CGO, VP finance and controller at Inhibikase Therapeutics, Cue Biopharma and Pressure Biosciences.

→ With the smallpox antiviral Tembexa (brincidofovir) awaiting a contract signature from BARDA and talks of potential use in the monkeypox outbreak — after the compassionate-use hubbub in 2014 that involved young Josh Hardy receiving the drug — Chimerix has pegged Christopher Jordan as VP, regulatory affairs. Jordan, an Eli Lilly alum, held the role of senior global program regulatory director at Novartis after a string of regulatory posts at Endocyte from 2013-19.

→ Houston-based TCR-T outfit Alaunos Therapeutics, once known as Boston-based Ziopharm Oncology, is bringing in Abhishek Srivastava as VP, technical operations. A former assistant professor at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Srivastava comes to Alaunos from Athenex, where he was VP, cell therapy development.

Mary McNamara-Cullinane

→ ClearPoint Neuro has recruited Mary McNamara-Cullinane as VP of regulatory affairs. McNamara-Cullinane joins from Alira Health, where she was SVP of regulatory affairs. Prior to that, McNamara-Cullinane was principal of MMC regulatory consulting at Intrinsic Therapeutics and Echo Therapeutics.

→ KemPharm, which forked over $12.8 million in cash for Orphazyme and its “pipeline-in-a-product” in May, has selected Nichol Ochsner as VP, investor relations and corporate communications. Ochsner was previously an investor relations and communications exec with Statera Biopharma and TherapeuticsMD.

John Maraganore

→ Just when you think the Maraganore Meter is taking a breather at Peer Review, here he comes again: Former Alnylam CEO John Maraganore is making his way to the board of directors at ProKidney with Nuvation Bio CFO Jennifer Fox. The list of board appointments and advisory roles for Maraganore is as long as your arm, from chairing the board at Hemab Therapeutics to helping out Overland Pharmaceuticals as a strategic advisor — and beyond.

→ Former HHS Secretary Alex Azar has popped up over at 3D Systems as part of the company’s medical advisory board. Azar brings with him a wealth of experience including his time as president of the US division of Eli Lilly and as a board member of BIO. Leading up to his role as HHS secretary under former president Donald Trump, Azar formerly served as general counsel of HHS starting in 2001.

Thomas Soloway

→ Natalie Holles-led Third Harmonic Bio is shoring up its board of directors by appointing Thomas Soloway. The current T-knife CEO was Holles’ COO at Audentes and he’s also on the board at Satsuma Pharmaceuticals.

→ Liver disease biotech Albireo has elected Habib Dable and Susan Alesina to the board of directors. Dable was president and CEO of Acceleron after a 22-year career with Bayer, while Alesina is a MilliporeSigma and Sunovion vet who is VP, national business development and alliances at Boston Children’s Hospital.

→ MindMed, the company focused on brain health disorders, has signed on Suzanne Bruhn and Roger Crystal to its board of directors. Bruhn is president, CEO and director of Tiaki Therapeutics while Crystal is the president, CEO and director of Opiant Pharmaceuticals and the lead inventor of the Narcan nasal spray.

→ Carlsbad, CA-based Curate Biosciences has tapped Daniel Getts as a new member of its board of directors. Getts is the co-founder and CEO of Myeloid Therapeutics and has previously had gigs as VP of research at TCR2 Therapeutics and co-founder and CSO of Cour Pharmaceuticals.

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Net Zero, The Digital Panopticon, & The Future Of Food

Net Zero, The Digital Panopticon, & The Future Of Food

Authored by Colin Todhunter via Off-Guardian.org,

The food transition, the energy…

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5 hours ago

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March 14, 2024

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Net Zero, The Digital Panopticon, & The Future Of Food

Authored by Colin Todhunter via Off-Guardian.org,

The food transition, the energy transition, net-zero ideology, programmable central bank digital currencies, the censorship of free speech and clampdowns on protest. What’s it all about? To understand these processes, we need to first locate what is essentially a social and economic reset within the context of a collapsing financial system.

Writer Ted Reece notes that the general rate of profit has trended downwards from an estimated 43% in the 1870s to 17% in the 2000s. By late 2019, many companies could not generate enough profit. Falling turnover, squeezed margins, limited cashflows and highly leveraged balance sheets were prevalent.

Professor Fabio Vighi of Cardiff University has described how closing down the global economy in early 2020 under the guise of fighting a supposedly new and novel pathogen allowed the US Federal Reserve to flood collapsing financial markets (COVID relief) with freshly printed money without causing hyperinflation. Lockdowns curtailed economic activity, thereby removing demand for the newly printed money (credit) in the physical economy and preventing ‘contagion’.

According to investigative journalist Michael Byrant, €1.5 trillion was needed to deal with the crisis in Europe alone. The financial collapse staring European central bankers in the face came to a head in 2019. The appearance of a ‘novel virus’ provided a convenient cover story.

The European Central Bank agreed to a €1.31 trillion bailout of banks followed by the EU agreeing to a €750 billion recovery fund for European states and corporations. This package of long-term, ultra-cheap credit to hundreds of banks was sold to the public as a necessary programme to cushion the impact of the pandemic on businesses and workers.

In response to a collapsing neoliberalism, we are now seeing the rollout of an authoritarian great reset — an agenda that intends to reshape the economy and change how we live.

SHIFT TO AUTHORITARIANISM

The new economy is to be dominated by a handful of tech giants, global conglomerates and e-commerce platforms, and new markets will also be created through the financialisation of nature, which is to be colonised, commodified and traded under the notion of protecting the environment.

In recent years, we have witnessed an overaccumulation of capital, and the creation of such markets will provide fresh investment opportunities (including dodgy carbon offsetting Ponzi schemes)  for the super-rich to park their wealth and prosper.

This great reset envisages a transformation of Western societies, resulting in permanent restrictions on fundamental liberties and mass surveillance. Being rolled out under the benign term of a ‘Fourth Industrial Revolution’, the World Economic Forum (WEF) says the public will eventually ‘rent’ everything they require (remember the WEF video ‘you will own nothing and be happy’?): stripping the right of ownership under the guise of a ‘green economy’ and underpinned by the rhetoric of ‘sustainable consumption’ and ‘climate emergency’.

Climate alarmism and the mantra of sustainability are about promoting money-making schemes. But they also serve another purpose: social control.

Neoliberalism has run its course, resulting in the impoverishment of large sections of the population. But to dampen dissent and lower expectations, the levels of personal freedom we have been used to will not be tolerated. This means that the wider population will be subjected to the discipline of an emerging surveillance state.

To push back against any dissent, ordinary people are being told that they must sacrifice personal liberty in order to protect public health, societal security (those terrible Russians, Islamic extremists or that Sunak-designated bogeyman George Galloway) or the climate. Unlike in the old normal of neoliberalism, an ideological shift is occurring whereby personal freedoms are increasingly depicted as being dangerous because they run counter to the collective good.

The real reason for this ideological shift is to ensure that the masses get used to lower living standards and accept them. Consider, for instance, the Bank of England’s chief economist Huw Pill saying that people should ‘accept’ being poorer. And then there is Rob Kapito of the world’s biggest asset management firm BlackRock, who says that a “very entitled” generation must deal with scarcity for the first time in their lives.

At the same time, to muddy the waters, the message is that lower living standards are the result of the conflict in Ukraine and supply shocks that both the war and ‘the virus’ have caused.

The net-zero carbon emissions agenda will help legitimise lower living standards (reducing your carbon footprint) while reinforcing the notion that our rights must be sacrificed for the greater good. You will own nothing, not because the rich and their neoliberal agenda made you poor but because you will be instructed to stop being irresponsible and must act to protect the planet.

NET-ZERO AGENDA

But what of this shift towards net-zero greenhouse gas emissions and the plan to slash our carbon footprints? Is it even feasible or necessary?

Gordon Hughes, a former World Bank economist and current professor of economics at the University of Edinburgh, says in a new report that current UK and European net-zero policies will likely lead to further economic ruin.

Apparently, the only viable way to raise the cash for sufficient new capital expenditure (on wind and solar infrastructure) would be a two decades-long reduction in private consumption of up to 10 per cent. Such a shock has never occurred in the last century outside war; even then, never for more than a decade.

But this agenda will also cause serious environmental degradation. So says Andrew Nikiforuk in the article The Rising Chorus of Renewable Energy Skeptics, which outlines how the green techno-dream is vastly destructive.

He lists the devastating environmental impacts of an even more mineral-intensive system based on renewables and warns:

“The whole process of replacing a declining system with a more complex mining-based enterprise is now supposed to take place with a fragile banking system, dysfunctional democracies, broken supply chains, critical mineral shortages and hostile geopolitics.”

All of this assumes that global warming is real and anthropogenic. Not everyone agrees. In the article Global warming and the confrontation between the West and the rest of the world, journalist Thierry Meyssan argues that net zero is based on political ideology rather than science. But to state such things has become heresy in the Western countries and shouted down with accusations of ‘climate science denial’.

Regardless of such concerns, the march towards net zero continues, and key to this is the United Nations Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development Goals.

Today, almost every business or corporate report, website or brochure includes a multitude of references to ‘carbon footprints’, ‘sustainability’, ‘net zero’ or ‘climate neutrality’ and how a company or organisation intends to achieve its sustainability targets. Green profiling, green bonds and green investments go hand in hand with displaying ‘green’ credentials and ambitions wherever and whenever possible.

It seems anyone and everyone in business is planting their corporate flag on the summit of sustainability. Take Sainsbury’s, for instance. It is one of the ‘big six’ food retail supermarkets in the UK and has a vision for the future of food that it published in 2019.

Here’s a quote from it:

“Personalised Optimisation is a trend that could see people chipped and connected like never before. A significant step on from wearable tech used today, the advent of personal microchips and neural laces has the potential to see all of our genetic, health and situational data recorded, stored and analysed by algorithms which could work out exactly what we need to support us at a particular time in our life. Retailers, such as Sainsbury’s could play a critical role to support this, arranging delivery of the needed food within thirty minutes — perhaps by drone.”

Tracked, traced and chipped — for your own benefit. Corporations accessing all of our personal data, right down to our DNA. The report is littered with references to sustainability and the climate or environment, and it is difficult not to get the impression that it is written so as to leave the reader awestruck by the technological possibilities.

However, the promotion of a brave new world of technological innovation that has nothing to say about power — who determines policies that have led to massive inequalities, poverty, malnutrition, food insecurity and hunger and who is responsible for the degradation of the environment in the first place — is nothing new.

The essence of power is conveniently glossed over, not least because those behind the prevailing food regime are also shaping the techno-utopian fairytale where everyone lives happily ever after eating bugs and synthetic food while living in a digital panopticon.

FAKE GREEN

The type of ‘green’ agenda being pushed is a multi-trillion market opportunity for lining the pockets of rich investors and subsidy-sucking green infrastructure firms and also part of a strategy required to secure compliance required for the ‘new normal’.

It is, furthermore, a type of green that plans to cover much of the countryside with wind farms and solar panels with most farmers no longer farming. A recipe for food insecurity.

Those investing in the ‘green’ agenda care first and foremost about profit. The supremely influential BlackRock invests in the current food system that is responsible for polluted waterways, degraded soils, the displacement of smallholder farmers, a spiralling public health crisis, malnutrition and much more.

It also invests in healthcare — an industry that thrives on the illnesses and conditions created by eating the substandard food that the current system produces. Did Larry Fink, the top man at BlackRock, suddenly develop a conscience and become an environmentalist who cares about the planet and ordinary people? Of course not.

Any serious deliberations on the future of food would surely consider issues like food sovereignty, the role of agroecology and the strengthening of family farms — the backbone of current global food production.

The aforementioned article by Andrew Nikiforuk concludes that, if we are really serious about our impacts on the environment, we must scale back our needs and simplify society.

In terms of food, the solution rests on a low-input approach that strengthens rural communities and local markets and prioritises smallholder farms and small independent enterprises and retailers, localised democratic food systems and a concept of food sovereignty based on self-sufficiency, agroecological principles and regenerative agriculture.

It would involve facilitating the right to culturally appropriate food that is nutritionally dense due to diverse cropping patterns and free from toxic chemicals while ensuring local ownership and stewardship of common resources like land, water, soil and seeds.

That’s where genuine environmentalism and the future of food begins.

Tyler Durden Thu, 03/14/2024 - 02:00

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Five Aerospace Investments to Buy as Wars Worsen Copy

Five aerospace investments to buy as wars worsen give investors a chance to acquire shares of companies focused on fortifying national defense. The five…

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March 14, 2024

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Five aerospace investments to buy as wars worsen give investors a chance to acquire shares of companies focused on fortifying national defense.

The five aerospace investments to buy provide military products to help protect freedom amid Russia’s ongoing onslaught against Ukraine that began in February 2022, as well as supply arms in the Middle East used after Hamas militants attacked and murdered civilians in Israel on Oct. 7. Even though the S&P 500 recently reached all-time highs, these five aerospace investments have remained reasonably priced and rated as recommendations by seasoned analysts and a pension fund chairman.

State television broadcasts in Russia show the country’s soldiers advancing further into Ukrainian territory, but protests have occurred involving family members of those serving in perilous conditions in the invasion of their neighboring nation to be brought home. Even though hundreds of thousands of Russians also have fled to other countries to avoid compulsory military service, the aggressor’s President Vladimir Putin has vowed to continue to send additional soldiers into the fierce fighting.

While Russia’s land-grab of Crimea and other parts of Ukraine show no end in sight, Israel’s war with Hamas likely will last for at least additional months, according to the latest reports. United Nations’ leaders expressed alarm on Dec. 26 about intensifying Israeli attacks that killed more than 100 Palestinians over two days in part of the Gaza Strip, when 15 members of the Israel Defense Force (IDF) also lost their lives.

Five Aerospace Investments to Buy as Wars Worsen: General Dynamics

One of the five aerospace investments to buy as wars worsen is General Dynamics (NYSE: GD), a Reston, Virginia-based aerospace company with more than 100,000 employees in 70-plus countries. A key business unit of General Dynamics is Gulfstream Aerospace Corporation, a manufacturer of business aircraft. Other segments of General Dynamics focus on making military products such as Abrams tanks, Stryker fighting vehicles, ASCOD fighting vehicles like the Spanish PIZARRO and British AJAX, LAV-25 Light Armored Vehicles and Flyer-60 lightweight tactical vehicles.

For the U.S. Navy and other allied armed forces, General Dynamics builds Virginia-class attack submarines, Columbia-class ballistic missile submarines, Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyers, Expeditionary Sea Base ships, fleet logistics ships, commercial cargo ships, aircraft and naval gun systems, Hydra-70 rockets, military radios and command and control systems. In addition, the company provides radio and optical telescopes, secure mobile phones, PIRANHA and PANDUR wheeled armored vehicles and mobile bridge systems.

Chicago-based investment firm William Blair & Co. is among those recommending General Dynamics. The Chicago firm gave an “outperform” rating to General Dynamics in a Dec. 21 research note.

Gulfstream is seeking G700 FAA certification by the end of 2023, suggesting potentially positive news in the next 10 days, William Blair wrote in its recent research note. The investment firm projected that General Dynamics would trade upward upward upon the G700’s certification.

“General Dynamics’ 2023 aircraft delivery guidance of approximately 134 planes assumes that 19 G700s are delivered in the fourth quarter,” wrote William Blair’s aerospace and defense analyst Louie DiPalma. “Even if deliveries fall short of this target, we believe investors will take a glass-half-full approach upon receipt of the certification.”

Chart courtesy of www.stockcharts.com.

Five Aerospace Investments to Buy as Wars Worsen: GD Outlook

The G700 is a major focus area for investors because it is Gulfstream’s most significant aircraft introduction since the iconic G650 in 2012, DiPalma wrote. Gulfstream has the highest market share in the long-range jet segment of the private aircraft market, the highest profit margin of aircraft peers and the most premium business aviation brand, he added.

“The aircraft remains immensely popular today with corporations and high-net-worth individuals,” Di Palma wrote. “Elon Musk has reportedly placed an order for a G700 to go along with his existing G650. Qatar Airways announced at the Paris Air Show that 10 G700 aircraft will become part of its fleet.”

G700 deliveries and subsequent G800 deliveries are expected to be the cornerstone of Gulfstream’s growth and margin expansion for the next decade, DiPalma wrote. This should lead to a rebound in the stock price as the margins for the G700 and G800 are very attractive, he added.

Management’s guidance is for the aerospace operating margin to increase from about 13.2% in 2022 to roughly 14.0% in 2023 and 15.8% in 2024. Longer term, a high-teens profit margin appears within reach, DiPalma projected.

In other General Dynamics business segments, William Blair expects several yet-unannounced large contract awards for General Dynamics IT, to go along with C$1.7 billion, or US$1.29 billion, in General Dynamics Mission Systems contracts announced on Dec. 20 for the Canadian Army. General Dynamics shares are poised to have a strong 2024, William Blair wrote.

Five Aerospace Investments to Buy as Wars Worsen: VSE Corporation

Alexandria, Virginia-based VSE Corporation’s (NASDAQ: VSEC) price-to-earnings (P/E) valuation multiple of 22 received support when AAR Corp. (NYSE: AIR), a Wood Dale, Illinois, provider of aviation services, announced on Dec. 21 that it would acquire the product support business of Triumph Group (NYSE: TGI), a Berwyn, Pennsylvania, supplier of aerospace services, structures and systems. AAR’s purchase price of $725 million reflects confidence in a continued post-pandemic aerospace rebound.

VSE, a provider of aftermarket distribution and repair services for land, sea and air transportation assets used by government and commercial markets, is rated “outperform” by William Blair. The company’s core services include maintenance, repair and operations (MRO), parts distribution, supply chain management and logistics, engineering support, as well as consulting and training for global commercial, federal, military and defense customers.

“Robust consumer travel demand and aging aircraft fleets have driven elevated maintenance visits,” William Blair’s DiPalma wrote in a Dec. 21 research note. “The AAR–Triumph deal is valued at a premium 13-times 2024 EBITDA multiple, which was in line with the valuation multiple that Heico (NYSE: HEI) paid for Wencor over the summer.”

VSE currently trades at a discounted 9.5 times consensus 2024 earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) estimates, as well as 11.6 times consensus 2023 EBITDA.

Five Aerospace Investments to Buy as Wars Worsen: VSE Undervalued?

“We expect that VSE shares will trend higher as investors process this deal,” DiPalma wrote. “VSE shares trade at 9.5 times consensus 2024 adjusted EBITDA, compared with peers and M&A comps in the 10-to-14-times range. We think that VSE’s multiple will expand as it closes the divestiture of its federal and defense business and makes strategic acquisitions. We see consistent 15% annual upside for shares as VSE continues to take share in the $110 billion aviation aftermarket industry.”

William Blair reaffirmed its “outperform” rating for VSE on Dec. 21. The main risk to VSE shares is lumpiness associated with its aviation services margins, Di Palma wrote. However, he raised 2024 estimates to further reflect commentary from VSE’s analysts’ day in November.

Chart courtesy of www.stockcharts.com.

Five Aerospace Investments to Buy as Wars Worsen: HEICO Corporation

HEICO Corporation (NYSEL: HEI), is a Hollywood, Florida-based technology-driven aerospace, industrial, defense and electronics company that also is ranked as an “outperform” investment by William Blair’s DiPalma. The aerospace aftermarket parts provider recently reported fourth-quarter financials above consensus analysts’ estimates, driven by 20% organic growth in HEICO’s flight support group.

HEICO’s management indicated that the performance of recently acquired Wencor is exceeding expectations. However, HEICO leaders offered color on 2024 organic growth and margin expectations that forecast reduced gains. Even though consensus estimates already assumed slowing growth, it is still not a positive for HEICO, DiPalma wrote.

William Blair forecasts 15% annual upside to HEICO’s shares, based on EBITDA growth. HEICO’s management cited a host of reasons for its quarterly outperformance, highlighted by the continued commercial air travel recovery. The company also referenced new product introductions and efficiency initiatives.

HEICO’s defense product sales increased by 26% sequentially, marking the third consecutive sequential increase in defense product revenue. The company’s leaders conveyed that defense in general is moving in the right direction to enhance financial performance.

Chart courtesy of www.stockcharts.com.

Five Dividend-paying Defense and Aerospace Investments to Purchase: XAR

A fourth way to obtain exposure to defense and aerospace investments is through SPDR S&P Aerospace and Defense ETF (XAR). That exchange-traded fund  tracks the S&P Aerospace & Defense Select Industry Index. The fund is overweight in industrials and underweight in technology and consumer cyclicals, said Bob Carlson, a pension fund chairman who heads the Retirement Watch investment newsletter.

Bob Carlson, who heads Retirement Watch, answers questions from Paul Dykewicz.

XAR has 34 securities, and 44.2% of the fund is in the 10 largest positions. The fund is up 25.82% in the last 12 months, 22.03% in the past three months and 7.92% for the last month. Its dividend yield recently measured 0.38%.

The largest positions in the fund recently were Axon Enterprise (NASDAQ: AXON), Boeing (NYSE: BA), L3Harris Technologies (NYSE: LHX), Spirit Aerosystems (NYSE: SPR) and Virgin Galactic (NYSE: SPCE).

Chart courtesy of www.stockcharts.com

Five Dividend-paying Defense and Aerospace Investments to Purchase: PPA

The second fund recommended by Carlson is Invesco Aerospace & Defense ETF (PPA), which tracks the SPADE Defense Index. It has the same underweighting and overweighting as XAR, he said.

PPA recently held 52 securities and 53.2% of the fund was in its 10 largest positions. With so many holdings, the fund offers much reduced risk compared to buying individual stocks. The largest positions in the fund recently were Boeing (NYSE: BA), RTX Corp. (NYSE: RTX), Lockheed Martin (NYSE: LMT), Northrop Grumman (NYSE: NOC) and General Electric (NYSE:GE).

The fund is up 19.07% for the past year, 50.34% in the last three months and 5.30% during the past month. The dividend yield recently touched 0.69%.

Chart courtesy of www.stockcharts.com

Other Fans of Aerospace

Two fans of aerospace stocks are Mark Skousen, PhD, and seasoned stock picker Jim Woods. The pair team up to head the Fast Money Alert advisory service They already are profitable in their recent recommendation of Lockheed Martin (NYSE: LMT) in Fast Money Alert.

Mark Skousen, a scion of Ben Franklin, meets with Paul Dykewicz.


Jim Woods, a former U.S. Army paratrooper, co-heads Fast Money Alert.

Bryan Perry, who heads the Cash Machine investment newsletter and the Micro-Cap Stock Trader advisory service, recommends satellite services provider Globalstar (NYSE American: GSAT), of Covington, Louisiana, that has jumped 50.00% since he advised buying it two months ago. Perry is averaging a dividend yield of 11.14% in his Cash Machine newsletter but is breaking out with the red-hot recommendation of Globalstar in his Micro-Cap Stock Trader advisory service.


Bryan Perry heads Cash Machine, averaging an 11.14% dividend yield.

Military Equipment Demand Soars amid Multiple Wars

The U.S. military faces an acute need to adopt innovation, to expedite implementation of technological gains, to tap into the talents of people in various industries and to step-up collaboration with private industry and international partners to enhance effectiveness, U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. told attendees on Nov 16 at a national security conference. Prime examples of the need are showed by multiple raging wars, including the Middle East and Ukraine. A cold war involves China and its increasingly strained relationships with Taiwan and other Asian nations.

The shocking Oct. 7 attack by Hamas on Israel touched off an ongoing war in the Middle East, coupled with Russia’s February 2022 invasion and continuing assault of neighboring Ukraine. Those brutal military conflicts show the fragility of peace when determined aggressors are willing to use any means necessary to achieve their goals. To fend off such attacks, rapid and effective response is required.

“The Department of Defense is doing more than ever before to deter, defend, and, if necessary, defeat aggression,” Gen. Brown said at the National Security Innovation Forum at the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg Center in Washington, D.C.

One of Russia’s war ships, the 360-foot-long Novocherkassk, was damaged on Dec. 26 by a Ukrainian attack on the Black Sea port of Feodosia in Crimea. This video of an explosion at the port that reportedly shows a section of the ship hit by aircraft-guided missiles.


Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown, Jr.
Photo By: Benjamin Applebaum

National security threats can compel immediate action, Gen. Brown said he quickly learned since taking his post on Oct. 1.

 

“We may not have much warning when the next fight begins,” Gen. Brown said. “We need to be ready.”

 

In a pre-recorded speech at the national security conference, Michael R. Bloomberg, founder of Bloomberg LP, told the John Hopkins national security conference attendees about the critical need for collaboration between government and industry.

 

“Building enduring technological advances for the U.S. military will help our service members and allies defend freedom across the globe,” Bloomberg said.

 

The “horrific terrorist attacks” against Israel and civilians living there on Oct. 7 underscore the importance of that mission, Bloomberg added.

Paul Dykewicz, www.pauldykewicz.com, is an accomplished, award-winning journalist who has written for Dow Jones, the Wall Street Journal, Investor’s Business Daily, USA Today, the Journal of Commerce, Seeking Alpha, Guru Focus and other publications and websites. Attention Holiday Gift Buyers! Consider purchasing Paul’s inspirational book, “Holy Smokes! Golden Guidance from Notre Dame’s Championship Chaplain,” with a foreword by former national championship-winning football coach Lou Holtz. The uplifting book is great gift and is endorsed by Joe Montana, Joe Theismann, Ara Parseghian, “Rocket” Ismail, Reggie Brooks, Dick Vitale and many others. Call 202-677-4457 for special pricing on multiple-book purchases or autographed copies! Follow Paul on Twitter @PaulDykewicz. He is the editor of StockInvestor.com and DividendInvestor.com, a writer for both websites and a columnist. He further is editorial director of Eagle Financial Publications in Washington, D.C., where he edits monthly investment newsletters, time-sensitive trading alerts, free e-letters and other investment reports. Paul previously served as business editor of Baltimore’s Daily Record newspaper, after writing for the Baltimore Business Journal and Crain Communications.

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Health Officials: Man Dies From Bubonic Plague In New Mexico

Health Officials: Man Dies From Bubonic Plague In New Mexico

Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Officials in…

Published

9 hours ago

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March 13, 2024

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Health Officials: Man Dies From Bubonic Plague In New Mexico

Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Officials in New Mexico confirmed that a resident died from the plague in the United States’ first fatal case in several years.

A bubonic plague smear, prepared from a lymph removed from an adenopathic lymph node, or bubo, of a plague patient, demonstrates the presence of the Yersinia pestis bacteria that causes the plague in this undated photo. (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention/Getty Images)

The New Mexico Department of Health, in a statement, said that a man in Lincoln County “succumbed to the plague.” The man, who was not identified, was hospitalized before his death, officials said.

They further noted that it is the first human case of plague in New Mexico since 2021 and also the first death since 2020, according to the statement. No other details were provided, including how the disease spread to the man.

The agency is now doing outreach in Lincoln County, while “an environmental assessment will also be conducted in the community to look for ongoing risk,” the statement continued.

“This tragic incident serves as a clear reminder of the threat posed by this ancient disease and emphasizes the need for heightened community awareness and proactive measures to prevent its spread,” the agency said.

A bacterial disease that spreads via rodents, it is generally spread to people through the bites of infected fleas. The plague, known as the black death or the bubonic plague, can spread by contact with infected animals such as rodents, pets, or wildlife.

The New Mexico Health Department statement said that pets such as dogs and cats that roam and hunt can bring infected fleas back into homes and put residents at risk.

Officials warned people in the area to “avoid sick or dead rodents and rabbits, and their nests and burrows” and to “prevent pets from roaming and hunting.”

“Talk to your veterinarian about using an appropriate flea control product on your pets as not all products are safe for cats, dogs or your children” and “have sick pets examined promptly by a veterinarian,” it added.

“See your doctor about any unexplained illness involving a sudden and severe fever, the statement continued, adding that locals should clean areas around their home that could house rodents like wood piles, junk piles, old vehicles, and brush piles.

The plague, which is spread by the bacteria Yersinia pestis, famously caused the deaths of an estimated hundreds of millions of Europeans in the 14th and 15th centuries following the Mongol invasions. In that pandemic, the bacteria spread via fleas on black rats, which historians say was not known by the people at the time.

Other outbreaks of the plague, such as the Plague of Justinian in the 6th century, are also believed to have killed about one-fifth of the population of the Byzantine Empire, according to historical records and accounts. In 2013, researchers said the Justinian plague was also caused by the Yersinia pestis bacteria.

But in the United States, it is considered a rare disease and usually occurs only in several countries worldwide. Generally, according to the Mayo Clinic, the bacteria affects only a few people in U.S. rural areas in Western states.

Recent cases have occurred mainly in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Countries with frequent plague cases include Madagascar, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Peru, the clinic says. There were multiple cases of plague reported in Inner Mongolia, China, in recent years, too.

Symptoms

Symptoms of a bubonic plague infection include headache, chills, fever, and weakness. Health officials say it can usually cause a painful swelling of lymph nodes in the groin, armpit, or neck areas. The swelling usually occurs within about two to eight days.

The disease can generally be treated with antibiotics, but it is usually deadly when not treated, the Mayo Clinic website says.

“Plague is considered a potential bioweapon. The U.S. government has plans and treatments in place if the disease is used as a weapon,” the website also says.

According to data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the last time that plague deaths were reported in the United States was in 2020 when two people died.

Tyler Durden Wed, 03/13/2024 - 21:40

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