Drug's 5,000% price increase, where's the justification?

Dj_Jestar said:
Tefal - how do you justify the 5,500% overnight increase in price?
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i don't, because this was an already developed drug they simply bought not developed and so are not paying off the costs of development.

not sure why your asking me given iwas talking about investment for R&D.
 
Monkeynut said:
Wait, if this drug is so old, how are generics not allowed?
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may well have originally been an orphan drug, ie for a very rare condition etc so they get longer patents to give them time to recoup the costs and other incentives to try and get people to research for rare conditions.

if its now used for HIV treatment that wasn't really a big condition 60 years ago so.
 
wildman said:
lol the ignorance alone in this statement is priceless...............

you think a private investor is going to throw boats of cash into something that will yield no return.............. Yes that's exactly how it works, I'll secure billions in investment from private investors by promising them a place in heaven with Jesus and Allah right ???
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LOL the sheer nerve of this post calling me ignorant! Firstly if it will yield no return then what's the point of doing it at all? If there's no point doing it then why price gouge the existing drug?

Secondly, yes I do think a private investor is going to throw boat-loads of cash at pharmaceutical R&D - what do you think shareholders are?

Thirdly, like it or not loans are typically how R&D projects are funded. Fundamental to this is the concept of risk, the risk that the R&D project doesn't result in a viable product at the end. This is why big pharaceutical companies have the advantage because they have the means to undertake multiple R&D projects and it's extremely unlikely that all will fail, your product that does become viable is how you repay your loans. This is why GlaxoSmithKline's total debts in 2014 reached $32bn.

Basic Business 101 for wildman over - lol.

wildman said:
Whether you all like it or not Pharmaceutical Companies are run for profit nor for saving lives. people just need to get their heads around that idea. If it was about saving lives then governments would invest in their own not for profit R&D. But governments full well know it simply can't be done without the muscle of massive PLC companies that are traded on stockmarkets.

if it was as easy as the average person on here thinks don't you think governments would be running their own massive research complexes and saving billions on their healthcare costs ?
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Utter codswallop - government's don't do pharmaceutical research because they aren't and shouldn't be concerned with the design and manufacture of drugs - they should concentrate on running their country. They do fund research (as do charities), but they get people with the proper expertise to do it and rightly so. Saving and improving lives is the goal of pharmaceutical eco-system - I've certainly never said pharmaceutical companies shouldn't be allowed to make a profit, but I don't believe they should be allowed to make a profit by buying the rights to ancient, cheap drugs then putting up the price because it's "undervalued compared to other life-saving medicine". :rolleyes:
 
Tefal said:
what life threatening condition does cannabis treat?

And how does your "it's a plant!!" Agument hold up in the face of say poppies?

They're a pretty big medical crop and big money too. (Even legally)
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It may not cure it, since there is no cure, but it makes the neuropathic pain from MS a hell of a lot more bearable and lets you try to get back to some kind of normality.
I took Sativex, which is made from cannabis for a few years and that helped me to sleep at night. Eased the pain and spasticity in my legs.
 
scorza said:
LOL the sheer nerve of this post calling me ignorant! Firstly if it will yield no return then what's the point of doing it at all? If there's no point doing it then why price gouge the existing drug?

Secondly, yes I do think a private investor is going to throw boat-loads of cash at pharmaceutical R&D - what do you think shareholders are?

Thirdly, like it or not loans are typically how R&D projects are funded. Fundamental to this is the concept of risk, the risk that the R&D project doesn't result in a viable product at the end. This is why big pharaceutical companies have the advantage because they have the means to undertake multiple R&D projects and it's extremely unlikely that all will fail, your product that does become viable is how you repay your loans. This is why GlaxoSmithKline's total debts in 2014 reached $32bn.

Basic Business 101 for wildman over - lol.



Utter codswallop - government's don't do pharmaceutical research because they aren't and shouldn't be concerned with the design and manufacture of drugs - they should concentrate on running their country. They do fund research (as do charities), but they get people with the proper expertise to do it and rightly so. Saving and improving lives is the goal of pharmaceutical eco-system - I've certainly never said pharmaceutical companies shouldn't be allowed to make a profit, but I don't believe they should be allowed to make a profit by buying the rights to ancient, cheap drugs then putting up the price because it's "undervalued compared to other life-saving medicine". :rolleyes:
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Shareholders invest because they expect to get dividends and a return on their investment. Shareholders are not charity, they expect returns, and returns means having to make a decent enough profit. R&D pipelines for large pharma are not bank rolled by unsecured loans from the banking sector. If a company fails to make bank it gets liquidated and anything it works on gets sold as part of the asset strip to the highest bidder who in turn will gouge it to ensure they do make bank. That includes products that are in development where the most amount of profit can be secured if they are successfully taken through phase 4 and into commercial production.

It's not just basic business 101 when it comes to pharma, its a lot more complex because of the massively long drawn out development cycles and the fact that your success rate is around 1 in 5000 of every development started. Investors do not throw money into Pharma for no gain, they expect to turn a tidy profit. If you really don't get that you need to go back to school.
 
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Supposedly he's being accused of doing this to make money on short selling. The way he's publicized this has driven the stocks down of other pharma companies which he can then make money on.

I'm sure it's totally not true, he hasnt been accused of it before and it's purely coincidental, he just wanted to make the drugs for the benefit of everyone and needed the money to start developing other drugs.
 
Calabi said:
Supposedly he's being accused of doing this to make money on short selling. The way he's publicized this has driven the stocks down of other pharma companies which he can then make money on.

I'm sure it's totally not true, he hasnt been accused of it before and it's purely coincidental, he just wanted to make the drugs for the benefit of everyone and needed the money to start developing other drugs.
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Win win both ways. If it gets accepted he makes $260m a year. If the authorities come down on him like a tonne of bricks and threaten new laws to stop this (which is what happens) 4% gets wiped off pharmaceutical companies share prices in one day.

So put your money in both and you will win either way. :D
 
He's essentially s*****d over the pharmaceutical industry since we will almost definitely get some sort of regulation being looked at now to prevent this kind of gauging in future.

He's also pulled a dodgy scam since he probably planned to hike the price to $750 to see the reaction and then slash the price in 'half' to make people happy. Win win situation for this low life.
 
Greebo said:
Win win both ways. If it gets accepted he makes $260m a year. If the authorities come down on him like a tonne of bricks and threaten new laws to stop this (which is what happens) 4% gets wiped off pharmaceutical companies share prices in one day.

So put your money in both and you will win either way. :D
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Exactly it would be genius, if it wasnt so blatant.
 
valkynaz said:
You clearly didn't read my post properly as you would have seen the billions I mentioned was in reference to companies such as Intel.

And as for future R&D, the likelihood is the company will have expand its product range into other pharmaceutical products or more effective drugs it currently produces in order to remain competitive and survive in the market through product diversification.
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Lol. Just lol.

Dj_Jestar said:
Turing Pharmaceuticals have just two products. This one, and Vecamyl™ - an antihypertensive drug. Oh and it was developed in the 1950s. The only thing that Turing Pharmaceuticals have done for "biotech" is to buy marketing rights of cheap drugs and gouge the prices.

Turing Pharmaceuticals is a hedge fund with "Pharmaceuticals" in the name.
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Clap clap.

Someone who is smart enough to get it.
 
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Tefal said:
may well have originally been an orphan drug, ie for a very rare condition etc so they get longer patents to give them time to recoup the costs and other incentives to try and get people to research for rare conditions.

if its now used for HIV treatment that wasn't really a big condition 60 years ago so.
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it isn't used for HIV treatment

it is sometimes used by HIV patients among others

HIV wasn't even known about 60 years ago, let along not just being a big deal
 
Greebo said:
Still genius as he hasn't done anything illegal and he's made a shed load of money.

Downside he's hated.
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I dont know, I thought there were rules against market manipulation like this.

I'm sure if they were inclined they could find something illegal to bring him up on.

But even so all the money he has now should probably be enough to bribe off and avoid mitigate the hate.
 
just more of the same

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-34331761

Seems this guys has done the rounds of 'business' already

In 2006, Mr Shkreli started his own hedge fund, Elea Capital Management.

The fund closed a year later after a $2.3 million lawsuit from Lehman Brothers, which collapsed before it could collect on the ruling.

After Elea, Mr Shkreli started MSMB Capital Management in 2008. The fund would be his launch pad for founding biotech firms including Turing.

Turing was not Mr Shkreli's first foray into the pharmaceutical industry. In 2011, he founded biotech firm Retrophin, with the goal of focusing on medicines for rare diseases.

He was ousted as head of the company in 2014 amidst allegations he improperly handled legal settlements.

A year later the company filed a $65 million lawsuit that claimed Mr Shkreli created Retrophin and took it public simply to pay off investors in his old hedge fund, MSMB when the fund went under.

Mr Shkreli has denied the accusations. "They are sort of concocting this wild and crazy and unlikely story to swindle me out of the money," he told the New York Times.
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Researching new drugs takes money, and that money has to come from somewhere. If this guy had increased the price of a single dose of Daraprim from $13.50 to $20.00 or perhaps even $40.00, nobody would have batted an eyelid, but hiking it up to an obscene $750.00 is just taking the ****.

Whatever way I think about this it looks dodgy, and the shameless way he initially responded to his critics is probably a reflection of how he sees absolutely nothing inherently wrong with what he was doing. Like a lot of fund managers and financiers, there doesn't seem to be any filter to their business mindset that says 'sure, we could do this, but everyone will look at it and say we're filthy greedy rats, so maybe we shouldn't, if only so we don't look like terrible people'.
 
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