Health and Healthcare

Poll: Where Does MannKind Stock Go in 2015 After Afrezza Approval?

MannKind Corp. (NASDAQ: MNKD) has seen its shares surge on news that it has finally won U.S. Food & Drug Administration backing. This FDA approval for Type 1 and 2 diabetes is being hailed as a victory, with shares having traded up 10.5% to $11.04 in Monday afternoon trading. Also standing out was the $11.48 high on the day — the new 52-week high.

On June 14 we opined that the MannKind lifeline was lighting up. Shares were right around $10 at the time.

What 24/7 Wall St. wants to know is what your take is on the matter. This has been a true battleground stock, pitting short-sellers against bulls, pitting options traders against equity traders, and on and on.

What investors should consider is that some investors might have thought that the stock volatility on Friday, the huge short interest and the massive open interest in options contracts might have yielded a more than 10% move. It, at least so far, has not.

The volume of 40 million shares even just before 2:00 p.m. ET is very impressive, but we have to consider that the April 2, 2014, jump was on 97,544,000 shares, rising up to $6.99 from $4.02 the prior trading day. No April Fool’s joke there.

So far we have seen that J.P. Morgan has cautioned that Afrezza still has commercial hurdles ahead of it. The firm maintained a Neutral rating, now that its diluted market cap (after warrants) stands at $5 billion. RBC gave it an Outperform rating back on June 14.

All in all, there have yet to be a flood of analyst reports here. The reality is that many analysts gave up because the FDA had been a consistent roadblock. Some additional things to consider:

  • As of March 31, MannKind had under $40 million in cash.
  • As of March 31, the company’s ongoing losses to offset future income were almost -$2.4 billion.
  • MannKind shares have a 52-week low of $3.80.
  • Shares are back to a high not seen since 2007.
  • And the all-time high peaks for the stock in 2004 and 2006 were closer to $20.

So, tell us what you think. What happens to MannKind from here, entering the second half of 2015 and into 2015, considering that its diluted market cap closer to $5 billion — or $4.17 billion without considering the warrants trading as MNKDW?

[polldaddy poll=8157176]

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