RE:Taimed's Conference May 31 of 2021 I totally agree they should have straighten up the expectations of Trogarzo’s sales when they quite quickly realized their market projection was too high rather than waiting almost a year so both company’s lost some credibility right there and it was strategically wrong decision, THTX has now a plan and I certainly hope a more clear shareholder communication is part of it. As for sales it is not fair to expect growth during lockdowns in the US and almost a total lockdown in Canada and Europe. Pre pandemic in Q3 2109 their total revenues for both drugs were $16,111,000 Trogarzo’s sales were $6,923,000 and Egrifta’s sales were $9,188,000. In the last Q the total revenues were $15.430, 000 Trogarzo’s sales were $6,742,000 and Egrifta’s sales were $8.688.000, comparing the sales for both drugs pre pandemic and during pandemic Trogarzo’s sales declined by 2.5% and Egrifta’s sales declined by 5% looking at annual sales 2019 and 2020 actually total revenues were similar but again in 2019 the Trogarzo’s sales were increasing and in 2020 we had the lockdowns therefore an annual comparison won’t be a fair one.
So considering Trogarzo is administrated by IV and many clinics postponed the elective surgeries, patients avoided clinics being fearful of contracting the virus, many doctors working remotely and overall a total mess a decrees of 2.5% for Trogarzo’s sales is not exactly a disaster. The drug has a good patient’s compliance/satisfaction and it is used as the last line of defense currently. The company is trying to educate both patients and doctors not to wait until it’s too late, the marketing strategies are much more efficient as discussed many times earlier and both IV and IM should impact the sales as I don’t think patients like to go twice a month and spend 40 minutes in the clinics to get the drug administrated, I believe IV/IM will be more successful to start the patients on the drug. To summarize it all, economies opening up post pandemic, easier initiations of patients due to more patient friendly administrations , better marketing strategies, good compliance and launch of Trogarzo in 5 more European countries one can presume the Trogarzo’s sales will be increasing. As per Egrifta some of the above together with increasing patient awareness re the comorbidities caused by lipodystrophy resulting many other serious condition and launching the pen injector one can make the same argument for better sales of the drug going forward.
stock38 wrote:
Dear all
Is there anyone who can tell me the reason why the sales of Trogarzo is so bad. I have some guesses and do not know right or not. Would appreciate to have your comments and instructions.
1. Both Taimed and TH said loudly at the beginning that Tro.is a
life saving drug about 10000 to 15000 people are waiting it to
save lives. But the truth is that these people did not die without
Tro. They actually can use current drug other than Tro.and still
live well (maybe no well owing to the side effect of the drugs
they were using). So this lifesaving disclosure is over
exaggerated or only kind of propaganda anyway( in this case
the blame should be put mainly on Taimed who is the
procducer.
2. Most MDR patients were underprivileged groups. Maybe
already lost their jobs and live miserably , so they can not buy
insurance to cover Tro. If they apply to social assistance , they
have to struggle to get permission which is no easy
cause the budget is limited. In short , Tro.is good but the
patients could not afford it. So the good efficacy means little for
customers. The sale prospect is very dark it has few chance to
go further.
3. TH was unable to promote Tro. either because of their sale
force or unproper strategy or both. In this case people may
wonder if NASH project develops well, can they sell it well .
Of course they can sell loyalty to others, that is another story.
4. Now Taimed and TH are developing IV push and IM push. Do
these two kinds of injection really help sales a lot or just let
patients have more options.
5. TH made some payments to Taimed with their shares. I do not
know exactly how much shares Taimed has . But I once asked CFO of Taimed , why they did not charge TH with cash. He
told me Taimed also paid their loyalty fee to other firms
with shares and finally they got five times profits because
Taimed shares went high. Since Taimed was so confident
about Tro. They even issued a statement that permit their staff
have the right to buy Taimed's share at the price
of NT$180/share.The report showed that both CEO and
CFO bought many shares at this price(they do not sell till
now). And now since the sales of Tro.is so frustrating that TH
and Taimed's share plunged and plunged heavily. Right now
Taimed's price is only NT$70 and the statement became a
sad joke.
6. I ho not know exactly how much shares of TH Taimed has.
But the CFO told me once that if TH increases C$1.--, Taimed
will benefit about 45 millions Taiwan dollars . so these two
companies really bind together. You can imagine that Taimed
already lost lot of money in TH’s share.
Thanks for your attention for reading this long letter
Stock 38 from Taiwan