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Back in June, we touched on the incredible possibilities for mRNA technology beyond vaccines. 👇
Tim Vollans
Now they're moving on to cancer therapies, and this early trial (on mice) is incredibly encouraging...
Jack Dunhill
Once again, it's the ability to specifically target and transmit a 'code' to a specific area that is yielding results...
Researchers tried to target the cytokines directly to the tumors using viral vectors, but this led to genetic issues and interference from the immune system that was undesirable. If only there was a safe way to stimulate the body into creating these cytokines at the desired place, preventing an overload of cytokines that travel throughout the body and cause problems.
Enter, mRNA therapies.
By inserting a cocktail of mRNA that encodes cytokines directly into the tumor, the body creates those cytokines in large quantities, ready to fend off the rapidly-growing mass of cancer cells. When BioNTech, in collaboration with Sanofi, tried this on 20 mice with melanomas, 17 mice produced enough cytokines to effectively shrink the tumors to nothing within 40 days.
When it was used on mice with two different types of tumors (melanomas and lung cancer), the therapy injected into the melanomas worked to shrink them, but also traveled off-site and inhibited the growth of lung tumors as well. The experiments suggest that the new therapy may be potent against targeted tumors and any secondary tumors that may result from it disseminating.
As stated above, cytokine therapies often have undesirable effects. However, this treatment left the mice with no observable adverse effects.
Human trials are already underway, and there are dozens of mRNA cancer treatments in development at BioNTech...
Encouraging trials of mRNA tech to treat cancer https://t.co/TM1k5QqXqS pic.twitter.com/Gdehwv2GkB
— Tim (@VolaTim) September 9, 2021
The history of mRNA stretches back to 1990, when Hungarian biochemist Katalin KarikĂł was constantly seeing her grant applications rejected...
In 1995 she was demoted at the University of Pennsylvania.
Now she's a senior vice president at BioNTech...
Fair to say some enthusiasm is already built into the price, but it's well off the August high at 391.50.
Keep an eye on the trial publication dates. Successful human trials would be a genuine medical breakthrough...
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Buy the Rumour, Sell the Fact was in play again yesterday....
At hyperspeed!
Walmart announced a partnership with Litecoin, which turned out to be a complete hoax...
A one hour round trip from 175 to 237 and back again.
Even before it was confirmed as a hoax, there was a lot of head-scratching...
"Why TF would Walmart partner with Litecoin?"
It didn't make any sense. Didn't pass the first sniff test...
This is where Twitter is such a fantastic tool... 👇
Emailing Walmart to confirm...
— Frank Chaparro (@fintechfrank) September 13, 2021
Note it is on Globe Newswire, which runs all the official press releases. So, would be a big feat if someone had managed to fraudulently pull that off.https://t.co/zulAlgjFl3
— Newsquawk (@Newsquawk) September 13, 2021
It was a big feat, and there were two huge red flags...
What happened to the fact checkers in the big news orgs?
Auto-pilot & a rush to be first are the likely culprits.
Speed will be sacrificed for accuracy time and again.
Profit opportunities will be created for those that know their market.
Or chase the fast moves without knowing the context and get...
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Evergrande 'on the brink' is now common knowledge, BUT this will take time to play out...
Long-time readers know we've been banging on about Evergrande for a couple of years now. ICYMI, this was the deepest dive 👇
David Belle
There seems to be an assumption that everything will be fine.
The CCP will wave their magic wand and bailout the company to fix everything.
They won't.
Something of this scale doesn't just disappear.
Beware of anyone telling you that this will blow over without a fuss...
"Oh, they're too big to fail"
So was the US banking system. It didn't fail, but the post '08 period wasn't exactly prosperous!
There is genuine systemic risk in play, and it will take many months or even years to unravel the full extent of the losses.
China's central bank highlighted in its financial stability report in 2018 that companies including Evergrande might pose systemic risks to the nation's financial system.
Evergrande's liabilities involve more than 128 banks and over 121 non-banking institutions, according to the letter Evergrande sent to the government late last year. JPMorgan estimated last week China Minsheng Bank (600016.SS) has the highest exposure to Evergrande.
Late payments could trigger cross-defaults as many financial institutions have exposure to Evergrande via direct loans and indirect holdings through different financial instruments.
In the dollar bond market, Evergrande accounts for 4% of Chinese real estate high-yields, according to DBS. Any defaults will also trigger sell-offs in the high-yield credit market.
A collapse of Evergrande will have a large impact on the job market. It has 200,000 staff and hires 3.8 million people every year for project developments.
Media reports said regulators have approved an Evergrande proposal to renegotiate payment deadlines with banks and other creditors. The Guangzhou government is also seeking opinions from Evergrande's major lenders about setting up a creditor committee.
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David Belle
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