The share price of multidisciplinary biomed company Opko Health Inc. (NYSE: OPK; TASE: OPK) rose 1% on the TASE today after losing 23% over the past three trading days. The rise can be partly attributed to an interview given by the company's founder and CEO Dr. Phillip Frost (who is also Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. (Nasdaq: TEVA; TASE: TEVA) chairman) on the "Seeking Alpha" site to TheStreetsweeper in which he responded to a report by Lakewood Capital which caused the falls
Although Frost has called a press conference for tomorrow in which he will address the "inaccuracies in the Lakewood report," it seems that he did not want to put the stock at risk of sharp falls for even one more day. Lakewood does not hide that it has a short position on the share, while StreetSweeper does not hide its support for the company.
In the interview Frost was asked about the share's potential. He said, "We don't have to have $20 billion in sales for all three (products in development) or even $10 billion, for that matter, for the present stock value to be extremely low … with the possibility of appreciation being very high. That's the reason I continue to buy shares."
Asked about the Lakewood Capital report suggesting that he may be consistently buying Opko stock in an attempt to entice investors into also buying, he said, "I can't keep people from being influenced one way or another. All I know is I invest because I don't know of another investment I could make that I would be more comfortable with. It's not part of a marketing strategy. Because if I didn't believe in it I would be throwing away an awful lot of money. I'm not the type of person who throws away money."
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on December 16, 2013
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