Howard Hughes: Updated Thoughts After Investor Day

I wanted to bring Howard Hughes Holdings (HHH, fka HHC) ($4.1B market cap) back up front as they just had their investor day this past Monday where they laid out a $118/share NAV and its been 3.5 months since Pershing Square filed their 13D without much of an update.  I believe it is likely that Ackman takes it private at somewhere between $95-$105/share.

Below are management's NAV slides:

Note the use of the phrase "conservative sum of the parts" in the second bullet. I'm sure lawyers took a close look at this deck before it was published and the company will need to justify a discount to this number in a private sale transaction (which they can and will, not suggesting it'll go for $118).

The bulk of the NAV is in the land, which is a little squishy and unlikely to be valued properly by public market investors, it's not often that land banks trade at NAV.  However, as the below slide shows, most of their land value is located in Summerlin outside of Las Vegas, where land sales to homebuilders have been strong for some time and the MPC long reached critical mass.

The nascent MPC of Floreo in Arizona, where the land value is least stress tested, is only 7% of the MPC NAV.  Additionally, mortgage rates remain stubbornly high despite the Fed starting to ease short term interest rates, it doesn't seem like we'll get a quick snap back to where existing home inventory jumps back to normal levels in the near term.  Leaving the only game in town new inventory.

However, if you look under the hood (below), about 1/3rd of the MPC NAV is commercial acreage:

Howard Hughes has noticeably pulled back on development in last year or two due to near zero office demand and increased construction costs, but there's been minimal change to the asset value of their commercial land real estate, that doesn't quite add up.  Additionally, they've only just started their first office building in Bridgeland, commercial properties are years (decade?) off in Teravalis/Floreo, it's hard to square that math in my head even with healthy discount rates.

They also bumped up their Hawaii (and now also Woodlands) condo price per square foot up significantly as they've recently announced the last two buildings (located near the beach, would replace part of the land occupied by their sales center at the IBM building) as ultra luxury.  Just a few years ago, this price per square foot would seem unattainable, high rise development is a risky endeavor, keeping the discount rate constant while bumping up the price 60% doesn't immediately scream "conservative sum-of-the-parts" valuation to me.  But they've done extraordinarily well in Ward Village, breezed through several potential economic headwinds since development there started over 10 years ago.

For the operating assets, they do appear to be on the conservative side.

Their office assets are primarily located in growing desirable areas without some of the headaches of large gateway markets and their occupancy levels show that at 88%.  The lagger in their portfolio is Hughes Landing in the Woodlands, they're moving their headquarters once again, this time just inside the MPC from the Town Center to Hughes Landing in order to focus on it (there's also a luxury multi-family asset being built there) and free up the premium space they previously occupied in the OXY buildings.

So net-net, operating properties are probably a little undervalued, the commercial land and condos slightly overvalued given the timing of those cash flows and risks involved in development.  We know that Ackman can't pay $118/share, he's a fiduciary to his own investors who would be backing the deal, somewhere between $95-$105 seems right to me (no hard math, just a guess).  He owns 37.5% of the company, while there's likely a process ongoing to identify other bidders, its hard to imagine another bidder willing to pay more (otherwise they would have back in 2018-2019 when then HHC ran a similar strategic alternatives process, presumably without Ackman has a bidder since he didn't update his 13D at the time).

Ackman has an attachment to Howard Hughes (he's essentially the company's founder and has added to his ownership stake along the way, during Covid and through a 2022 tender offer more recently) that I think the market is underestimating, his Forbes cover is often mocked, but the byline to the 2015 article is about how he's going to turn Howard Hughes (not Pershing Square) into his version of Berkshire Hathaway.  He's been an outspoken supporter of President-Elect Donald Trump and Republicans in the 2024 election, with the red sweep he's likely confident in the economic climate going forward, possibly bulled up on animal spirits wanting to secure a big win.

In his fund's quarterly update call yesterday, he said, "..we don't think that Howard Hughes is going to develop a real franchise today as a public company."  He's really the only one who can change that with his ownership level and the structure of HHH, he'll take it private within 1-2 months and do well with it.

Disclosure: I own shares of HHH and some calls on HHH

Creative Media & Community Trust: Forced Selling After Preferred Conversion to Equity, Highly Speculative, Option-Like

Creative Media & Community Trust (CMCT, fka CIM Commercial Trust) (~$20MM market cap) is a tire fire of a REIT (externally managed by CIM Group) that owns a mixture of traditional office, "creative office", multi-family and a hotel, the majority of which are located in California.  I owned CMCT briefly back in 2021 as it was the target of an activist campaign, CIM Group eventually thwarted the activist by doing a dilutive rights offering (and backstopping the rights offering) at $9.25 (the shares trade for $0.23/share today) to cement voting control.  After the rights in 2021, management owned 45+% of the company.

As most know, the commercial real estate market has struggled significantly as the result of slow return-to-office trends, higher for longer interest rates and some location specific issues to the Oakland/Bay Area market where several of CMCT's chunkier assets are located.  

Here's a quick snapshot of the company's assets:

CIM Group had an ongoing preferred stock issuance program going at CMCT, it was a way to increase assets (and thus external management fees) without issuing common stock at below NAV and CIM also had an affiliate act as a placement agent to collect additional fees.  As the real estate asset value dropped at CMCT and preferred stock issuance didn't slow (CMCT was issuing preferred stock as recent as earlier this year), the common stock felt the pain and was upside down.  Additionally, their bank credit facility is no longer in compliance with its financial covenants.

Earlier this year, CMCT tried to sell a handful of assets in order to raise cash and payoff the credit facility, but the buyer wasn't able to close:

CMCT recently explored the sale of several high-quality assets to improve its common equity ratio. The offer CMCT received reflected what the Company believed to be the fair value of these assets, but the buyer was unable to close. As a result of this and the recent decline in interest rates, CMCT has decided to shift its focus to refinancing rather than a sale of these assets.

CMCT's preferred stock is convertible into common shares at the option of the issuer. Subsequentially to the failed asset sale, in September, CMCT decided to "improve its common equity ratio" by converting some preferred stock to common:

As part of its program to improve its common equity ratio, the Company is suspending its Series A1 Preferred Stock offering and announcing the redemption of approximately 2.2 million shares of Series A Preferred Stock and approximately 2.6 million shares of Series A1 Preferred Stock, with the redemption price to be paid in shares of common stock in accordance with the terms of the Series A Preferred Stock and Series A1 Preferred Stock, respectively. 

In total, they redeemed $118.9MM (~$345MM is remaining) of preferred stock with 60,526,804 common shares, or at a price of $1.96/share.

Preferred stock holders (probably RIA's in the HNW channel) naturally puked the stock out (they only had 22.8 million shares outstanding before the preferred conversion, nearly 4x'ing the shares outstanding to motivated sellers), when the price dropped due to the forced selling, it created tax loss selling and further spiraling down the drain to $0.23/share where it trades today.  The new plan, to refinance at the property level and repay the credit facility is outlined in the most recent 10-Q:

Management plans to address any possible future event of default under the 2022 Credit Facility by entering into new financing arrangements to repay amounts outstanding under the 2022 Credit Facility. The Company is in the process of obtaining refinancing for the Company’s hotel in Sacramento, California (the “Sheraton Refinancing”). If completed, the Company intends to use the proceeds of the Sheraton Refinancing to repay part of the amount outstanding under the 2022 Credit Facility and to pay for the Hotel Renovation described above. In addition, the Company is in the process of obtaining refinancing (the “Los Angeles Refinancing”) for three of its properties in Los Angeles, California. If completed, the proceeds of the Los Angeles Refinancing, along with a portion of the proceeds from the Sheraton Refinancing, are anticipated to be in an amount sufficient to repay all amounts outstanding under the 2022 Credit Facility, with the rest to be used for general corporate purposes. The Company expects that each of the Sheraton Refinancing and the Los Angeles Refinancing will close by the end of the first quarter of 2025.

Management of the Company believes that its plans to repay amounts outstanding under the 2022 Credit Facility are probable based on the following: (1) the Company has executed term sheets with the respective lenders under the Sheraton Refinancing and the Los Angles Refinancing; (2) the Company expects that both the Los Angeles Refinancing and the Sheraton Refinancing will close by the end of the first quarter of 2025; (3) the favorable loan-to-value ratios (“LTVs”) of the properties that are the subject of the Sheraton Refinancing and the Los Angeles Refinancing and (4) the Company’s plans and efforts to date to obtain additional financing to be secured by two properties that it owns (in addition to the Sheraton Refinancing and the Los Angeles Refinancing), and the favorable LTVs of these two properties. Management’s plans are intended to mitigate the relevant condition that would raise substantial doubt about the Company’s ability to continue as a going concern within one year after the date that the interim financial information contained in this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q is issued. The accompanying consolidated financial statements have been prepared assuming that the Company will continue its operations as a going concern and do not include any adjustments that might result from the outcome of events described in this paragraph.

Potentially there's some value here if the company is able to switch from recourse to non-recourse debt and ride out any real estate recovery.  CMCT does have a series of potential development sites, (through CIM) access to co-investors for project specific capital (so they won't need to raise it at the CMCT level, because they can't), there's a world where they don't file for bankruptcy and they can limp along far enough to make to the other side of their transition to "creative office" and multi-family.  The underlying asset value of the company haven't changed much since the preferred conversion (likely only improved slightly as short-term rates come down and more companies call employees back into the office) and they're going to save roughly $8 million per year in preferred dividends as a result of the conversion.  Yet the stock is down ~90% from the conversion price.  Could this be a potential January effect beneficiary?  Again, super speculative, but I think it might.

In attempt to determine how much if any value is here, one way is to back into an implied cap rate of 5.8% based on the last-twelve months of net operating income, not particularly cheap.  Howard Hughes (HHH) just had an investor day where they laid out their NAV using an 11% cap rate for their office properties.

Another way, CMCT pays CIM Group a base management fee based on the NAV which is determined by a third party, they used to disclose NAV, but I haven't seen it called out for year-end 2023.  But based on the quarterly fee (0.25% of Net Asset Value Attributable to Common Stockholders) you can back into the NAV.

Of course all the normal caveats apply to the NAV, there's an inherent conflict of interest to inflate it when your management fees are calculated off it.

The bet here is that CMCT is indeed able to refinance their properties and extract value embedded in their assets, reinvest those cash flows into new multi-family buildings and no longer be a bankruptcy candidate.  Any slight positive change in the outlook for California commercial real estate could make this turnout to be a multi-bagger, the opposite is true as well, if CRE continues to stink it up, this will be a zero or effectively so through more dilution of the remaining preferred shares.

Risks/Other thoughts:

• This very likely could be a zero, it is a call option disguised as common stock on commercial real estate values improving and interest rates continuing to fall.
• CMCT could convert more preferred to common and crash the stock again.
• CMCT pays their dividend in shares now, so don't get excited over the appearance of a big dividend yield.
• They have a small SBA lending operation that lends into the mom and pop owner/operator hotel market, this along with their hotel they've called out as being non-core and potentially look to sell those assets to reinvest in more multi-family developments.
• After the conversion, management now only owns 15% of the company.  Remember, they were buyers at $9.25, odd that they tanked their own position to such a degree, but now with less ownership, might be even more likely to do it again to save their management fee income.

Disclosure: I own shares of CMCT (about a ~2% position, and sworn to myself I won't average down)

Singular Genomics Systems: Exclusivity Period w/ Deerfield, Spread Remains

Singular Genomics Systems (OMIC) ($60MM market cap) is an early stage medical device company, they have one commercial product (G4) and one in development (G4X) that is a promising next generation genome sequencer.  The company burns quite a bit of cash, approximately $25MM a quarter, but with the commercial launch of G4X in Q2 2025, OMIC could be coming to an inflection point with revenues coming in 2025.  Prior to bidders appearing, the stock traded at a massive discount to cash.

Recent Events:

• Back on 9/12, long time investor in OMIC and large health care fund, Deerfield Management, made a $10/share bid for OMIC.  Shares traded for approximately $5.60/share before the offer.
• Following Deerfield's bid, on 9/19, our friend Kevin Tang lobbed in his own $12/share bid, he owns just under 15% of the company.
• Presumably there was a fairly competitive bidding process (and likely at least one additional bidder other than Deerfield or Tang, Tang doesn't really want the IP normally it seems which would cap him out here) following 9/14 because on 11/4, we found out that Deerfield's latest bid is a whooping $24/share and has entered into an exclusivity period with OMIC to finalize a definitive agreement.

From Deerfield's latest 13D:

As previously disclosed, on September 5, 2024, Deerfield Private Design Fund IV, Deerfield Mgmt IV and Deerfield Management (collectively, “Deerfield”) submitted a non-binding proposal (the “September 2024 Proposal”) to the special committee of independent directors of the Company (the “Special Committee”). The September 2024 Proposal related to a proposed acquisition through a special purpose vehicle to be established by Deerfield of all of the outstanding shares of Common Stock not already owned by Deerfield or any other stockholders or members of management that Deerfield invites to “rollover” their current equity shares. Following negotiations with the Special Committee in a competitive process, Deerfield proposed an increased purchase price of $24.00 per share (the Original Proposal, as so modified, the “Modified Proposal” and the transaction contemplated thereby, the “Modified Transaction”), and following such proposed increase, on October 31, 2024, the Company and Deerfield entered into an exclusivity agreement to facilitate completion of Deerfield’s due diligence and the preparation and negotiation of definitive agreements in respect of the Modified Transaction.

Downside could be pretty considerable here, but we do have a high quality counterparty in Deerfield, competitive process and despite the sharp increase in the bid, I still have Deerfield picking up OMIC below an estimated NCAV at deal close  if you exclude the leases.

Including the operating lease, NCAV is closer to $20/share.

To me this is a similar trade to Asensus Surgical (ASXC), a cash burning business being led into the arms of a creditable buyer that knows it well.   I bought shares around $21.50, or a 11.6% spread to the $24.00 current bid.  Depending on where this trades it might not be actionable.  I'd probably be a buyer below $22.00, we'll see where the price settles in anticipation of the next piece of news.  There's a slight chance of another bump, but not counting on that.

Disclosure: I own shares of OMIC

Athira Pharma: Perceptive Working on a Reverse-Merger?

Athira Pharma (ATHA) ($24MM market cap) is a biotech focused on treatments to restore neuronal health and slow neurodegeneration.  On 9/3, the company announced its Phase 2/3 trial of fosgonimeton for mild-to-moderate Alzheimer's Disase did not meet its primary or secondary endpoints.  Rather than waiving the white flag and launching a strategic alternatives process, two weeks after, they announced Athira was going to focus on its earlier stage ALS treatment, ATH-1105, along with a 70% workforce reduction-in-force.

But that doesn't mean that other discussions might be happening behind the scenes, a 70% RIF is pretty large and sort of signals you're a cash shell.  Perceptive Advisors (14% owner) revised their 13D last week (thanks for the tip from a commenter), and included the line:

Consistent with their investment intent, each Reporting Person may from time to time discuss with the Issuer’s management, directors, other shareholders and others, the Issuer’s performance, business, strategic direction, capital structure, product development program, prospects and management, as well as various ways of maximizing stockholder value. Representatives of the Reporting Persons are engaged in discussions with the Issuer’s management and other third parties with respect to a potential extraordinary transaction involving the Issuer and other third parties. There is no assurance that any such transaction will develop or materialize, or if it does, as to its timing or whether the Reporting Persons will participate.

This sure sounds like Perceptive is trying to arrange a reverse merger transaction with Athira Pharma as the shell.  This idea is a little riskier, Athira hasn't declared strategic alternatives and has some pretty significant cash burn, time isn't on Perceptive's side to a get a deal done.  If we get well into 2025 and there's no deal, the cash burn might push the company to raise equity and pursue the original plan.

Here's my back of the envelope math on Athira:

The fairly small cash balance available to a reverse merger candidate could be an issue (I typically don't look at ones much smaller than this one), but as we saw with ATVE, some of these deals have been structured in a way where the reverse-merger candidate is really only interested in the public listing shell and legacy cash can be paid out as a special dividend to original shareholders.  

Disclosure: I own shares of ATHA

ESSA Pharma: Another Broken Biotech

ESSA Pharma (EPIX) ($72MM market cap) is the latest addition to the broken biotech basket.  EPIX is a clinical stage pharmaceutical company that was previously focused on developing therapies for the treatment of prostate cancer.  On Thursday (10/31/24), the company announced they were terminating all of their clinical studies and an initiating a review of strategic alternatives.

In the press release the company gave us 9/30 cash numbers:

Liquidity and Outstanding Share Capital

 

·

As of September 30, 2024, the Company had available cash reserves and short-term investments of $126.8 million and net working capital of $124.3 million (unaudited figures). The Company has no long-term debt facilities.

·

As of September 30, 2024, the Company had 44,388,551 common shares issued and outstanding, and there were 2,920,000 common shares issuable upon the exercise of prefunded warrants at an exercise price of $0.0001.

This one is fairly clean, although we don't have a severance charge estimate (the company has 50 employees), EPIX hasn't been burning much cash, only approximately $7MM a quarter prior to the termination of their R&D program.  My back of the envelope math is pretty straight forward, I'm assuming about $20MM of the expenses to wind down the company from here or get it to a place where a reverse merger can be done, feel free to make your own assumptions.

My liquidation value is about 40% higher than where shares traded Friday following the news.

Disclosure: I own shares of EPIX

HomeStreet: Likely Deal Break w/ FSUN

Unfortunately, this year I'm getting crushed in a game of Battleship, every speculative merger or in this case announced merger gets blown up (TH & BOOM being the other recent ones).  An astute commenter on my original HomeStreet (HMST) post noticed that FirstSun Capital Bancorp (FSUN) left out any mention of their pending acquisition of HomeStreet in their Q3 earnings release that came out on Monday (10/28) as an ominous sign.  After the market closed on Tuesday (10/29), the two banks jointly announced the deal as-is will be rejected by FSUN's regulators:

DENVER & SEATTLE--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- FirstSun Capital Bancorp (FSUN) (“FirstSun”) and HomeStreet, Inc. (HMST) (“HomeStreet”) announced that, based on discussions FirstSun and its subsidiary, Sunflower Bank, N.A. (“Sunflower”) have had with the Federal Reserve and the Texas Department of Banking, that regulatory approvals necessary for the mergers with HomeStreet and its subsidiary, HomeStreet Bank to proceed have not been obtained and FirstSun and Sunflower have been asked to withdraw their merger applications. FirstSun and HomeStreet are discussing the pursuit of an alternative regulatory structure for the merger. The parties are also discussing terms on which they would terminate the merger agreement if no alternative structure is feasible. There can be no assurance that an alternative regulatory structure may ultimately be feasible.

Rewinding time six months, following Q1 earnings, the two re-traded their merger agreement due to HomeStreet not adequately hedging their loan book as interest rate expectations coming into the year were for many Fed Funds rate cuts, but those expectations were scaled back significantly.  In that revised deal, FSUN also disclosed they were changing the charter structure of the primary bank subsidiary, Sunflower Bank, to a Texas state chartered bank that would be regulated by the Texas Department of Bank versus the OCC. 

Presumably the motivation behind the change was to get easier treatment after the OCC was embarrassed following the failure of New York Community Bank (NYCB) this past spring due to their significant rent-controlled NY multifamily exposure that had fallen in value (HMST has a large Class B/C multifamily loan book in Los Angeles County).

In FSUN's own words:

Neal E. Arnold FirstSun Capital Bancorp – CEO, President, COO & Director

"Let me also briefly explain the regulatory shift for us. We will remain a Fed-regulated bank holding company as previous. However, we've also decided to proceed with an application to have the pro forma bank also be primarily regulated by the Federal Reserve and the state of Texas Department of Banking.

After discussion with our respective Boards, we decided this is a better long-term path for the combined organization. We believe the Fed and the state of Texas have a firm understanding of our business and the nature of our CRE risks.

In our discussions with the OCC in Washington, it became obvious that we would not gain near-term approval given their recent experience with multifamily and CRE positions. We believe their position also resided in the fact that they were not the primary regulator for HomeStreet. The Fed is taking a very different approach, in part due to the changes we have made through the transaction. Our belief is that CRE is not the same across all categories and all geographies. And it's particularly distinguished when comparing West Coast multifamily and East Coast, New York multifamily. We've had a significant interaction with the state of Texas and the Fed, and we believe there's a pathway for this merger application to be approved."

Following this news, HomeStreet stock is down by a 1/3rd today to $9.30 per share.  To be clear, HomeStreet is still a mess, the bank is zombie that is just treading water with minimal net interest margin that is fully eaten up by their non-interest expense.  However, the loan and securities book seems to be at least credit-good, they've had minimal losses and FSUN along with their advisors have had a few different looks at it and have agreed (from the 5/1 call) :

Robert A. Cafera FirstSun Capital Bancorp – Executive VP & CFO

"So Matt, thank you for the questions. And yes, we are reaffirming the credit mark here. We actually had an outside firm assist us independent third-party review the portfolio at HomeStreet, and actually a sizable percentage of the portfolio, 75-plus percent there. And we would echo, market had made some comments on the underwriting of the HomeStreet portfolio. We would echo those comments relative to everything that we found through the process, both upfront and post announcement in terms of the strength of the underwriting on the portfolio here.

So we remain encouraged by the performance here. And as a matter of process on the underwriting side at HomeStreet practices, there is sensitivity analysis. We actually utilized our independent third-party to revalidate the sensitivity analysis side of what the credits would look like in the current rising interest rate environment. And all that led us to the same conclusion on credit mark."

And in HomeStreet's most recent earnings release:

"In the third quarter our ratio of nonaccrual assets to total assets and our total loan delinquencies remained low at 0.47% and 0.69%, respectively. Our credit quality remains strong and we have not identified any potentially significant credit issues in our loan portfolio.”

And previously in the merger break press release:

“We are disappointed that the regulators are unwilling to grant the regulatory approvals necessary for the merger to proceed,” stated Mark Mason, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer of HomeStreet. “Importantly, HomeStreet has been advised by its regulators that there were no regulatory concerns specifically related to HomeStreet that would have prevented approval of the merger.”

So while the rate environment hasn't been kind to these loans, it doesn't appear on the face they're in any real trouble of permanent losses as long as HomeStreet is able to hold.  The multifamily loans have an approximate 2.5 year duration, some are reaching their pricing date, its not a super long duration portfolio that will leave them stuck for years.  In a slide deck, HMST provided the below update:

They've got a plan to sell some MF loans, hopefully prove out the marks, and the last bullet makes it fairly clear they'd be open to another M&A transaction.  I still think it makes an attractive acquisition target as they're in attractive retail/deposit markets and an acquirer could buy HMST at a significant discount to tangible book and enjoy that accretion over time as loans mature.

Other thoughts:

• HMST puts out an "estimated tangible fair value per share" metric that attempts to fair value the loans and their debt (I might exclude the debt) to give a more mark-to-market look at book, it was $18.52 at 9/30, or about 2x the current share price.  GAAP tangible book value is $28.13 per share.
• Mark Mason is still in charge, he's a controversial banking figure for good reason, so that adds some hair to situation, his capital allocation skills are bluntly terrible.  In reading the deal proxy, it also appears that an ongoing role for him was an important consideration.
• Presumably, activist Blue Lion Capital (1.3% owner) is still around, they've been vocal about the deal, especially around change of control payments to Mark Mason.
• FSUN did raise capital already to make the deal work, points to their commitment to make the deal work, I wouldn't fully count out another recut transaction that would be at a nice premium to today's share price.
• In the original strategic alternatives process, HomeStreet did receive two other legitimate offers that made to the final round of bidding, one for $15.19 per share in cash and the other for $13.50 per share in cash.  Again, validating the idea that others have due diligenced this portfolio and that there should be buyers for HomeStreet if the deal with FSUN expires in mid-January without a newly structured deal.

While HomeStreet is certainly a far lower quality bank than First Horizon (FHN), the situation rhymes a bit in that regulators are blocking the deal for reasons largely outside of the target's control, as a result, the stock is forced sold by arbitragers possibly creating an opportunity to pick up shares on the cheap.  I bought a few more shares today.  But full warning, this is much riskier than FHN.

Disclosure: I own shares of HMST (also short some Nov $15 calls I wrote a few months back)

Aerovate Therapeutics: Broken Biotech, Shell Company? Potential Liquidation

I'm a little late posting this one, but as mentioned in the comment section of my Mid-Year update, I did add Aerovate Therapeutics (AVTE) ($55MM market cap) to my broken biotech basket.  Back in June, Aerovate, a one-shot-on-goal biotech, announced poor topline results from the Phase 2b portion of their AV-101 study for the treatment of pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH).  A few weeks later, the company announced they were laying off 78% of their staff, costing them $5.6MM, $3MM of which will hit in Q3 and Q4.  Then another week later, AVTE officially announced they were exploring strategic alternatives:

Aerovate has engaged Wedbush PacGrow as the company’s exclusive strategic financial advisor to assist in the process of exploring strategic alternatives, which may include but are not limited to, an acquisition, merger, reverse merger, business combination, liquidation or other transaction.

Notably, they listed a liquidation as a possible outcome, generally we don't see a liquidation called out in the initial strategic alternatives announcement.  One reason might be they don't have any other product candidates, from their latest 10-Q:  

Overview

We are a biopharmaceutical company. Our initial focus was on advancing AV 101, our dry powder inhaled formulation of imatinib for the treatment of pulmonary arterial hypertension, or PAH, a devastating disease impacting approximately 70,000 people in the United States and Europe. On June 17, 2024, we announced topline results from the Phase 2b portion of our Phase 2b/Phase 3 Inhaled Imatinib Pulmonary Arterial Hypertension Clinical Trial of AV-101, or IMPAHCT. Topline data showed that, while AV-101 was generally well tolerated across all dose groups, the study did not meet its primary endpoint for improvement in pulmonary vascular resistance compared to placebo for any of the studied doses or show meaningful improvements in the secondary endpoint of change in six minute walk distance. We also reviewed data from several additional secondary endpoints of the Phase 2b portion of IMPAHCT, which also failed to show meaningful improvements. Based upon these results and in agreement with the independent study advisory committee, we halted enrollment and shut down the Phase 3 portion of IMPAHCT as well as the long-term extension study. AV-101 for the treatment of PAH was our only product candidate in development. At this time, we do not intend to resume development of AV-101 or any other product candidates. In July 2024, we announced the decision to conduct a comprehensive review of strategic alternatives focused on maximizing shareholder value. We also engaged Wedbush Securities Inc. (Wedbush PacGrow) as our exclusive strategic financial advisor to assist in the process of exploring strategic alternatives, which may include but are not limited to, an acquisition, merger, reverse merger, business combination, liquidation or other transaction.

I'm still trying to get my arms around how the new SEC shell company rule is going to play out after going effective July 1, 2024, but it appears that these one-shot-on-goal type biotechnology companies, like AVTE, without other assets might fall into the shell company bucket and could be pushed towards a liquidation as a result.  Others that are continuing development at the same time as pursuing strategic alternatives might make for better reverse merger candidates, which have generally worked out well this year.  But I'm not a lawyer, and thus not entirely sure if this new rule means much to this part of the market since biotechs generally don't make outlandish SPAC-like revenue projections regulators are trying to stamp out.  If others have more intelligent thoughts, as usual please share.

My back of envelope liquidation math:

AVTE is pretty clean, there are minimal dilutive securities outstanding, minimal operating lease remaining and likely the IP value is worthless.  I still struggle a bit with estimating wind down expenses, feel free to use your own estimate, but at today's price, AVTE seems to be relatively cheap compared to my estimate of liquidation value.

If they do go the reverse merger route, there's some nice option value, interestingly RA Capital owns ~32% of AVTE and engineered a successful reverse merger at ELYM with Tenet Medicines that's seen the stock go up almost 200% since that deal was announced in April.

Disclosure: I own shares of AVTE 

Howard Hughes: PSH Considering a Take-Private Offer

Just a brief news post, I'll use the comment section to update my thoughts as this situation develops.  Last night, 8/6, Pershing Square (37.5% owner) updated their 13D in Howard Hughes (HHH) ($3.2B market cap) disclosing the following change:

“The Reporting Persons are and intend to continue evaluating the possibility of various potential alternatives with respect to their investment in the Issuer, including a possible transaction in which the Reporting Persons and/or one or more of their affiliates (either alone or together with one or more potential co-investors) may acquire all or substantially all of the shares of Common Stock in the Issuer not owned by them and their affiliates and in connection therewith take the Issuer private (a “take-private”). Jefferies LLC began advising the Reporting Persons on August 6, 2024 in connection with this evaluation. The Reporting Persons may discuss their evaluation and the potential alternatives, including a potential take-private, with one or more prospective co-investors, which discussions are expected to be conducted on a confidential basis. In the event the Reporting Persons explore such a potential transaction, there can be no guarantee that an agreement regarding such potential transaction can be reached and/or consummated.

I find the timing rather odd so soon after the spinoff of Seaport Entertainment (SEG), the spinoff was designed to remove some of the complexity and cash burning assets from Howard Hughes, return it to a pure play master planned community developer story.  In theory, HHH then might re-rate closer to its NAV of $100+.  If the plan all along was really to dump Seaport Entertainment, come in to scoop up HHH on the cheap, why is Pershing Square backstopping the SEG rights offering?  Just strange to spend $30 million in cash expense to spin SEG, backstop SEG, and then take HHH private so soon after.  Should have just bought it before the spin and save the legal bills.

Possibly this is the result of Ackman pulling the IPO of his closed end fund after selling a stake in his GP raising expectations for growth, he could need an investment vehicle or non-securities assets to redomicile Pershing Square Holdings Ltd to the United States and avoid being under the 1940 Act.

As for the potential price or structure, I'm prepared to be disappointed, NAV is likely well over $100 per share, but is unlikely to be realized in a transaction.  As a reminder for those newer to the company, back in 2019, Howard Hughes did run a full strategic process that failed to produce a buyer willing to pay the asking price.  Have things changed much since?  Brookfield (who notoriously don't pay fair value) was involved in the GGP restructuring and was an HHC shareholder for a while, but otherwise, Pershing Square might be the only buyer so I'm not getting my hopes up for a large premium.  The language in the 13D suggests a cash offer to go-private, that's preferable in mind than some convoluted structure where Howard Hughes shareholders trade discounted HHH shares for discounted PSHZF in some share-for-share merger.

Disclosure: I own shares of HHH and SEG 

HilleVax: Failed Vaccine Trial, Pre-SA, Trading Below Cash

HilleVax (HLVX) (~$85MM market cap) is a clinical-stage biotech that focuses on developing vaccines, their initial focus has been on a vaccine (HIL-214) designed to treat severe acute gastroenteritis events in infants.  On Monday, the stock crashed below cash as HilleVax announced their HIL-214 trial did not meet its primary endpoint and showed no clinical benefit observed across secondary endpoints.  Unfortunately, little other disclosures were made; there was no announcement of seeking strategic alternatives, no workforce reduction and no estimate of current cash.  The only mention of a go forward strategy was the line:

The Company plans to discontinue further development of HIL-214 in infants and is exploring the potential for continued development of HIL-214 and HIL-216, HilleVax’s Phase 1 ready vaccine candidate, in adults.

The piece about continuing to explore the potential development of HIL-216 is slightly concerning as broken biotechnology companies go.  HIL-214 (the failed vaccine) was licensed from Takeda (which owns 14% of HLVX), HIL-216 was a separate licensing agreement with a Chinese pharmaceutical company, Kangh, and thus management might make the argument the HIL-214 failure shouldn't cloud the potential for HIL-214.  However, as we've seen with many others, often the board along with their advisors determine that the cost of capital is too high to continue on their own and they'll likely decide to pursue strategic alternatives.

Running through my typical back of the envelope liquidation math:

HilleVax does have an ATM in place they leaned on pretty heavily in Q1 to raise approximately $15MM, if they continued into Q2 (which you can tell they did a bit based on the change in share count from 3/31 to 5/6 when the last 10-Q was published) it would only add upside to the math.  The risk is really in the burn rate going forward from here (also note, my Q2 number above is an estimate based on Q1) since we don't have any indication from management on their plan, my $50MM in a total guess but using some experience from the last dozen or so of these, hopefully it is directionally correct.

There could be two catalysts here, one on the announcement of strategic alternatives and another on the ultimate conclusion, but HLVX is a bit riskier than others that are further along in their wind down process.

Disclosure: I own shares of HLVX

Mid Year 2024 Portfolio Review

** Note, I'm a little late in posting my mid-year review as I was unplugged a bit for the last couple weeks.  Back dating the post to its usual spot.**  

My blog portfolio is essentially flat year-to-date with a gain of 2.99%, well behind the S&P 500 with a gain of 15.29%.  The broken biotech basket performed well but was generally offset by declines in a lot of my legacy holdings and just malaise in my speculative M&A ideas (crossing my fingers that M&A picks up in the second half).  Long term performance remains solid at a 21.75% pre-tax IRR.

Closed Positions:

• Quite a bit of churn happened in the broken biotech basket, I sold Eliem Therapeutics (ELYM), Homology Medicines (FIXX), Graphite Bio (GRPH), Kinnate Biopharma (KNTE), Reneo Pharmaceuticals (RPHM), Cyteir Therapeutics (CYT), AVROBIO (AVRO) and Theseus Pharmaceuticals (THRX) as each of these had some sort of buyout or reverse merger transaction.  If there was a CVR component, I held through the merger and sold shortly after.  Some of these rallied significantly post reverse merger, but in attempt to stick to the original thesis, I generally sold after the shareholder base turned over a bit.
• I got spooked out of both Instil Bio (TIL) and Aclaris Therapeutics (ACRS) -- although I made a nice profit on ACRS -- as both management teams don't appear to be following the reverse merger and/or buyout with a CVR strategy.  Instil Bio has yet to sell their new manufacturing facility and I don't have confidence in the property valuation, plus TIL included the line of their intention of "Exploring opportunities to in-license/acquire and develop novel therapeutic candidates in diseases with significant unmet medical need."  Aclaris announced alongside their Q1 results "we have decided to progress ATI-2138 into a proof-of-concept Phase 2a trial in patients with moderate to severe atopic dermatitis", however this one might be worth looking at as BML Capital Management has accumulated a significant stake and could push ACRS to revisit their go-forward strategy.
• Sio Gene Therapies (SIOX) made their liquidating distribution and is now pushed into the non-traded bucket.  Similarly, Merrimack Pharmaceuticals (MACK) made its liquidating distribution, the remaining penny or two is now in a non-traded liquidating trust.
• Pieris Pharmaceuticals (PIRS) announced they are pursuing a similar strategy as MACK did, minimizing corporate expenses in an effort to extend their cash runway long enough to capture any milestone payments among their disparate portfolio of development partnerships.  I sold to capture a tax loss, but will continue to monitor this one for a re-entry, if any of their milestones do hit, the return could be a multiple of the current market cap.
• MariaDB (MRDB) and Asensus Surgical (ASXC) were similar situations, cash burning companies with potentially valuable IP that was subject to a non-binding tender offer, if the tender fell through, both could be worthless.  Luckily for me, both deals went to a definitive agreement and I sold each as the spread tightened to a normal range.
• First Horizon (FHN) was added shortly after their transaction with TD Bank broke in middle of the short lived bank crisis last year, this spring FHN passed over the long-term capital gains mark for me and I booked the profit.  I could see FHN being an acquisition target for one of the super regional banks trying to use an acquisition as a springboard into a higher regulatory tier category.
• I should probably leave the traditional merger arbitrage trades to the experts, I exited Spirit Airlines (SAVE) after the judged ruled against the merger on anti-trust grounds, Albertsons (ACI) hasn't gone to court yet, but under the current administration, likely faces a similar result.  Unlike Spirit, Albertsons is cheap on a standalone basis and their PE sponsor Cerberus is likely to seek liquidity in other ways if their merger with Kroger (KR) fails.
• NexPoint Diversified Real Estate Trust (NXDT) and Transcontinental Realty Investors (TCI) both fall into a similar bucket for me, real estate companies trading at very wide discounts to their NAV, but with management in no hurry to close those gaps (or simply unable to in the current interest rate regime / real estate market).  NXDT has seen some recent insider buying that improves the story, but it has been several years since the old closed end fund converted to a REIT and little has been done to simplify the portfolio or tell the story.

Previously Undisclosed Positions:

• I've initiated a small position in DMC Global (BOOM) which owns three separate and distinct industrial businesses.  The company has announced a strategic review to sell two of the three businesses, leaving behind a multi-family residential building products business (Arcadia).  I didn't buy earlier in the story because it is unclear to me why Arcadia is chosen one to remain in the public shell, but the situation changed when Steel Partners (savvy, NOL maximizing conglomerate) lobbed in a $16.50/share offer (shares currently trade sub $14).  BOOM has acknowledged the offer and stated they'll consider it as part of their greater strategic alternatives process.

Current Portfolio:

I will be doing some reshuffling of my personal balance sheet, likely withdrawing cash from this account in the near future so keep that in mind when I post the year end results.

Since this is a pretty brief update, thought I'd include my current watchlist with a little blurb on each, as always, feel free to share any ideas or provide any pushback.

Disclosure: Table above is my taxable account/blog portfolio, I don't manage outside money and this is only a portion of my overall assets. As a result, the use of margin debt, options or concentration does not fully represent my risk tolerance.

Vanda Pharmaceuticals: 2 Bidders, Entrenched Management, Upcoming Business Catalysts

Vanda Pharmaceuticals (VNDA) (~$365MM market cap) is a biopharma company with a number of drugs either already being commercialized, on the cusp of commercialization or in late stage trials.  I have no idea if any of these are valuable franchises (as always, if you have any insights, please share them):

• Hetlioz -- commercial treatment for the treatment of Non-24-Hour Sleep-Wake Disorder in the U.S., it is facing generic competition as of December 2022 and has a few legal battles in its attempt to get additional approved indications
• Fanapt -- recently approved for biopolar disorder, launching commercialization in Q3 2024
• Ponvory -- recently acquired from Johnson & Johnson (this came from Actelion Pharmaceuticals) for $100MM, treatment for multiple sclerosis, launching commercialization in Q3 2024
• Tradipitant -- treatment for gastroparesis, PDUFA date set for 9/18/24
• Misaperidone -- treatment for schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, new drug application expected to be submitted in early 2025

On top of that grab bag of drugs (to my untrained eye, they don't appear to have a coherent strategy), Vanda has approximately $5.40/share of net cash and marketable securities on the balance sheet after subtracting out all liabilities (shares currently trade under $6/share).  Where things get a bit interesting, Vanda has received two unsolicited bids from potential buyers, both of which have received the cold shoulder from the board, as a result the buyers went public trying to get shareholders to exert pressure:

5/7/2024: Vanda Pharmaceuticals Confirms Receipt of Revised Unsolicited Takeover Proposal from Future Pak -- offer was for $7.25-$7.75 in cash per share, plus a CVR.  Future Pak seems like an odd buyer as the company is a privately held pharma contract manufacturer and packaging business that has the financial backing of private credit provider Colbeck Capital Management.  The board rejected the proposal:

Vanda Pharmaceuticals Inc. (Vanda) (Nasdaq: VNDA) today announced that the Company’s Board of Directors (the “Board”) carefully reviewed the revised unsolicited proposal from Future Pak, LLC (“FP”) to acquire the Company for $7.25 to $7.75 per share in cash plus certain Contingent Value Rights (“CVRs”) and, after having consulted with the Company’s independent financial and legal advisors, unanimously concluded that the proposal substantially undervalues the Company, creates significant risk and uncertainty and is not in the best interests of the Company and its shareholders. Accordingly, the Board has rejected the proposal.

In reaching its conclusion, the Board evaluated all aspects of Vanda’s business, including its clinical development pipeline, expanding commercial presence and significant cash balance, as well as the speculative nature of the CVRs given the uncertainty surrounding the achievement of the commercial milestones under FP’s management. The Board believes the revised unsolicited proposal is yet another opportunistic attempt to purchase the Company’s shares at a discount to Vanda’s intrinsic value.

The Board and management team remain confident that Vanda’s robust revenue, strong cash position and efficient operations position the Company well for significant long-term growth and value creation far in excess of the consideration offered by FP.

6/6/2024: Vanda Pharmaceuticals Confirms Receipt of Unsolicited, Non-Binding Indication of Interest from Cycle Group Holdings -- offer is for $8 in cash per share with no CVR component.  Cycle seems a little more credible than Future Pak, they have a few commercial drugs in the market already, in their press release, they included the following explanation for making their bid public:

Cycle issued the following statement regarding its proposal:

“Our proposal for Vanda delivers immediate, compelling and certain cash value for Vanda shareholders with a highly attractive premium. Cycle’s proposal represents a better outcome for shareholders, who would receive all-cash upfront value exceeding that of Future Pak’s cash portion of its latest offer announced May 7, 2024. It would also benefit patients, as Cycle has a proven commercial strategy in the U.S., a strong distribution footprint and an established track record of delivering medicines and individualized support to patients suffering from conditions with high unmet medical need.

While we would have preferred to reach an agreement privately, Cycle is publicly disclosing our proposal for the benefit of Vanda shareholders and to encourage Vanda shareholders to express their views on this proposal to the independent directors of the Vanda Board of Directors.

Given our familiarity with Vanda, its brands and our extensive knowledge of the industry, we believe we can efficiently and quickly complete our diligence. Once we receive access to the required information, we believe that we can complete our due diligence within 2-3 weeks and reach a definitive agreement shortly thereafter.

We stand ready to work immediately with Vanda’s Board and management team to reach an agreement that would provide a compelling premium and certain cash value today for all Vanda shareholders.”

Vanda has acknowledged receipt of the offer, but as of this writing haven't rejected it yet.

Why isn't the board engaging?  Management seems very entrenched here, the co-founder (Mihael Polymeropoulos) is the CEO and Chairman of the Board.  He employs a number of family members at Vanda and does own 3+% of the stock.  Given the near term regulatory catalysts, it could be argued that these are opportunistic bids, but if they run a full a process, maybe they can get an even higher number or Polymeropoulos could partner with a firm that would back a bid for him to take it private.  I've sized this relatively small, it could be more attractive at a higher price if VNDA's board does the right thing and engages with the bidders.

Disclosure: I own shares of VNDA

Ikena Oncology: 50% RIF, Trading Below Cash, Strategic Alternatives

The broken biotech basket has been emptying out lately, but the latest addition is Ikena Oncology (IKNA) (~$75MM market cap), a clinical stage biotechnology targeting cancer therapies, that announced yesterday they are shuttering development on their most advanced therapy candidate, IK-930, reducing their workforce by 53% (they previously did a 35% layoff in January) and will pursue strategic alternatives.  Notably this isn't a full stop of development, Ikena does have another asset (IK-595) that dosed its first Phase 1 patient in December 2023.  But Ikena does a nice job of itemizing their operating expenses in their 10-Q, making estimating future cash burn slightly easier.

Below is my quick back of envelope liquidation analysis:

The process for these situations is a well worn road at this point, others have also pointed to the new cash shell rules regarding reverse mergers going into effect July 1st could act as a catalyst; I don't think this process will take terribly long.

Some items to note here:

• OrbiMed is the largest shareholder with approximately 23% of the shares.  Recent similar situations, KNTE and THRX, also featured OrbiMed near the top of shareholder registry, both produced good results with cash plus CVR buyouts.
• Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMY) previously had a collaboration agreement with Ikena for IK-175 and IK-412, they declined to go forward with development, but IKNA is looking to sell or out-license these.  Probably minimal value, but could add a few cents per share in upside.
• Ikena Oncology has been quick to already sublease space and sell lab equipment, neither for significant sums, but shows some shareholder friendliness in moving quickly to a shoestring operation to preserve value.

Disclosure: I own shares of IKNA

Seaport Entertainment: Initial Form 10 Thoughts, Spinoff, Rights Offering

The first public draft of the Seaport Form 10-12 came out on Friday, I took a quick read of it, here are some initial thoughts that I'll likely come back to as the spinoff approaches sometime in Q3.  Howard Hughes Holdings (HHH) is going to be spinning four main assets into the newly created Seaport Entertainment (SEG) that will focus on "intersection of entertainment and real estate":

1. The Seaport District in Lower Manhattan, which includes the South Street Seaport itself, some neighboring buildings and the 250 Water St development site (which HHH/SEG recently won a lawsuit that sets the stage for construction), all of which Howard Hughes has sunk over $1B into over the last decade and is still bleeding cash (-$55MM in 2023).  Thus far, the Seaport has been a disaster (HHH took a $672.5MM impairment on the Seaport last year) and waste of capital, the project was started a year or two after Super Storm Sandy destroyed much of the old structure in 2012 and was underwritten at a 4-6% return on cost.  The development had many delays and hasn't come close to the original profitability projections a decade or so later, as a long term HHH shareholder, I blame the Seaport for much of the underperformance over the last 5-7 years (alongside the Ackman covid capital raise).  Maybe focused management can turn this around?  There are a total of 11 physical buildings at the Seaport, as a whole it is about 2/3rd's leased at this point.
2. 25% interest in Jean-Georges Restaurants that was acquired for $45MM (potentially an Ackman vanity investment) with the stated strategy to partner with Jean-George in the future as an anchor tenant in new developments (Jean-Georges leases the entire Tin Building in a JV with SEG for a food hall concept).  This investment reminds me of MSGE/Sphere's investment in TAO Group where they argued TAO's nightclub expertise could be used at the Sphere and other entertainment venues, TAO was eventually divested.  The Jean-Georges investment feels very non-core and could be sold to raise capital for their two big development projects (250 Water St and Fashion Show Air Rights).
3. The Las Vegas Aviators (highest revenue grossing minor league team), the Oakland A's AAA affiliate, and the corresponding newish Las Vegas Ballpark located in Howard Hughes' Summerlin master planned community.  The A's are moving to the Las Vegas strip (where the old Tropicana was located) in a couple years, the current plan is to keep the Aviators in Summerlin, but TBD on how that impacts attendance/revenue.  HHH did pay $16.4MM for the remaining 50% of the Aviators they didn't own in 2017 and the ballpark cost approximately $125MM in 2019.
4. 80% interest in the air rights above the Fashion Show Mall on the Las Vegas strip, which is located on the north end of the strip near Treasure Island and the Wynn hotels.  Howard Hughes has brought in Anton Nikodemus as the CEO of Seaport, his previous stop was as the President/COO of MGM's City Center in Las Vegas and before that he led the development of MGM's National Harbor and Springfield, MA casinos.  I go annually to a conference in the City Center and have visited the National Harbor property, both are impressive gaming resorts that are well run.  The Fashion Show Mall and the other 20% of the air rights are owned/operated by Brookfield Properties (which acquired General Growth Properties (GGP), the original parent of Howard Hughes).  There's been a significant increase in supply on the north end of the Las Vegas strip in the past year with the opening of Resorts World and the Fontainebleau (both of which post-opening are relative ghost towns).  But with Nikodemus onboard, it clearly signals that they intend to redevelop the Fashion Show Mall in the medium-to-long term.

Each of these are a bit difficult to value and don't quite fit into a typical public real estate company (although HHH/HHC will still be a bit of an odd ball public stock following the spin, it helps on the margins).  My question prior to the Form 10-12 release was how this company would be capitalized given it loses money and likely will for the near future, plus the plan is clearly to sink money into their development assets, that question was answered with disclosure that Seaport intends to conduct a $175MM rights offering with Ackman's Pershing Square backing it up plus cash from HHC, giving SEG roughly ~$200MM in cash at closing:

Seaport Entertainment expects to conduct a $175 million Rights Offering of equity to our stockholders following the distribution. In connection with the Rights Offering, the Company is in serious discussions with Pershing Square Capital Management, L.P. (“Pershing Square”), which through investment funds advised by it is HHH’s largest shareholder, regarding a potential backstop agreement which would be entered into prior to the distribution. Pursuant to that agreement, if finalized, Pershing Square would agree to (i) exercise its pro rata subscription right with respect to the Rights Offering at a price of $100 per share of our common stock and (ii) purchase any shares not purchased upon the expiration of the Rights Offering at the Rights Offering price, up to $175 million in the aggregate. The backstop agreement could result in Pershing Square’s affiliated funds owning as much as       % of our common stock if no other stockholders participate in the Rights Offering. Any capital raised through the Rights Offering would further strengthen our balance sheet. With over $      million of liquidity, primarily consisting of (i) $23.4 million of cash contributed by HHH pursuant to the Separation Agreement, (ii) expected proceeds from the anticipated Rights Offering and (iii) amounts available under the Revolving Credit Agreement (as defined herein), we believe we will have ample capital to invest in and drive internal and external growth opportunities in the leisure, tourism, hospitality, gaming, food and beverage and live entertainment spaces.

Rights offerings can often be juicy special situations (is this a Greenblatt special, spin + rights offering?), they come around rarely, but often signal an opportunity because the company is offering all shareholders the opportunity re-up often at a discount.  

Ackman clearly wants more exposure to SEG, by backstopping the rights offering where it'll likely not be fully subscribed, he's increasing his exposure in more shareholder friendly way than he did with Howard Hughes during covid with a private placement that minority shareholders couldn't participate.  His interest in Seaport Entertainment is a bit puzzling to me, Ackman tends to like higher quality companies, something SEG is not.  New York real estate plays have always been challenging to me, especially ones that rely on development, 250 Water St will take several years to build (with original cost estimates of $850MM in 2021, likely higher now) and who knows what the apartment and office leasing environment will be at that point.  Add that with the underwritten low cap rates, the margin of safety in NY development seems extra slim.  It is also worth noting that Ackman has left the board of HHH, this is after he was famously on the cover of Forbes as Baby Buffett for his role in Howard Hughes.  I've seen some speculation that it clears the path for Ackman to make a bid for HHH, unlikely, but who knows.

The Seaport spin is going to be a challenge to value, can't really do a cap rate based SOTP.  HHH trades for 1.1x book value at this point (despite holding a lot of land/buildings at historical cost), HHH is the higher quality asset, guessing Seaport will trade at a discount to book.

We don't know the spin ratio yet, but at 80% of book, Seaport is roughly worth ~$6-7 per HHH share prior to the rights offering, or about 10% of the HHH market cap.  That likely means we see forced selling, could be an interesting one to keep on the watchlist.

Disclosure: I own shares of HHH (fka HHC)

Inhibrx Inc: Cash Buyout + SpinCo (Inhibrx Biosciences) and CVR

Inhibrx Inc (INBX) (~$1.8B market cap) is a clinical stage biotech that announced the sale of their most advanced therapy, INBRX-101 (a treatment for patients with alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency or "AATD"), in January to Sanofi (SNY) for $30/share in cash, plus 92% ownership in the remaining development pipeline via a taxable spin of NewCo Inhibrx Biosciences (SNY to retain the other 8%) and a $5/share CVR that pays out if INBRX-101 receives final FDA approval prior to 6/30/2027.  INBX shares trade for $34.20 today -- all approvals have been received and the merger will close 5/30/24.

The advantage of this structure is Inhibrx won't pay corporate taxes on the sale of INBRX-101, but shareholders will still pay taxes based on their tax basis, avoiding the double tax if Inhibrx had simply sold INBRX-101 and continued on in the same corporate structure.  We've seen similar deals with Pfizer/Biohaven (they even mention in the proxy wanting to do a "Biohaven-like structure")  and a little further back, JNJ/Actelion/Idorsia, where both SpinCos performed well initially post deal completion.

My thinking around this transaction is pretty straight forward, because the $30/share makes up a vast majority of the consideration here, the merger/stub securities are likely undervalued, although it is hard to size this up enough to create a meaningful position (INBX isn't marginable at my broker for some reason).  For the SOTP, I'm going to lean on the proxy statement as I don't have an informed view on the science other than this team already developed one valuable asset in INBRX-101.

The CVR is fairly simple, there's only one milestone, that's FDA approval of INBRX-101 for AATD:

At or prior to the Effective Time, pursuant to the Merger Agreement, Parent will enter into a Contingent Value Rights Agreement between Parent and Continental Stock Transfer & Trust Company (the “Rights Agent”), in substantially the form attached to the Merger Agreement (the “CVR Agreement”). Each CVR will represent the right to receive a contingent payment of $5.00 in cash, without interest, payable to the Rights Agent for the benefit of the holders of CVRs, if the following milestone is achieved:

•

The final approval by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (“FDA”), on or prior to June 30, 2027, of the new drug application or supplemental new drug application filed with the FDA pursuant to Section 351 of the Public Health Service Act and 21 CFR §§ 600 et seq. (for clarity, including accelerated approval) that is necessary for the commercial marketing and sale of the Company’s precisely engineered recombinant human AAT-Fc fusion protein, also known as INBRX-101 in the United States of America for the treatment of patients with AATD and clinical evidence of emphysema following the clinical trial with identifier INBRX101-01-201, entitled “A Phase 2, Double-Blind, Randomized, Active-Control, Parallel Group Study to Assess the Pharmacokinetics, Pharmacodynamics, Immunogenicity, and Safety of INBRX-101 Compared to Plasma Derived Alpha-1 Proteinase Inhibitor (A1PI) Augmentation Therapy in Adults with Alpha-1 Antitrypsin Deficiency Emphysema,” regardless of any obligation to conduct any post-marketing or confirmatory study (which we refer to as the “Milestone”).

For the CVR valuation, Centerview (INBX's advisor) put the NPV at $2.05/share using a 60% success rate, which the company provided (management took down the success rate from 90%, citing a less advantageous regulatory environment and potential success of similar products):

Contingent Value Right Analysis

For analytical purposes, assuming a 60% probability CVR holders receive an aggregate payment of $5.00 per CVR upon the achievement of the Milestone based on the probability of success as estimated by Company management in, and the estimated timing of achievement of the Milestone under the CVR Agreement implied by, the Management Forecasts, as described under the section entitled, “The Transactions — Certain Financial Projections” and further assuming a discount rate of 13.5%, the midpoint of a range of discount rates from 12.5% to 14.5%, based on Centerview’s analysis of the Company’s weighted average cost of capital, Centerview calculated an illustrative net present value for one (1) CVR of $2.05.

Inhibrx Biosciences (SpinCo) is a little more complicated, SNY is going to seed the company with $200MM of cash, which is expected to get them about a year of cash runway.  The spin ratio is 0.25 shares of SpinCo for each share of INBX.  The spinoff will have INBX's remaining development assets, which includes two oncology therapies currently in clinical studies with data readouts within the next 12 months:​

•

INBRX-106 is a hexavalent product candidate agonist of OX40. OX40 is a co-stimulatory receptor expressed on immune cells that is enriched in the tumor microenvironment. OX40 ligand is a trimeric protein that activates OX40 signaling through clustering.

​

•

INBRX-109 is a precision-engineered, tetravalent death receptor 5 (DR5) agonist antibody designed to exploit the tumor-biased cell death induced by DR5 activation.

INBRX-109 (which has both fast track and orphan designations) is farther along, it is currently in a registration enabling Phase 2 trial for the treatment of chondrosarcoma (an aggressive type of bone cancer where most patients do not respond well to current therapies) with data expected in the first half of 2025.  INBRX-106 is in a Phase 1/2 study testing it in combination with Keytruda, initial data is expected towards the end of 2024. Again, leaning on Centerview's analysis:

SpinCo Discounted Cash Flow Analysis

Centerview performed a discounted cash flow analysis of SpinCo based on the Management Forecasts. A discounted cash flow analysis is a traditional valuation methodology used to derive a valuation of an asset or set of assets by calculating the “present value” of estimated future cash flows of the asset or set of assets. “Present value” refers to the current value of future cash flows or amounts and is obtained by discounting those future cash flows or amounts by a discount rate that takes into account macroeconomic assumptions and estimates of risk, the opportunity cost of capital, expected returns and other appropriate factors.

For purposes of the analysis of the net present value of the future cash flows of SpinCo, Centerview calculated a range of equity values for 0.25 of a share of SpinCo common stock by (a) discounting to present value as of June 30, 2024 using discount rates ranging from 14.0% to 16.0% (reflecting analysis of SpinCo’s expected weighted average cost of capital) and using a mid-year convention: (i) the forecasted risk-adjusted, after-tax unlevered free cash flows of SpinCo over the period beginning on June 30, 2024 and ending on December 31, 2043, utilized by Centerview based on the Management Forecasts, (ii) an implied terminal value of SpinCo, calculated by Centerview by assuming that unlevered free cash flows would decline in perpetuity after December 31, 2043 at a rate of free cash flow decline of 60% year over year (with the exception of platform cash flows for which a 0% perpetuity growth rate was assumed), and (iii) tax savings from usage of SpinCo’s federal net operating losses from SpinCo’s estimated future losses, as set forth in the Management Forecasts, and (b) adding to the foregoing results SpinCo’s estimated net cash of $200 million, assuming SpinCo is capitalized with $200 million in cash and no debt, as of June 30, 2024, and the net present value of the estimated costs of an assumed $150 million equity raise in 2025 and $300 million equity raise in each of 2026 and 2027, as set forth in the Internal Data. Centerview divided the result of the foregoing calculations by the number of fully diluted outstanding shares of estimated SpinCo common stock (determined using the treasury stock method and taking into account the dilutive impact of warrants on the then-existing terms and 8% of shares of SpinCo common stock to be retained by the Company, and assuming no exercise of Company options receiving SpinCo common stock, as instructed by Company management) as of January 18, 2024, based on the Internal Data, resulting in a range of implied equity values per 0.25 of a share of SpinCo common stock of $5.85 to $7.95 rounded to the nearest $0.05.

Just based on cash, the NewCo would be worth $3.40/share of INBX at the outset, although that's a bit faulty logic as the cash is already spoken for in the projected cash burn.  But again, pattern recognition here tells me that this situation has a decent shot of working out well in the near term, $30.00 + $2.05 + $5.85 = ~$38/share versus the current $34.20/share.  If you back out the $30/share in cash, the stub is a potential bargain heading into closing at month end.

Disclosure: I own shares of INBX