A Great Quarter for Many Tools and Diagnostic Stocks
The tools and diagnostics sector usually underperforms biopharmaceuticals because the companies are more tethered to deal news and fundamentals. We will review our focus stocks below as Q1 earnings come in. NASDAQ is down about 3% over the last 5 trading days so many of the stronger performers are off their highs.
Here are the big winners:
- CardioVascular Systems(CSII) up 35%
- Alere (ALR) up 35%
- Thermofisher (TMO) up 23%
- Abaxis (ABAX) up 19.6%
Response Genetics (RGDX) was up 50% but we did not include it as a “big winner” because of the stock volatility. Two of our new picks are GenomicHealth (GHDX) and Hologic (HOLX). Quarter losers were Exact Sciences (EXAS) and Sequenom (SQNM).
Note that over a three year period, five of our picks were acquired at a premium over the price recommendation.
| 2010-2013 | Original | Price | Price | % | Price | Price | % RET | Price | %RET | |||
| Recomm | Dec’10 | Ret | 10/2/12 | 1/2/13 | 1 yr | 4/21/13 | YTD | |||||
| Abaxis | ABAX | 2/2/09 | 15 | 26.9 | 79 | 37.9 | 37.8 | 36.7 | 45 | 19.6 | ||
| CardioV.Sys. | CSII | 11/5/10 | 7.15 | 11.7 | 63 | 11.45 | 13 | 29.7 | 17.57 | 35 | ||
| Celera | CRA | 3/28/10 | 7 | 6.3 | 18 | acquired | ||||||
| Cepheid | CPHD | 10/23/12 | 31.4 | NEW | 35.5 | 13 | 38 | 7 | ||||
| Exact Sci | EXAS | 12/10/10 | 5.6 | 5.98 | 6.8 | 11.36 | 11 | 36 | 9.23 | -16 | ||
| GenomicH | GHDX | 2/26/13 | 28.5 | NEW | 27.24 | 6.3 | 29.76 | 9.25 | ||||
| GenProbe | GPRO | 2/2/09 | 45 | 58.4 | 30 | 82.55 | acquired | |||||
| Hologic | HOLX | 4/9/13 | 21.6 | NEW | 20 | 21.27 | new | |||||
| Illumina | ILMN | 2/2/09 | 29 | 63.3 | 118 | 51.2 | 55.4 | 81.8 | 56.09 | 2.7 | ||
| Immucor | BLUD | 4/5/10 | 20 | 19.8 | 0 | acquired | ||||||
| Alere | ALR | 2/2/09 | 25 | 36.6 | 46 | 19.64 | 19 | -18 | 25.63 | 35 | ||
| MicroFluidics | MFLU | 7/6/10 | 0.77 | 1.34 | 74 | acquired | ||||||
| NeoGen | NEOG | 7/2/10 | 26 | 41 | 58 | 42.8 | 45.6 | 48.8 | 49.85 | 9.3 | ||
| Qiagen | QGEN | 3/15/10 | 21.5 | 19.6 | -9 | 19 | 18.8 | 36 | 21 | 9.5 | ||
| Quidel | QDEL | 6/16/10 | 12.4 | 14.5 | 16 | 18.65 | 19.9 | 31.3 | 21.33 | 7.2 | ||
| ResponseG | RGDX | 2/3/12 | 1.5 | 1.3 | 1.4 | -13 | 1.21 | 50 | ||||
| Sequenom | SQNM | 11/18/09 | 3.75 | 8.03 | 114 | 3.5 | 4.93 | 10.8 | 3.97 | -20 | ||
| SeraCare | SRLS | 11/18/09 | 2.75 | 4.75 | 73 | acquired | ||||||
| ThermoFish | TMO | 7/25/12 | 53.5 | NEW | 59.4 | 65 | 44.5 | 80 | 23 | |||