No, not because of the economy. The FDA has recently approved a slew of new prescription drugs. Considering Americans are addicted to prescription pills, this is always a good sign.

Here’s the news blip:

FDA On Pace To Approve 18 New Drugs In 2008

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved nine new medicines as of the end of June, putting it on pace to be one of the slowest years for new drug approvals in the last five years.

Drugs approved this year include Wyeth’s (WYE) Pristiq, used to treat depression, Cephalon Inc.’s (CEPH) leukemia drug Treanda and UCB SA’s (UCB.BT) Cimzia for Crohn’s disease, which causes irritation in the digestive tract.

The agency approved 18 “new molecular entities,” which means the active ingredient hadn’t been used before in an FDA-approved therapy, in 2007. The agency could approve a similar amount if its pace continues. The agency approved 22 such drugs in 2006.

Pharmaceutical companies have decried what it sees as the FDA’s increasingly tough stance on safety, saying it is making it too hard to get drugs approved. The FDA has said it hasn’t become more conservative about safety but blames the companies’ faltering research for any decrease in drug approvals.

source: Dow Jones Tomorrow’s News Today
sponsored by SCOTTRADE

Baltia (BLTA.OB) has been climbing the last couple of days with some large volume buying - at least large for this stock. There hasn’t been any news so it leads me to believe someone knows something.

Could they be close to flight??

According to the Baltia Yahoo! forum they have met the last of DOT’s requirements, which was a financial fitness evaluation. I verified this information at the goverment’s documents site (click here).

More interestingly, the document reveals that Baltia plans to operate at least one round-trip flight per week to St. Petersburg and they have financing for a year’s worth of up to 5 flights per week. Assuming they can fill those flights and make a profit, this is HUGE insight.

Most of the operating expenses are backed and guaranteed by personal lines of credit of Baltia’s board. I like that a lot better than a company who’s board is disinterested and/or not personally liable. This puts the Baltia board in a make or break position. A couple of them will even lose their homes if this doesn’t work out. That’s more risk than I’m betting!

Also, they are outsourcing/leasing their aircraft, so equipment purchase and maintenance expenses will fall on third party operators. This will reduce expenses and increase profits when Baltia gets airborne. Let’s hope that happens soon.

See all of Baltia’s federal filings here.

Nothing new on the Baltia Blog. They may have forgotten about it.

CHCG is climbing. Hit a recent high the other day, then lulled, and its gonna shoot up within the next few weeks. It crashed due to the last quarter results panic but the next report is coming out soon and its great news. Strong company, owns a sizeable chunk of the Chinese electronics market (think Best Buy of China).

CBTE is still low. They just expanded to Japan. Good time to buy I think. I just bought more yesterday.

Baltia (BLTA.OB) - I hope these guys get FAA approval soon. They are still optimistic and updating their blog, so I think its gonna happen. Still waiting.

Something new? I haven’t heard anything but I did find a good site that aggregates all the stock blogs out there: StockReads.com

Check out Baltia Air’s Blog:

Baltia Weblog

They are staying positive about FAA approval and have even announced plans for an upcoming innaugural flight (however there’s no date set). Cool blog though. Seems like it will help me keep up with what’s going on over there.

If this FAA approval ever does happen, Baltia is gonna make me a nice profit.

What else has been happening? Not much. The U.S. economy is in horrible condition. Of course I posted that it was crashing before Wall Street realized it and I prepared my portfolio, so I’m good. Just annoyed that we’re on hold while the world economy adjusts itself. At least they’ve started arresting the assholes that dreamed up this subprime idiocy (see Bear Stearns).

Now I’m just riding out the storm, doing a little buying of my favorite stocks as they hit bottoms (like CBTE), and waiting for a recovery. Analysts estimate that will happen in late 2009. So I guess my portfolio play is on hold awhile. Glad I don’t run a hedge fund! haha

China 3C Group (CHCG) posts 1st quarter results. Down as expected..

Mr. Zhenggang Wang, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer commented, “While the first quarter was clearly a challenging period for our Company for a number of reasons including rising raw material costs, increased competition, and the severe snow storms in January that decreased store traffic and disrupted our supply chain, we were pleased to have increased our net income margin and believe that the remaining three quarters of 2008 will be more productive for our business. We were pleased to maintain Q1 general and administrative expenses as a percentage of revenue on the same level as a year ago. This is a result of our strategy for 2008 of improving efficiency and profitability per store as opposed to pursuing rapid expansion as we have in the past.

“As part of our strategy to improve profitability per store, we have decided to implement several new, higher margin concepts at our stores, including providing leasing services for products we sell, providing after sale equipment maintenance, working with a pre-owned 3C product retailer to roll out a second-hand 3C product repurchase service, and working with manufacturers to roll out zero-inventory consignment sales which can, among other benefits, decrease our inventory requirements.

read more here

It went up 5 cents on the news. I’m still long…

I got a Yahoo! Alert today letting me know that Allegro Biodiesel (ABDS.OB) is running. Went up 80% today. I didn’t see any news bulletins for them, so I’m not sure why its moving. I bought at .14 so its gonna need to move a little more for me to be happy..

I know, not much posting going on here. That’s because there’s not much trading going on. I’ve been watching a full board of stocks every day and they aren’t moving.

I see momentary rises but they are always quickly knocked down by profit takers. Looks to me like traders are so panicked they’re afraid to keep their money in the market. Scared rabbits!!

One of my clients mentioned that the profit taking could be due to US tax season and people need their cash to cover gains made last year. Anything is possible.

I saw nice action on a couple of my picks, CBTE hit a nice high and CHCG is mid-way through a nice run-up (probably cash out late summer or fall).

My other penny stocks are just sitting around though. People keep asking me if my position has changed and I’m still long on these:

• AMHI - reduced their costs and started turning a profit. just waiting for positive financial news.
• IFLI - only long because its cheap. its a good product but definitely risky. they have tons of press releases and news coverage, so growth will depend on profit.
• ABDS - strong company, newsworthy product line. it needs to start making a profit and the stock will run. right now though i’m not sure the company knows how to make a profit.
• BLTA - when oh when will the FAA approve? this one is risky but could explode if they get their approval. seems like the company expects it, since they even rented part of a terminal at JFK airport. FAA approval will mean 2 or 3 points. FAA denial will bankrupt the stock.

So, in summary, I haven’t been trading. Just holding my positions and waiting for these furry freaks to calm down and start investing again.

Oh yea, and its a great time to buy cheap houses if you are in the market. American house prices are down 15-30% from last year. Will probably be a few years before you can flip them though, since no banks are issuing mortgages anymore. Have fun!

A true penny stock, the stock hasn’t moved much in the last year, but it may push high in 2008. American HealthChoice (AMHI.pk) is a pink sheets stock. I bought a bunch of shares of this stock 2 years ago, saw it take a wild ride, then dumped it.

I decided to look at it again, and their recent news looks promising.

The Company has reduced its clinics to a core of six profitable clinics that should bill approximately $5 million in 2008. The clinic operations will continue to contribute profit and will be cash positive in the foreseeable future. AMHI continues to reduce corporate expenses to less than $400,000 annually.
http://www.americanhealthchoice.com/articles.cfm?art_ID=65

The financials aren’t updated with the SEC due to a lack of competence by their auditor. That’s also explained in the article above.

They are awaiting FDA approval for a new device that allows doctors to remotely monitor patients via IP. If that approval comes, news chatter will be boosted for the stock. 

If all they explained in the report is true - new device approved, profitability, SEC reports submitted - this penny stock could run soon. At these prices, it doesn’t hurt to be invested.

If any of you got into CBTE when I recommended it a few weeks ago - at its bottom - its time to sell it. The stock surged today after a couple positive news stories broke:

• Venturepharm Laboratories Becomes a Strategic Investor and Joint Venture Partner of Commonwealth Biotechnologies, Inc.
• Exelgen, Ltd, a Subsidiary of Commonwealth Biotechnologies, Inc., Announces Two New Major Drug Discovery Collaborations

Today’s high hit 2.97 (so far), which is more than a point higher than yesterday’s close. My shares sold automatically at $2.80 - 90 cents higher than I bought them a couple weeks ago.

The news just gave investors a reason to look at CBTE and what they found is all good. Great growth, great financials, great management. Now people are buying, so I hope you are selling.

Combine the flashy showmanship of the WWE with the gruesome full contact fight style of the UFC and you get the IFL - International Fight League (IFLI).

The International Fight League is an American mixed martial arts (MMA) promotion billed as the world’s first MMA league. Instead of the established norm for MMA events, where matchups are strictly one-on-one affairs, each IFL card is a showdown between two camps of at least three fighters, each fighter fighting one match against another in the opposing camps. from Wikipedia click here

Add that up and its a very exciting fight league with the potential to bring in lots of fans for every “camp”, however the IFL has yet to find its following. The UFC has been ingrained into American media through Spike’s obssesive event coverage and reality TV show. WWE is loved in nearly every trailer park in the US, with tens of thousands packing stadiums every week to watch live (fake) fights.

The IFL is televised in the U.S. by Fox Sports Net & MyNetworkTV, and several International networks - Malaysia Television (announced March 4, 2008), HBO Latin America, MBC in the Middle East and parts of Africa, Star TV in Asia, CanWest Global and Fox Sports Canada in Canada, EGO in Israel, TV4 in Sweden and Armed Forces Television.

The stock had its IPO in November 2006, through a merger with Paligent Inc., and quickly rose to over $13 after being touted on CNBC and 60 minutes. Its been in freefall ever since to today’s current price of 7 cents. Revenues have grown 68% since the IPO and their quarterly net loss was cut in half in Q3 2007 compared to Q2 2007 (from $6.8 mil to $3.6mil). Cash climbed during the same period from $2.5 million to $9 million.

See Quarterly Balance Sheet & Quarterly Income Statement

With a declining quarter-to-quarter loss and at least 3 quarters of cash in the bank, the question is, will this company see a profit before it runs out of cash?

Billionairre Mark Cuban thinks its a goldmine. He’s decided to show fights on his network, HDNet. You can view videos and read more about it on No Holds Barred.

You can read a Seeking Alpha article about the struggling MME industry here: World Wrestling Entertainment’s Mixed Martial Arts Potential

Also visit International Fight League homepage

There’s a lot of volume the last couple of days, indicating “something” is going on. The most recent quarterly report (Q4 07) and 2008 annual report will come out in about a week. If either shows a profit, this stock could climb quickly (at least enough to profit from 7 cent shares).