Motley Fool health care analyst Max Macaluso and Fool contributor Brian Orelli sat down to discuss Amarin , a biotech that recently launched its first drug, Vascepa. Their conversation follows:

Max Macaluso: So, Brian, Amarin is a biotech company that we both follow very closely, and it reported its fourth-quarter results last week. To be honest, I found the conference call almost identical to the presentation management gave at the JPMorgan Healthcare Conference in January, and I actually found it a little boring. Were there any surprises in the report for you?

Brian Orelli: Not really. We knew we weren’t going to get any sales figures since the launch started in the first quarter. I would have liked to see more quantitative rather than qualitative information from management. A few times they mentioned not disclosing information for competitive reasons. That’s reasonable, but it doesn’t help investors value the company.

About the only thing I found interesting is that management mentioned that there were well over 300 attendees on the call. I’ve never heard a company mention that before, and it seems awfully low to me. The average volume for Amarin is 4.5 million shares — and only 300 people are listening on the call? Maybe that’s only call-ins and not people on the webcast like I was.

Macaluso: That’s an interesting point. I also agree that most investors weren’t expecting any earth-shattering news to be released, so I’m wondering why shares were down more than 6% after the report came out. Why do you think the market is responded this way?

Orelli: Biotechs move in weird ways, so it’s anyone’s guess. I heard IMS released sales figures for January, so that could be part of it. But with just three or four days worth of prescriptions — the launch happened on Jan. 28 — it would only be stocking, which only tells you what retailers were guessing demand would be before the launch started, not what the actual demand is.

Macaluso: Why do you think management is playing the Vascepa launch so close to the chest? I realize that they don’t want investors to have high expectations and then risk disappointing them when the initial results come in for Q1, but why not make conservative projections and offer reasonable guidance for 2013? Like you said, if it helps the market value the company more accurately, why not?

Orelli: If they’re conservative, and we know they’re conservative, what’s the point? Celgene routinely offers conservative annual guidance at the JPMorgan Conference, and everyone just ignores it and tacks on a little extra. And that’s a large biotech that can give accurate information. Amarin’s guidance would be a guess at best.

Macaluso: Management seemed loath to talk about New Chemical Entity (NCE) status for Vascepa last night… and I’m not thrilled that we’re still talking about it more than half a year after the drug was approved! But like it or not, this is still an important catalyst for …read more
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