[Tester32]

Original geschrieben von Tester32 am 05.11.2004
Mich würde sehr interessieren:
1. ob die Fondsmanager nur so naiv sind, oder
2. ob der Wert gezielt leerverkauft wird.

Heute haben wir die Antwort auf diese Frage bekommen:

Vioxx Critic Defends Self
Matthew Herper, 12.01.04, 4:00 PM ET

NEW YORK - Eric Topol, chairman of cardiology at the Cleveland Clinic, was one of the leading voices challenging the safety of the arthritis drug Vioxx, which was eventually pulled from the market. That is why the news that he was acting as a consultant to a hedge fund that sold Merck short--essentially betting shares would fall--came as a shock.

Today, Topol explained his involvement with the investment fund via a prepared statement and an email.

Topol's first published criticisms of Vioxx occurred in the Journal of the American Medical Association in August 2001. He says he became an advisor for the investment fund, Great Point Partners, two years later in August 2003. The news was first reported by Fortune magazine.

In today's statement, Topol says that he was retained by Great Point Partners for a fee of $12,000 per year. However, he says, he never discussed Merck (nyse: MRK - news - people ) nor Vioxx with the fund, and had no knowledge that it was shorting Merck. Nor did he invest in the fund. Moreover, he says he has not seen marketing material referenced by Fortune that implied that he had helped the fund "get the jump" on its investing strategies--perhaps including Vioxx, and that he quit as soon as he heard about the potential conflict, on Oct. 28.

At that time, Topol says, he immediately resigned as an advisor to Great Point Partners because of concern about the appearance of a conflict of interest, and because the innuendo that he had ever been an investor in the fund "was completely unacceptable to me."

He also says in his statement that other leading medical authorities were on the advisory board to Great Point Partners. They are: Dr. Aram Chobanian, Dean of Boston University School of Medicine, Dr. Prakash Gill, Professor at USC, Dr. Donald Kufe, Professor at Harvard, and Dr. Daniel Von Hoff, Professor at Arizona Cancer Center.

"I am deeply distressed that my credibility is being challenged because I have been a vocal critic of a drug that threatened the lives of countless patients," writes Topol.

Topol notes that he's published academic papers on financial conflicts of interest in medicine. Topol also served at one point on the scientific advisory board of Forbes Medi-Tech (nasdaq: FMTI - news - people ), as Fortune pointed out.

That said, issues relating to the tangled web of relationships between medical academics and the financial and corporate world are coming to increasing prominence. Earlier this year, new cholesterol guidelines were challenged by some groups because most of the doctors who wrote them had relationships with drug companies.

Also this year, Bryan Brewer, a well-regarded expert in the study of cholesterol at the National Institutes of Health, was challenged by patient group Public Citizen regarding his relationship with AstraZeneca (nyse: AZN - news - people ), which makes the cholesterol drug Crestor.

Steven Nissen, a colleague of Topol's at The Cleveland Clinic and the co-author of the 2001 Vioxx paper, is the current head of Forbes Medi-Tech's scientific advisory board. He has the policy of telling companies to donate all the money they might pay him directly to a charity that funds heart health programs for employees of the American College of Cardiology.

Quelle: Forbes.com

An der Börse wird also nach wie vor das alte Spiel gespielt, daß nur die Outsider nicht verstehen. Ich mag die Hedgies. Sie helfen, Ungleichgewichte schneller zu beseitigen und sorgen für ein oder anderes Schnäppchen. Merck ist übrigens immer noch durchaus günstig und zahlt denjenigen, die die Aktie heute hatten, die Dividende von 38 Cents/Aktie.

@Alle: stellen die deutsche Banken für Dividenden der US-Aktien bei der IRS automatisch einen Antrag auf eine Befreiung von der Backup Witholding Tax oder muß ich mich darüber selber kümmern? Glaube zwar nicht, daß mir jemand diese Frage hier im Board beantworten kann, werde sie aber stellen, damit mrbomb mir später nicht widersprechen kann, wenn ich der Meinung bin, daß es sich nicht lohnt, hier im Board Fragen zu stellen.