Arena Pharma gains after report Pfizer deal will clear without HSR second request

Jeenah Moon/Getty Images News

• Arena Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:ARNA) rose 3.5% in after hours trading on a report that its planned sale to Pfizer Inc. (NYSE:PFE) won't require a longer review from the Federal Trade Commission, according a Dealreporter item.
• The waiting period under the Hart-Scott Rodino ("HSR") act for the deal is expected to expire on Wednesday without a second request from the FTC, according to a Dealreporter item, which cited sources familiar. The parties pulled and refiled their HSR notification on Feb. 3 after originally filing it on Jan. 4.
• The FTC approval is important as its the last remaining regulator needed to clear the $6.7B acquisition before it can close.

Comments

[Miquelet]

What will be your next arbitral? Tsem?

[catrina121]

Well after 5 years,,,and a,ready booking 512,000 profit..
I guess my last 62,000 shares at $17.85 average are poof….
Still,,,,price is way to cheap
Etrasimod worth $150 alone without the ralenepeg,cash,and pipeline

But at my age Ill take the 6.2 million total profit

Munshi Deserves nothing

[9coriolis1]

In the first bullet, change it's to its.

[jriver]

@9coriolis1 What ?

[SA Editor Joshua Fineman]

@9coriolis1 Fixed. Sorry about that.

[Paperone75]

@SA Editor Joshua Fineman "its the last remaining regulator...." you need to change its with it's

[sts66]

Never had any doubt this BO would pass muster. ARNA is easily my largest position in two accounts, and after 12 yrs of waiting for ARNA to pay off I'll finally get paid. Feel bad for other longs who gave up years ago, when the RS made their cost basis go up by a factor of 10.

[jriver]

@sts66 really ? Do you not understand that a reverse split has no effect on cost basis.

[catrina121]

@sts66 please tell me the difference between
10,000 shares at $1 going to 10
Or
1000 shares at $10 going to $100

you best stick to t bills

[sts66]

@jriver Of course it changes your cost basis - mine went from $4 to $40 with 1/10th the number of shrs owned - it just doesn't change the amount you have invested, and it won't affect taxes owed if you sell at a profit after a RS because total cost didn't change. Case in point for a RS making people give up - biotech NAVB never traded higher than $5 since I bought it in 2001 - my basis was $3.5 - they mismanaged the company to death, did a 1:20 RS in 2019, suddenly my basis was $70 for a stock that had never exceeded $5 - think I will ever have the chance to break even? Nope. It was $2.75 after the RS (now 78 cents and about to be delisted) - I should have thrown in the towel (many did) and just taken what I could get at that price.

As far as ARNA goes, it was primarily owned by retail back then (tutes owned ~ 43%), and management was tired of constantly being pestered by them - they did the RS partly to kick out retail and gain a larger % of institutional investors - if you go back and read the statements made by management at the time of the RS they even say that out loud, albeit not in those exact words. Now 'tutes own 84% of ARNA - clearly the RS did what ARNA wanted it to do, clear out retailers.