What happened
NeuBase Therapeutics (NBSE -4.90%) ended the week on a real sugar high, rising by nearly 17% on Friday. This was due to a glowing note about the biotech from one of its more prominent investors.
So what
The praise came from Greenlight Capital, the hedge fund run by noted investor David Einhorn. On Thursday, Greenlight released the latest quarterly update on its performance.
As is its habit, Greenlight dived into the particulars of several portfolio investments, among which was NeuBase. Greenlight waxed enthusiastic about the company's PATrOL platform, a cutting-edge technology which modifies the protein function of genes in order to precisely target diseases.
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"By addressing all of the causal mechanisms underlying rare and common diseases –- including cancer –- PATrOL consolidates the capabilities of highly valued gene silencing, gene editing and gene replacement companies in a single unified platform," Greenlight wrote in its assessment.
Describing the risk-reward proportion of NeuBase as "asymmetrical," Greenlight believes PATrOL has the potential to be a game-changing technology that could help fight a wide range of afflictions.
Now what
Greenlight is a true believer in that potential; it originally began loading up on NeuBase stock in the third quarter of 2019, and has since added several times to its holdings.
While the hedge fund manager's assessment of the company's prospects is believable, we should bear in mind that NeuBase is still a preclinical-stage biotech with no products on the market, and thus carries a very high degree of risk as an investment.