Prima BioMed files for NASDAQ listing (ASX: PRR)

Just a quick heads up that Australian biotech company Prima BioMed (ASX: PRR) has filed for a NASDAQ listing of American Depositary Receipts (ADR). Once the listing is complete the company will have a dual listings of its securities on both the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) and NASDAQ. Every one ADR will represent 30 common shares, so Prima at $0.17 cents would trade at $5.10 and a market cap of >$160 mln.

Prima’s proposed NASDAQ listing will be a Level II ADR compliance listing, and is being managed by Bank of New York Mellon and US broking houses Deutsche Bank AG, Noble Financial and Aegis. Prima did say that they are currently unable to say precisely when the shares will actually list and trade but we expect it will be soon.

Here the big question: Is this a blessing or a Curse ?

Prima is listing on the NASDAQ for better exposure and most importantly access to U.S. capital markets. The company is now beginning a Phase III trial in ovarian cancer using a dendritic cell based vaccine (in the U.S., Progenitor Cell Therapy (NeoStem-NBS) is doing the manufacturing, recall that PCT did the clinical work for Dendreon's Provenge and is also working for Coronado (CNDO) and Immunocellular (IMUC). If anyone can make sure that the "manufacturing goes off with-out a hitch” its PCT-NBS. 

So the next big question, is does it work ? Ovarian is a very tough indication and the life expectancy of Ovarian cancer varies a great deal. Prima's Phase II data was not double blinded cross-over so the results are not definitive. No way to say what the results of the current global PIII trial will be yet. We do know Prima will likely need to raise capital at some point ahead (thus the U.S. listing).

Perhaps the most important event that investors will watch will be not Prima at all, but Merck KG who is running the StimuVax trial which like Prima's product (C-Vac) targets the MUC-1 antigen (over-expressed in ovarian cancer).

If StimuVax works, Prima could rock, if not, it could flop as it validates one way or another the MUC-1 antigen as a target.

Let’s watch Prima and see how the company does as they work to build a U.S. institutional presence and present their data to the scrutiny of US investors.