Taking Stock – As leaves turn and fall, biotechs frequently rise

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If you listen to analysts, clothing isn’t the only thing that has seasons. Stocks do too.You bury the white shoes in the closet and pull out tweeds and purples in fall, just like you snap up biotech stocks at the turn of the season on Wednesday.“Biotech in general tends to do pretty well in the fall,” said Ren Benjamin, an analyst with Rodman & Renshaw Inc. in New York.While fashion has its runways, biotech companies have medical conferences for displaying new wares. “What the fall does is there are all these conferences … that provide venues for the biotech companies to provide [new] data,” Benjamin said.Upcoming conferences at the American Society of Hematology, the American Heart Association and — here’s a fun one — the Interscience Conference of Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy are all favorite spots to parade new findings on drug trials.Benjamin’s company does investment banking for a Maryland drug company called EntreMed Inc. The Rockville company develops cancer-fighting drugs that starve cancerous cells by limiting the growth of the blood vessels that feed them. Stock in EntreMed as well other biotech stocks soared over other securities last week as investors turned their eyes to the biotech market. The Amex Biotechnology Index climbed 4.7 percent and the Nasdaq Biotechnology Index climbed 2.1 percent during a week where the Dow Jones Industrial Average shed 0.3 percent and the Nasdaq Composite only gained 0.8 percent. In Maryland, the Bloomberg Maryland Index advanced 1.7 percent.EntreMed shares hitched a ride on that trend. Stock in the company closed at $1.80 on Friday — up 20.8 percent for the week. It’s not hard to climb 20 percent when you’re trading below $2. But EntreMed wasn’t alone.Gene Logic Inc. and Human Genome Sciences Inc. were up 11.3 percent and 9.2 percent, respectively. Even MedImmune Inc. climbed a penny in daily trading while one of its former top executives pled guilty to insider trading Friday.Benjamin said investors are hunting for good buys and biotech shares are a good target, as the sector has dropped some during the summer with a lack of attention and news.The fall biotech shows are sure to change that fortune with a regular drumbeat of drug study findings released at the shows, according to analysts. Biotech stocks are famous for trading on news as they await more substantial market movers, like positive earnings.“This late part of the year is typically the best season for biotech,” said analyst Edward Tenthoff of Piper Jaffray in New York.Biotech shares haven’t always ripened like pumpkins in the fall months. Last year the Nasdaq Biotechnology Index dropped 3 percent between September and December as the S&P gained 8 percent, according to a note issued this week by Rodman & Renshaw.GenVec Inc. is a case in point. The Gaithersburg-based company’s shares declined 5.9 percent while most biotech stocks enjoyed gains last week.Still, Rodman & Renshaw’s note showed biotechs beating the S&P in four of the last six years during the fall months.Kathleen Johnston Jarboe covers finance for The Daily Record.