XXII Recent activities 08/28/2014 00:32:30 $XXII
These guys effectively did a low key reinforcement of the "attack article" by re-stating it. God Bless america and damn it at the same time for allowing such hooey to coninue on XXII and other co.'s This Hedge Fund uses loop holes in regulations to attack indiscriminately. For fair play, lets repeat post the reply by XXII Mngt. in full below
22nd Century Group Comments on Misleading and Inaccurate Article
2014-08-27 15:20 ET - News Release
Company Website: http://www.xxiicentury.com/exclusive-worldwid...portfolio/
CLARENCE, N.Y. -- (Business Wire)
22nd Century Group, Inc. (NYSE MKT:XXII) noted there was unusual trading volume today in its common stock. The activity appears to be related to an inaccurate article published today by a short seller of the Company’s stock recommending that stockholders sell 22nd Century Group stock.
The author disclosed on the front page that he is “short” the Company’s stock, meaning that the short seller author stands to realize significant profit in the event that the share price of 22nd Century declines.
Although 22nd Century does not normally respond to false information written about the Company, 22nd Century Group management believes the degree of false information contained in the subject article warranted a Company response.
22nd Century strongly disagrees with the article’s incorrect assumptions and false conclusions. Although the misleading and inaccurate statements are too numerous to address, the following are a few examples:
1.“They have quadrupled the stock's share count to roughly 59 million.” In fact, 22nd Century Group went public in January 2011 with approximately 27 million shares. Currently the Company has approximately 59 million shares outstanding, not the 108 million alleged by the author.
2.The author asserts that 22nd Century is in default of a license agreement with a major university. This is patently false. Further, just today, 22nd Century signed a new license agreement with the same university that the author falsely alleges that the Company is in default with.
3.Contrary to the author’s assertions regarding stock promotion and sales, officers and insiders have never engaged in stock promotion and have made minimal sales of 22nd Century Group common stock; in fact, management and insiders retain more than 95% of their Company common stock. Collectively, officers of the Company directly and beneficially own approximately 28% of the total outstanding shares.
4. Contrary to the author’s assertions, 22nd Century has never abandoned any of its products. The Company is continuing its efforts to develop X-22, a cigarette intended for use as a prescription smoking cessation aid, and has an active investigational new drug application with the FDA. Various independent clinical studies continue to validate the efficacy of the Company’s products for harm reduction and smoking cessation.
Henry Sicignano III, the Company’s President, explained, “22nd Century’s commercial prospects have never been stronger. MSA authorization is imminent. Hundreds of tobacco retailers have expressed interest in carrying the Company’s super-premium RED SUN® brand. The Company is launching MAGIC ZERO at the Dortmund (Germany) International Tobacco Fair in September. And, as previously announced, the Company is exploring important joint venture opportunities in Asia.”
“The 22nd Century management team operates our Company with the absolute highest integrity,” said Joseph Pandolfino, Founder and Chief Executive Officer. “I have devoted the last 15 years of my life and essentially my entire net worth to 22nd Century. The issue I had with the SEC 23 years ago, when I was a kid in college, has given me the highest sense of awareness for securities laws and regulations. I would hope that the SEC investigates the author of the disparaging article on 22nd Century and other ‘short and distort’ authors. It is unfortunate that malicious articles by short sellers dupe and scare investors into selling.”
For additional information, please visit: www.xxiicentury.com
About 22nd Century Group, Inc.
22nd Century is a plant biotechnology company whose proprietary technology allows for the levels of nicotine and other nicotinic alkaloids (e.g., nornicotine, anatabine and anabasine) in the tobacco plant to be decreased or increased through genetic engineering and plant breeding. 22nd Century owns or is the exclusive licensee of 129 issued patents in 78 countries plus an additional 44 pending patent applications. Goodrich Tobacco Company, LLC and Hercules Pharmaceuticals, LLC are wholly-owned subsidiaries of 22nd Century. Goodrich Tobacco is focused on commercial tobacco products and potential less harmful cigarettes. Hercules Pharmaceuticals is focused on X-22, a prescription smoking cessation aid in development.
Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements:This press release contains forward-looking information, including all statements that are not statements of historical fact regarding the intent, belief or current expectations of 22nd Century Group, Inc., its directors or its officers with respect to the contents of this press release. The words “may,” “would,” “will,” “expect,” “estimate,” “anticipate,” “believe,” “intend” and similar expressions and variations thereof are intended to identify forward-looking statements. We cannot guarantee future results, levels of activity or performance. You should not place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date that they were made. These cautionary statements should be considered with any written or oral forward-looking statements that we may issue in the future. Except as required by applicable law, including the securities laws of the United States, we do not intend to update any of the forward-looking statements to conform these statements to reflect actual results, later events or circumstances, or to reflect the occurrence of unanticipated events. You should carefully review and consider the various disclosures made by us in our annual report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2013, filed on January 30, 2014, including the section entitled “Risk Factors,” and our other reports filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission which attempt to advise interested parties of the risks and factors that may affect our business, financial condition, results of operation and cash flows. If one or more of these risks or uncertainties materialize, or if the underlying assumptions prove incorrect, our actual results may vary materially from those expected or projected.
Contacts:
Redington, Inc.
Tom Redington, 203-222-7399
Source: 22nd Century Group, Inc.
© 2014 Canjex Publishing Ltd. All rights reserved.
You sure called the heavy volume. Just happened not to mention which way the share price was going to go. I am beginning to trust you knew about this article.
XXII Stock Message Board http://investorshangout.com/22Nd-Cent-XXII-68777/
You should reply them with the XXII PR rebuttal. That's too bad for them. What's so hard to believe about this company? That just shows us that only smart risk takers gain BIG in this life. Everyone else is just happy where they are (nothing wrong with that), but keep wishing and wishing for more without doing something about it--there is something wrong with that! Me, I'm tired of working for my money: I want my money working for me and generate income faster than me working if you know what I mean.
35%
Anyone who loaded under 2.00 is up 35% and should be praising the SA article for inducing a wild session. lol
Not to mention that these pros typically coordinate the selling pressure upon the release of article. Their selling sets the dominoes by hitting stop losses and snowballs from there. As you said, it's definitely more than just the innocent betting against the stock. The author probably has no clue.
This article almost appeared to be taking the side of the shorter. Unbelievable. It actually made Geo whatever seem like a legitimate entity and made the article sound reasonable. The article mentioned how these short sellers are merely placing bets the stock would go down, not mentioning it was the article itself that accomplished that!!! Talk about Topsy turvy!
Perker I trust your travel prognostications. Right about Poland. Right about Spain. Probably right about North Carolina. Probably right about Colorado. Do you arrange travel for the company? Just kidding and keep posting.
If only one could know how hard management is working and Henry travels more than the Secretary of State. He just got back from Colorado and has everyone there on board and ready to go. He goes a far real soon. So stay the course and in management we trust. Also, trust in me.
smart move... I totally missed best part of the opportunity as I was otherwise occupied through the first part of the trading day... 5.5 million shares turned loose today... somebodies going to regret letting go of those shares in a year or two...
the smart shorts got out today... the dumb ones got in... the shorters do this like clockwork... once you've been exposed to a few of these... you recognize it for what it is a paragraph into the article... actually the title itself was a pretty good tip off... yet it works, so it will continue to happen... just as long as retail investors remain gullible... it will continue to happen... jmo...
SA should be F'n shut down IMO
Go XXII
I sold stock to get in today thats how good this opportunity was.
I received a couple emails from friends warning me about XXII with the SA article attached . I've been trying to get them into this stock for a while. They had a feeling it was too good to be true. Unbelievable .
Had a chance to add today. SA to thank I guess
Web article sends stock on 22nd Century Group down 15%
22nd Century Group denies allegations by short seller
By David Robinson | News Business Reporter
on August 27, 2014 - 6:08 PM
inShare
Shares in 22nd Century Group, the Clarence company trying to develop a line of cigarettes with either very high or low levels of nicotine, lost 15 percent of their value Wednesday after an investor who stands to make money if the stock falls published a lengthy article that cast doubt on the firm’s prospects.
22nd Century executives responded by labeling the article as “ridiculously disparaging,” saying it was riddled with “incorrect assumptions and false conclusions.”
The article, posted on the Seeking Alpha investor website by a Pennsylvania-based hedge fund that will make a profit on its investment in 22nd Century if the share price declines, questioned whether the company’s cigarettes will turn into revenue-producing products and notes that the firm is running so short of cash that it will be forced to raise additional funds from investors within a few months.
The article accused 22nd Century executives of enriching themselves by collecting hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in pay from the company while the business continues to lose money and generates little revenue.
It also criticized the company’s involvement with firms that it has hired to promote 22nd Century’s stock and cited several announcements from the company touting developments that failed to pan out.
“There have been a lot of promises in the past that haven’t panned out,” said Dan David, GeoInvesting’s vice president, in an interview. “The one thing that has worked out “is the executives enriching themselves.”
The article sent 22nd Group’s stock tumbling by 15 percent, shaving its share price by 49 cents, to close at $2.68. 22nd Century shares, which traded for as much as $6.36 per share in mid-March, are worth no more than 20 cents, GeoInvesting said in the article.
“It appears the company is only good at building false hope so it can continue to raise money,” GeoInvesting said in the <URL destination="http://seekingalpha.com/article/2454105-22nd-century-group-a-lot-of-smoke-not-enough-fire">article.
22nd Century executives said the Seeking Alpha article took them by surprise and they accused GeoInvesting of taking “kernels of truth” about the company’s operations and interpreting them in the most negative way possible to help drive down the price of the lightly traded stock.
“Writing a 29-page article, as negative as this one was, makes this a self-fulfilling prophesy,” said Henry Sicignano III, 22nd Century’s president, in an interview. “We think the company is in better shape than it’s ever been.”
The company issued a statement challenging the accuracy of some of GeoInvesting’s allegations, including a claim that 22nd Century was in default on an agreement with North Carolina State University. They also denied that the company’s officers and directors had engaged in stock promotion and said 22nd Century continues to work on the development of the X-22, a cigarette intended for use as a prescription smoking-cessation aid that GeoInvesting said had been abandoned.
</URL>Regardless, the steep drop in 22nd Century’s stock price was good news for GeoInvesting, which has a history of successful investments as a short seller. A database compiled by Activist Shorts Research found that GeoInvesting had launched 38 short-selling activist campaigns, earning an average return of 48.5 percent.
Unlike traditional stock investors who buy a stock and hope it goes up in price, short sellers profit when they invest in a stock that goes down in value. Short sellers typically bet against a stock by selling shares that they have borrowed, in hopes that they will be able to repurchase them later at a lower price.
The relatively low trading volume of 22nd Century’s stock made it especially vulnerable to big swings in price. The shares, which traded an average of about 516,000 shares a day over the previous three months, saw its volume top 5.5 million shares Wednesday, more than 10 times more than usual.
The shares, which had fallen to as low as $1.92 late Wednesday morning and spent most of the day down by about 25 percent, rebounded in late afternoon trading after the company released its response to the article.
David, of GeoInvesting, said his firm first noticed 22nd Century’s stock in the spring, when the company’s shares rose above $6 after the company had made a series of announcements noting progress in bringing its cigarettes to the market. The company said it had won permission from federal tobacco regulators to start making its own cigarettes and had spent $6.4 million to purchase a North Carolina cigarette factory and cigarette-making equipment.
But as the company continued to wait for final agreement that would make it a participating member of the 1998 Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement between the tobacco industry and 46 states, the stock quickly sagged back to the $3 level within a month.
“There is a real business here,” David said. “It’s just not really happening for them.”
The company uses proprietary technology that allows it to manipulate the levels of nicotine and other chemicals in tobacco. Its Spectrum brand of research cigarettes can have the same amount of tar as conventional cigarettes but nicotine levels that vary from very low to very high. It also has plans to produce its Red Sun and Magic super-premium cigarette brands.
GeoInvesting also noted that Joseph Pandolfino, 22nd Century’s chief executive officer, had agreed to a settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission in 1992 on allegations that he fraudulently manipulated the price of two stocks by mailing anonymous letters urging people to buy shares in the companies.
Pandolfino agreed to pay about $26,000 – roughly the amount federal regulators said he made on the scheme while he was a 23-year-old graduate student at the University at Buffalo – to settle the charges.
“The issue I had with the SEC 23 years ago, when I was a kid in college, has given me the highest sense of awareness for securities laws and regulations,” Pandolfino said.
“I would hope that the SEC investigates the author of the disparaging article on 22nd Century and other ‘short and distort’ authors.”
“It is unfortunate that malicious articles by short sellers dupe and scare investors into selling,”he said.
Buffalonews
http://www.buffalonews.com/business/web-artic...5-20140827
Fair mentioned is in Dortmund, Germany under the name Inter Tabac between Sept 19-21, 2014.Professional audience only.
Nice to see Joe respond. I don't want to debate the range of what is considered imminent but would be greatly disappointed, again, if not announced Tuesday at latest. They know when they use the term imminent it will be translated, right or wrong (and they don't need to fuel the flame), as next day or two....
If Im management, Im wanting to destroy these shorters. And hit them where it hurts most...in the back pocket. I see PRs coming in the next day or two.
Agree Dane... two standouts in the PR ...which, in reading the tea leaves ...they were telling us more than what might appear on the surface.
IMHO... what they were saying:
1. MSA "imminent" ... i.e. approved and to be announced...
2. ASIA " the Company is exploring important joint venture opportunities in Asia.” i.e. heating up and near completion...
But who is Asia?... Where did they visit? We know...
I look for Friday/Tuesday for 1 or 2 or both.
These guys effectively did a low key reinforcement of the "attack article" by re-stating it. God Bless america and damn it at the same time for allowing such hooey to coninue on XXII and other co.'s This Hedge Fund uses loop holes in regulations to attack indiscriminately. For fair play, lets repeat post the reply by XXII Mngt. in full below
22nd Century Group Comments on Misleading and Inaccurate Article
2014-08-27 15:20 ET - News Release
Company Website: http://www.xxiicentury.com/exclusive-worldwid...portfolio/
CLARENCE, N.Y. -- (Business Wire)
22nd Century Group, Inc. (NYSE MKT:XXII) noted there was unusual trading volume today in its common stock. The activity appears to be related to an inaccurate article published today by a short seller of the Company’s stock recommending that stockholders sell 22nd Century Group stock.
The author disclosed on the front page that he is “short” the Company’s stock, meaning that the short seller author stands to realize significant profit in the event that the share price of 22nd Century declines.
Although 22nd Century does not normally respond to false information written about the Company, 22nd Century Group management believes the degree of false information contained in the subject article warranted a Company response.
22nd Century strongly disagrees with the article’s incorrect assumptions and false conclusions. Although the misleading and inaccurate statements are too numerous to address, the following are a few examples:
1.“They have quadrupled the stock's share count to roughly 59 million.” In fact, 22nd Century Group went public in January 2011 with approximately 27 million shares. Currently the Company has approximately 59 million shares outstanding, not the 108 million alleged by the author.
2.The author asserts that 22nd Century is in default of a license agreement with a major university. This is patently false. Further, just today, 22nd Century signed a new license agreement with the same university that the author falsely alleges that the Company is in default with.
3.Contrary to the author’s assertions regarding stock promotion and sales, officers and insiders have never engaged in stock promotion and have made minimal sales of 22nd Century Group common stock; in fact, management and insiders retain more than 95% of their Company common stock. Collectively, officers of the Company directly and beneficially own approximately 28% of the total outstanding shares.
4. Contrary to the author’s assertions, 22nd Century has never abandoned any of its products. The Company is continuing its efforts to develop X-22, a cigarette intended for use as a prescription smoking cessation aid, and has an active investigational new drug application with the FDA. Various independent clinical studies continue to validate the efficacy of the Company’s products for harm reduction and smoking cessation.
Henry Sicignano III, the Company’s President, explained, “22nd Century’s commercial prospects have never been stronger. MSA authorization is imminent. Hundreds of tobacco retailers have expressed interest in carrying the Company’s super-premium RED SUN® brand. The Company is launching MAGIC ZERO at the Dortmund (Germany) International Tobacco Fair in September. And, as previously announced, the Company is exploring important joint venture opportunities in Asia.”
“The 22nd Century management team operates our Company with the absolute highest integrity,” said Joseph Pandolfino, Founder and Chief Executive Officer. “I have devoted the last 15 years of my life and essentially my entire net worth to 22nd Century. The issue I had with the SEC 23 years ago, when I was a kid in college, has given me the highest sense of awareness for securities laws and regulations. I would hope that the SEC investigates the author of the disparaging article on 22nd Century and other ‘short and distort’ authors. It is unfortunate that malicious articles by short sellers dupe and scare investors into selling.”
For additional information, please visit: www.xxiicentury.com
About 22nd Century Group, Inc.
22nd Century is a plant biotechnology company whose proprietary technology allows for the levels of nicotine and other nicotinic alkaloids (e.g., nornicotine, anatabine and anabasine) in the tobacco plant to be decreased or increased through genetic engineering and plant breeding. 22nd Century owns or is the exclusive licensee of 129 issued patents in 78 countries plus an additional 44 pending patent applications. Goodrich Tobacco Company, LLC and Hercules Pharmaceuticals, LLC are wholly-owned subsidiaries of 22nd Century. Goodrich Tobacco is focused on commercial tobacco products and potential less harmful cigarettes. Hercules Pharmaceuticals is focused on X-22, a prescription smoking cessation aid in development.
Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements:This press release contains forward-looking information, including all statements that are not statements of historical fact regarding the intent, belief or current expectations of 22nd Century Group, Inc., its directors or its officers with respect to the contents of this press release. The words “may,” “would,” “will,” “expect,” “estimate,” “anticipate,” “believe,” “intend” and similar expressions and variations thereof are intended to identify forward-looking statements. We cannot guarantee future results, levels of activity or performance. You should not place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date that they were made. These cautionary statements should be considered with any written or oral forward-looking statements that we may issue in the future. Except as required by applicable law, including the securities laws of the United States, we do not intend to update any of the forward-looking statements to conform these statements to reflect actual results, later events or circumstances, or to reflect the occurrence of unanticipated events. You should carefully review and consider the various disclosures made by us in our annual report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2013, filed on January 30, 2014, including the section entitled “Risk Factors,” and our other reports filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission which attempt to advise interested parties of the risks and factors that may affect our business, financial condition, results of operation and cash flows. If one or more of these risks or uncertainties materialize, or if the underlying assumptions prove incorrect, our actual results may vary materially from those expected or projected.
Contacts:
Redington, Inc.
Tom Redington, 203-222-7399
Source: 22nd Century Group, Inc.
© 2014 Canjex Publishing Ltd. All rights reserved.
You sure called the heavy volume. Just happened not to mention which way the share price was going to go. I am beginning to trust you knew about this article.
XXII Stock Message Board http://investorshangout.com/22Nd-Cent-XXII-68777/
You should reply them with the XXII PR rebuttal. That's too bad for them. What's so hard to believe about this company? That just shows us that only smart risk takers gain BIG in this life. Everyone else is just happy where they are (nothing wrong with that), but keep wishing and wishing for more without doing something about it--there is something wrong with that! Me, I'm tired of working for my money: I want my money working for me and generate income faster than me working if you know what I mean.
35%
Anyone who loaded under 2.00 is up 35% and should be praising the SA article for inducing a wild session. lol
Not to mention that these pros typically coordinate the selling pressure upon the release of article. Their selling sets the dominoes by hitting stop losses and snowballs from there. As you said, it's definitely more than just the innocent betting against the stock. The author probably has no clue.
This article almost appeared to be taking the side of the shorter. Unbelievable. It actually made Geo whatever seem like a legitimate entity and made the article sound reasonable. The article mentioned how these short sellers are merely placing bets the stock would go down, not mentioning it was the article itself that accomplished that!!! Talk about Topsy turvy!
Perker I trust your travel prognostications. Right about Poland. Right about Spain. Probably right about North Carolina. Probably right about Colorado. Do you arrange travel for the company? Just kidding and keep posting.
If only one could know how hard management is working and Henry travels more than the Secretary of State. He just got back from Colorado and has everyone there on board and ready to go. He goes a far real soon. So stay the course and in management we trust. Also, trust in me.
smart move... I totally missed best part of the opportunity as I was otherwise occupied through the first part of the trading day... 5.5 million shares turned loose today... somebodies going to regret letting go of those shares in a year or two...
the smart shorts got out today... the dumb ones got in... the shorters do this like clockwork... once you've been exposed to a few of these... you recognize it for what it is a paragraph into the article... actually the title itself was a pretty good tip off... yet it works, so it will continue to happen... just as long as retail investors remain gullible... it will continue to happen... jmo...
SA should be F'n shut down IMO
Go XXII
I sold stock to get in today thats how good this opportunity was.
I received a couple emails from friends warning me about XXII with the SA article attached . I've been trying to get them into this stock for a while. They had a feeling it was too good to be true. Unbelievable .
Had a chance to add today. SA to thank I guess
Web article sends stock on 22nd Century Group down 15%
22nd Century Group denies allegations by short seller
By David Robinson | News Business Reporter
on August 27, 2014 - 6:08 PM
inShare
Shares in 22nd Century Group, the Clarence company trying to develop a line of cigarettes with either very high or low levels of nicotine, lost 15 percent of their value Wednesday after an investor who stands to make money if the stock falls published a lengthy article that cast doubt on the firm’s prospects.
22nd Century executives responded by labeling the article as “ridiculously disparaging,” saying it was riddled with “incorrect assumptions and false conclusions.”
The article, posted on the Seeking Alpha investor website by a Pennsylvania-based hedge fund that will make a profit on its investment in 22nd Century if the share price declines, questioned whether the company’s cigarettes will turn into revenue-producing products and notes that the firm is running so short of cash that it will be forced to raise additional funds from investors within a few months.
The article accused 22nd Century executives of enriching themselves by collecting hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in pay from the company while the business continues to lose money and generates little revenue.
It also criticized the company’s involvement with firms that it has hired to promote 22nd Century’s stock and cited several announcements from the company touting developments that failed to pan out.
“There have been a lot of promises in the past that haven’t panned out,” said Dan David, GeoInvesting’s vice president, in an interview. “The one thing that has worked out “is the executives enriching themselves.”
The article sent 22nd Group’s stock tumbling by 15 percent, shaving its share price by 49 cents, to close at $2.68. 22nd Century shares, which traded for as much as $6.36 per share in mid-March, are worth no more than 20 cents, GeoInvesting said in the article.
“It appears the company is only good at building false hope so it can continue to raise money,” GeoInvesting said in the <URL destination="http://seekingalpha.com/article/2454105-22nd-century-group-a-lot-of-smoke-not-enough-fire">article.
22nd Century executives said the Seeking Alpha article took them by surprise and they accused GeoInvesting of taking “kernels of truth” about the company’s operations and interpreting them in the most negative way possible to help drive down the price of the lightly traded stock.
“Writing a 29-page article, as negative as this one was, makes this a self-fulfilling prophesy,” said Henry Sicignano III, 22nd Century’s president, in an interview. “We think the company is in better shape than it’s ever been.”
The company issued a statement challenging the accuracy of some of GeoInvesting’s allegations, including a claim that 22nd Century was in default on an agreement with North Carolina State University. They also denied that the company’s officers and directors had engaged in stock promotion and said 22nd Century continues to work on the development of the X-22, a cigarette intended for use as a prescription smoking-cessation aid that GeoInvesting said had been abandoned.
</URL>Regardless, the steep drop in 22nd Century’s stock price was good news for GeoInvesting, which has a history of successful investments as a short seller. A database compiled by Activist Shorts Research found that GeoInvesting had launched 38 short-selling activist campaigns, earning an average return of 48.5 percent.
Unlike traditional stock investors who buy a stock and hope it goes up in price, short sellers profit when they invest in a stock that goes down in value. Short sellers typically bet against a stock by selling shares that they have borrowed, in hopes that they will be able to repurchase them later at a lower price.
The relatively low trading volume of 22nd Century’s stock made it especially vulnerable to big swings in price. The shares, which traded an average of about 516,000 shares a day over the previous three months, saw its volume top 5.5 million shares Wednesday, more than 10 times more than usual.
The shares, which had fallen to as low as $1.92 late Wednesday morning and spent most of the day down by about 25 percent, rebounded in late afternoon trading after the company released its response to the article.
David, of GeoInvesting, said his firm first noticed 22nd Century’s stock in the spring, when the company’s shares rose above $6 after the company had made a series of announcements noting progress in bringing its cigarettes to the market. The company said it had won permission from federal tobacco regulators to start making its own cigarettes and had spent $6.4 million to purchase a North Carolina cigarette factory and cigarette-making equipment.
But as the company continued to wait for final agreement that would make it a participating member of the 1998 Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement between the tobacco industry and 46 states, the stock quickly sagged back to the $3 level within a month.
“There is a real business here,” David said. “It’s just not really happening for them.”
The company uses proprietary technology that allows it to manipulate the levels of nicotine and other chemicals in tobacco. Its Spectrum brand of research cigarettes can have the same amount of tar as conventional cigarettes but nicotine levels that vary from very low to very high. It also has plans to produce its Red Sun and Magic super-premium cigarette brands.
GeoInvesting also noted that Joseph Pandolfino, 22nd Century’s chief executive officer, had agreed to a settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission in 1992 on allegations that he fraudulently manipulated the price of two stocks by mailing anonymous letters urging people to buy shares in the companies.
Pandolfino agreed to pay about $26,000 – roughly the amount federal regulators said he made on the scheme while he was a 23-year-old graduate student at the University at Buffalo – to settle the charges.
“The issue I had with the SEC 23 years ago, when I was a kid in college, has given me the highest sense of awareness for securities laws and regulations,” Pandolfino said.
“I would hope that the SEC investigates the author of the disparaging article on 22nd Century and other ‘short and distort’ authors.”
“It is unfortunate that malicious articles by short sellers dupe and scare investors into selling,”he said.
Buffalonews
http://www.buffalonews.com/business/web-artic...5-20140827
Fair mentioned is in Dortmund, Germany under the name Inter Tabac between Sept 19-21, 2014.Professional audience only.
Nice to see Joe respond. I don't want to debate the range of what is considered imminent but would be greatly disappointed, again, if not announced Tuesday at latest. They know when they use the term imminent it will be translated, right or wrong (and they don't need to fuel the flame), as next day or two....
If Im management, Im wanting to destroy these shorters. And hit them where it hurts most...in the back pocket. I see PRs coming in the next day or two.
Agree Dane... two standouts in the PR ...which, in reading the tea leaves ...they were telling us more than what might appear on the surface.
IMHO... what they were saying:
1. MSA "imminent" ... i.e. approved and to be announced...
2. ASIA " the Company is exploring important joint venture opportunities in Asia.” i.e. heating up and near completion...
But who is Asia?... Where did they visit? We know...
I look for Friday/Tuesday for 1 or 2 or both.
