What Is Dylan Jovine’s (“Cut & Paste”) CRISPR Biotech Pick?

I’ve seen numerous ads for Dylan Jovine’s CRISPR stock teaser in recent months and finally decided to check it out. Specifically, I’m talking about the presentation where he teases a “breakthrough” that can supposedly “Cut & Paste” disease from the body.

In short, it’s a pitch for a newsletter he runs called Behind The Markets, and Jovine shares his pick in a report called “Living Software – The Small Company Revolutionizing Medicine,” which subscribers get access to.

However, as usual, I did some sleuthing to see what I could dig up. And in this post, I’ll show you what company I think he’s recommending.

“Cut & Paste” Disease from the Body?

Dylan Jovine began the presentation by teasing a mysterious “vial” full of a liquid that supposedly has the potential to cure “6,000 genetic diseases.” According to Jovine, this “treatment,” called CRISPR, could eliminate the need for medicine as we know it.

“The contents of this vial will change medicine and perhaps what it means to be human – I’ve never been more certain of anything in almost thirty years as a professional investor.  

“So what is this breakthrough that’s going to revolutionize medicine?

“How on earth does the liquid in this one vial have the potential to cure all 6,000 genetic diseases known to man?

“In short, it’s a treatment that eliminates the need for medicine as we currently know it.

It’s called CRISPR for short.”

Source: https://go.behindthemarkets.com/limited-time-offer-4

What is CRISPR?

CRISPR (an acronym for Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats) is a genome editing tool that, according to yourgenome.org, enables geneticists to edit parts of the genome by removing, adding, or altering sections of the DNA sequence.

And the basis of Dylan Jovine’s presentation is that this “breakthrough,” as he refers to it, can supposedly “Cut & Paste” disease from the human body.

“CRISPR allows scientists to tell a cell to go into your DNA and find the place where the mutation matches.

“And once it gets to the place it cuts the DNA and provides the sequence with a repair sequence.

“So that by the time you’re finished you’re left with a normal, healthy DNA sequence.

“In simple terms, CRISPR technology allows you to ‘Cut’ away bad genes ‘Paste’ in good ones.”

At one point, he described this tech as “living software.”

“The CRISPR technology is actually more like a ‘living software’ program…  

“You program it to ‘CUT’ mutated genes and ‘PASTE’ in healthy ones.”

Let’s be real; the whole “cut and paste” thing is a bit of a marketing gimmick.

But what Jovine said about this tech overall seems to (more or less) line up with what CRISPR is about (i.e., editing parts of the human genome with the goal of treating diseases).

Does that mean you’ll profit from his CRISPR pick?

Nope, but Jovine seems to think the company has huge potential.

During the presentation, he compared his recommendation to Amgen, a U.S.-based biopharmaceutical company that he says “made investors 46,750%.”

And after saying that “CRISPR is to the drug industry what the iPhone was to the old cell phone,” Jovine cited numerous examples of turning a small $1,000 stake into hundreds of thousands, even millions, of dollars.

Anything is possible in the stock market. But the reality is that, regardless of how good any technology might be, nobody knows how well any investment will do in the future. So I think it’s always worth taking some of what is said in the presentations with a pinch of salt.

In any case, I was keen to know what company Jovine was teasing, and in the next section, I’ll show you exactly what my research uncovered.

What Is Dylan Jovine’s CRISPR Pick?

Here’s a summary of the main clues Dylan Jovine shared about the CRISPR company he’s bullish on in the presentation:

“And that’s on top of the $120 million Bill Gates and Google Ventures already invested into this.”

[…]

“The current market capitalization is just $1.5 billion.

[…]

“My research has led me to a firm that was formed five years ago…

“And this small company has the patent on the most popular way of doing this.

“And they have the two other key ingredients: a strategic partner and they’ve already survived a patent challenge.

“In the last few months, they’ve announced positive results from a partnership with Allergan Pharmaceuticals and Celgene, one of the largest biotech companies in the world.”

What’s he teasing?

This one was actually pretty easy to solve…

The very first clue I looked into, the one about a $120 million investment involving Bill Gates and Google Ventures, led me to this Wired article centered around Editas Medicine Inc.

And from there, I looked into the other clues (above), which seem to line up.

For example, Editas Medicine (EDIT) has a roughly $1 billion market cap as of writing and was likely closer to $1.5 billion when Jovine published the presentation, which I think was in 2018.

Not only that, but Editas Medicine was originally founded under the name “Gengine, Inc.” in 2013, which matches Jovine’s clue about how the company was “formed five years ago.”

Lastly, according to this editasmedicine.com press release, the company had a partnership with Allergan and a “collaboration agreement” with Celgene as of the end of 2019. It’s unclear if Editas is still working with these companies, but either way, that’s a match.

What does the company do?

Editas Medicine is a clinical-stage biotechnology company based in Cambridge that’s developing therapies for rare diseases using CRISPR gene editing technology.

As for how the company’s technology works, explaining that is well above my pay grade. But there is a page on the company website dedicated to discussing its CRISPR gene editing platform, which explains how CRISPR gene editing works and discusses what the company is working on. So that’s probably the best page to see if you want to know more.

In any case, based on Jovine’s clues, Editas Medicine (ticker: EDIT) is the CRISPR company he’s teasing in the so-called “Cut & Paste” presentation.

If you want to know for sure, however, you’ll need to see Jovine’s report, which is called “Living Software – The Small Company Revolutionizing Medicine.”

And the only way to get that is to join his service, Behind The Markets.

What Is Behind The Markets?

Behind The Markets is Dylan Jovine’s flagship stock advisory service focused on long-term value investing. And according to the website, he typically recommends companies with a market cap of $1 billion to $10 billion (aka mid-caps).

I’m not a member of this service, but I have looked into different stock teaser presentations Dylan Jovine has released. For example, aside from this one, I recently looked into his “End of Alzheimer’s” pitch, which focused on a different biotech company.

And like this presentation, that teaser was promoting his Behind The Markets service. So if you want to get a better idea of what companies he recommends as part of this service, I recommend seeing the article I linked to above.

As for how it works, a subscription to Behind The Markets costs $39 for one year’s access at the time of writing if you join through the presentation.

And as a subscriber, you get Dylan Jovine’s latest insights and recommendations each month. According to Jovine, he normally shares one new pick a month or 12 a year.

You also get access to the model portfolio, updates on his picks, and other resources aimed at helping subscribers invest better.

As for whether it’s worth joining or not, that’s something only you can decide. But Jovine does appear to have recommended some decent stocks in his time. And for $39, there’s not a huge risk in giving the service a try.

Keep in mind, however, that investing itself is risky. So as with any service, you could potentially lose money if the recommendations don’t work out.

Bottom Line

Dylan Jovine’s CRISPR presentation is all about the potential behind CRISPR gene editing technology and a biotech company he’s bullish on, which I think is Editas Medicine.

I have no idea if that stock will go up or down, nor do I make predictions about that kind of thing. But I do think that this technology, in general, is very interesting.

What scientists are doing in regards to CRISPR, genomics, and synthetic biology, for example, is pretty incredible. And we appear to be at the very early stages of what is possible. So it will be interesting to see how the space develops in the years ahead.

Anyway, that’s my take. Thanks for reading.