Because Monday is a public holiday celebrating two of our presidents, Washington and Lincoln, it gives us a chance to take a break from their current successor's rants and raves against, among other fiends, the free press, of which I am a part. The markets are digesting big news, including a bid for Unilever by Kraft and, in our case, lots of quarterly and annual reports.

With a holiday coming, equity traders are busily locking in some recent wow profits with sales, taking down the markets to take some money off the table, not just in Trumplandia, but worldwide.

The dollar is down too, maybe because of the terrifying press conference and the clear disarray of the current administration.

There will be no blog Monday. We also have a new stock pick in anticipation of St. Patrick's Day, from Ireland plus an explan​a​tion of my headline.

For years I have resisted the charms of Shire plc of Ireland whose primary listing is in London because I think its key drug, for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in children, is a racket to protect schoolteachers who cannot control their classes. However, my son, a CFA married to an education PhD, has long put SHPG ADRs in accounts his firm manages (including my managed pension plan).

Shire yesterday reported good results both from internal growth and its $32 billion takeover of Baxalta last Jan. The former was the ADHD franchise and the latter new businesses. And the growth of sales in 2016 of 78% to $11.39 billion came mostly from Baxalta lines helped Shire beat analyst forecasts. New treatment lines, including Baxalta ones, accounted for $8.6 billion of the growth last year. New drugs in non-oncology rare diseases and internal medicines, up 14% and 17% respectively last year and include hematology, immunology, opthtamic, lysosomal disorders, and neuroscience. (The latter includes ADHD.) Shire is now a key rare disease drug-maker.

Last year it used the money partly to cut the debt from the Baxalta deal by $1 bn. CEO Flemming Ornskow said paying down the $22 billion it still owes is a key challenge for the current year with his aim to get it down to 2 to 3 x cash flow. This hit $4.7 billion last year.

The new drugs include Cinryze and Firzyr to treat hereditary angio-edema plus other genetic diseases, which now account of $2.7 billion of sales. Another winner was Xiildra to treat dry eyes which accounted for a quarter of US sales. Meanwhile Vyvanse, the ADHD drug sold $2 billion, below forecasts. CEO Ornskow forecast that revenue will rise in double-digits this year with as the key for the current one. Many new meds were launched last year but are only beginning to gain market share. He said sales should reach $14.5-14.8 billion this year. Moreover there are still more synergies between the two drug lines in the plan, cutting costs.

The very positive 2017 outlook led brokers Beaufort Securities in London figure that the real Shire current p/e ratio is around 14x, although the formal level is 18.4x. Beaufort also worked out that Shire is trading at only 11.6x 2017 enterprise value/cash flow (EBITDA, as above) a low among drug companies because it expects cash flow to grow 35% nest year. It put a buy today on Shire in Britain at £47.57 with a target price of £62, and expectation also that the yield, now 0.5%, will also pick up.

The report is by Ben Martland, CFA in London. For a niche drug company with a small number of products, he says the risks are higher than with a drug major. Because of its strong US sales the currency risk is moderate, in my view, but there are risks from any reform of drug pricing and reimbursement from the changes in Obamacare cited by Ian Smith of Investor's Chronicle. Smith thinks the hemophilia drug is being under-valued by the analysts, and thinks non-US orders, which are bigger but less frequent that those in the US will boost 2017 results.

Shire is rated a buy by Citigroup, Deutsche Bank, and Liberum Capital, the latter with a lower target price than Martlands, of £55. I bought the ADR rather than the SHPGY pink sheet shares which are a third of an ADR at $180.85 and if I don't get them I will re-input Monday which is a working day in England and Ireland.

Benitec Biopharma reported that it presented data on development of its hepatitis B DNA-directed RNA interference agents, BB-102, and BB-103 at the Shanghai International Liver Meeting today. This came after successful studies in chimeric mice reported last Dec. where a single injection of dd RNAi suppressed the hep B virus for 56 days and even longer when combined with antiviral agent entecavir. A chimeric mouse is one whose own liver cells have been replaced with human hepatocopytes so they can be infected with hepatitis B.

Stada Artzneimittel now confirms that it has a third potential buyer, unnamed, offering euros 58/sh, 2 euros above the offer from Cinven and Advent International. 

Swiss Roche (which can do French) is suing Amgen in a Delaware court for failing to provide the data it needs to resolve patent disputes over a biosimilar to Avastin in what it calls “a patent dance”. This violates the US Biologics Price Comepetition and Innovation Act, RHHBY claims.

The Norsemen and Mounties are Coming

The Norwegian Sovereign Wealth Fund is increasing its equity exposure by 5% to 75% to make up for low bond yields. This should boost the stocks of companies from Norway and the region. One to consider is Norwegian Air Shuttle which has fallen over 6% since it announced that it would offer bargain biz class transatlantic flights between Stewart International Airport (up the Hudson near Newburgh, NY) via Cork and Shannon in Ireland to Oslo to make up for the scant landing slots at JFK. I am not convinced this is a non-starter. Newburgh is not only accessible from NYC but also from parts of NJ, PA, CT, and MA and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey may gear up to run buses there from its terminals on 34^th Street and 168^th St. in Manhattan.

But beside that long shot we can envisage Norway buying into financial firms like Finland's Sampo or Sweden's Investor, and some of the Danish drug companies we cover.

Canadians are advised to buy dual-listed local blue chip shares, which also trade in the USA, by blog dailybuyselladvisors because “inte​r​listing” allows them to gain visibility and the ability to do deals here. Among the recommended shares for the newsletter are Bank of Nova Scotia, Barrick Gold, BCE, CAE, and other banks, insurance firms, and energy producers, plus the two railroads. Starting from the US, I look for Canadians which offer an investment not available in this country, a bank active in Latin America, a solid gold mine, a dominant telco, and a maker of airplane training simulators.

War and Wall Stocks

BAE Systems won a boost from UK brokerage Kepler Cheuvreux which upped its target price on the recommended share from GBX600 to 700. BAESY, the ADR, is equal to 4 shares, and trades at $30.16. The target price now is $30-35.

After it reported, CAE was rated sector perform by Royal Bank of Canada, but outperform by Scotiabank.

Ecopetrol's no. 2 pipeline, Cano Limon Covenas, was hit by a bombing of its pumping station by the Marxist ELN rebels, who unlike the FARC, have not yet concluded their peace talks with the Bogota government. State-controlled EC is a target for guerrillas.

Mexichem is paying its first dividend since we owned it, at NMP 01.25/sh, about half a penny/sh, on Feb. 28, which will be repeated quarterly.

More ATMs, 5,200, will be set up in Mexico by Bank of Nova Scotia (Scotiabank) in cooperation with the Intercam Banco financial group. They currently run only 1,690 (BNS) and 84 (Intercam). Canada's BNS currently has deals with Inbursa, BanBajio, Afirme, andBanRegio in Mexican ATMs, which interconnect for customers according to Eduardo Garcia writing in www.sentidocomun.co.mx with which we exchange.

Funds

JP Morgan Chase is proposing to liquidate the JPMorgan China Regional Fund we own at the May 11 annual meeting. We will get proxies to vote and get the proceeds which may not be paid out all at once because there are exchange control restrictions on the repatriation of the proceeds of sale of Chinese A shares. There are also tax consequences. The bank has long been uncomfortable with the sole closed-end fund it runs in the US but this may not be the best outcome for shareholders. A merger would be better if Jamie Dimon can swallow his pride.

British solicitor P. Gerald Malone is running for renewal of his chairmanship of Aberdeen Asia Pacific Income Fund FAX, and Global Income Fund FCO. He is also chairman of the board of trustees of the Aberdeen Funds in Britain. By no means does he qualify, as the prospectus reads, as independent nominee.

Russ Koesterich of Blackrock Global Allocation Fund recommends the investors buy gold as an insurance against elections in Europe, Brexit, and political uncertainty in the US, all political risks he says are not sufficiently taken into consideration by markets.

​Since his group does not offer a gold fund, I am pretty sure he is buying SPDR Gold, GLD with the $41 billion he has under management.

More agita on Advent Claymore Global Convertible Securities & Income Fund, AGC, as a 4.07% increase in ownership was reported to the SEC by manager Tracy Martland V, and 4.2% by the management group. He owns of 1.67% of the shares outstanding and the managers 1.62% of them. However Advisors Asset Mgm Inc now owns only 6.82% of shares out, down by a third. The main buyer has been a hedge fund operating out of the Cayman Island, not on this list.

Korea Fund stock has been sold by 1607 Capital Partners and after selling 1.05% of its holdings it now owns only 7.3% of the shares out. One reason may be that the rival Korea Equity Fund is now being bought by Phil Goldstein, the activist.