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Trouble for deCODE

Iceland biotech linkurl:deCODE Genetics;http://www.the-scientist.com/2008/4/1/20/1/ is taking a hit from the global financial downswing. The company's stock price has plunged 54% since September to $0.45 a share. According to NASDAQ's s regulations, companies must keep their share prices over $1. DeCODE dipped below $1 on September 10, and has 180 days to bounce back to maintain a NASDAQ listing. (The company's net worth, $27.88 million, puts it above the $5 million -- not $50 million, as lin

Written byAndrea Gawrylewski
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Iceland biotech linkurl:deCODE Genetics;http://www.the-scientist.com/2008/4/1/20/1/ is taking a hit from the global financial downswing. The company's stock price has plunged 54% since September to $0.45 a share. According to NASDAQ's s regulations, companies must keep their share prices over $1. DeCODE dipped below $1 on September 10, and has 180 days to bounce back to maintain a NASDAQ listing. (The company's net worth, $27.88 million, puts it above the $5 million -- not $50 million, as linkurl:Nature reported;http://www.nature.com/news/2008/081014/full/455842a.html?s=news_rss -- required to keep its listing.) "We have been seriously influenced by the American banking crisis and not the Icelandic," Kari Stefansson, founder and CEO of the company told Nature. "But we will survive. We are working on refinancing and restructuring the company. And we are fairly optimistic today that we will succeed." The Iceland economy has been in free-fall for nearly a month, with the government seizing banks and the stock market shut down. Iceland is now turning to Russia for emergency loans. In the last month, deCODE scientists linkurl:identified;http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v455/n7210/full/nature07229.html three new schizophrenia-associated mutations, filed an FDA new drug application for Alzheimers, and linkurl:reported;http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18849993?ordinalpos=1&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_DefaultReportPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum on genetic variants at risk for basel-cell carcinoma, the journal reported. Last week the company launched a controversial personal breast cancer screening test, called deCODE BreastCancer, that was met with some skepticism. The simple blood test is meant to assess whether a woman has a potential risk for common forms of breast cancer. "There is at least a significant chance this test will could falsely reassure some women and alarm others," Eric Winer, oncologist at Harvard University, told the linkurl:Washington Post.;http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/07/AR2008100702682.html
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