Friday, February 16, 2024

Janover: Bringing Better Experience to Real Estate Lending

 PRIME SERIES


  • Janover brings a new search and application platform to the commercial real estate lending market, using technology and artificial intelligence to make the process more human.
  • Real estate lending is expected to recover in 2024, after inflation, rising interest rates and persistent vacancies due to persistent work-from home arrangements led to a decade low in 2023.
  • Recovery in real estate loan activity or none, frictions in the lending process present obstacles and increase costs for borrowers and frustrate lenders looking for customers.        
  • The Janover team believes they can democratize the prevailing real estate lending sector with a platform that brings transparency to lender discovery and streamlines applications.
  • A recent strategic acquisition of a complementary business and new partnerships are expected to boost growth beginning in the current year.
  • Janover stock appears to have gone unnoticed by investors, leaving an unappreciated opportunity in the fintech sector.

 

The real estate industry is staging for a recovery this year as inflation subsides and interest rates stabilize.  The Mortgage Bankers Association estimates the industry could experience 19% increase in the dollar value of all real estate loan volume in 2024 over 2023.  Commercial and multifamily mortgage loans are expected to lead the industry with 29% year-over-year increase in loan value. 

The turnaround is not likely there will be a complete U-turn to how things were in real estate lending before the coronavirus pandemic with the attendant inflation and higher interest rates.  Demand for office space has been profoundly altered, shifting plans and strategies for real estate projects. Perhaps more importantly, real estate professionals are looking for change in how they go about their business.

Decision makers of all stripes have grown accustomed to the immediacy and convenience of digital applications.  The analog practices of the past are just not good enough for the present-day real estate sector.  Technology based on artificial intelligence (AI) is well-suited to industry that requires participants to wade through vast amounts of data.  Programs enhanced with AI can efficiently sift through the bits and bytes to streamline property search and analysis, deepen due diligence, fine tune project design or match compatible counterparties.

Friday, February 09, 2024

Clearmind Medicine: Exploring a Pathway out of Alcohol Abuse

 PRIME SERIES


Clearmind Medicine (CMND) is a clinical stage pharmaceutical company with the promising CMND-100 candidate at the front end of its pipeline.  CMND-100 is based on the psychoactive compound MEAI, shorthand for the synthetic molecule 5-MEthoxy-2-AminoIndine.  The Company purchased the compound in 2021, and has since completed several pre-clinical studies in animals to establish safety and metabolic profiles.  

One of the pre-clinical studies tested MEAI as a curb for alcohol cravings in ‘binge drinking’ mice.  The MEAI compound interacts with central nervous system elements, specifically serotonergic receptors 5-HT1A and 5-HT2B as well as adrenergic receptors α2A, α2B and α2C.  The receptor 5-HT1A is particularly important in alcohol dependence, so agonists of this receptor could help in reducing alcohol intake.  Importantly, MEAI may have application for other binge-like diseases such as cocaine abuse and overeating.

Results for early tests have been promising, prompting the Company to make plans for human clinical trials.  In early 2023, an Investigational New Drug (IND) application was submitted to the U.S. Federal Drug Administration (FDA) for the first human clinical trials of MEAI as CMND-100 aimed at patients with Alcohol Abuse Disorder or AUD. 

The U.S. trials will be conducted at the Yale School of Medicine’s Department of Psychiatry and Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.  A similar application has been submitted to Israel’s Pharmaceutical Division of the Ministry of Health, which regulates the drug registration process in that country.

Friday, January 05, 2024

Storming of the Capital

On the Anniversary of January 6, 2021 Storming of the U.S. Capital:  a look back at how Donald Trump won the 2106 election from a financial analyst’s perspective. 

 

The following commentary was originally posted on January 24, 2017, following Donald Trump’s victory in the U.S. Electoral College in the 2016 Election.  Trump was sworn in as president of the United States despite Hillary Clinton prevailing by a significant margin in the popular vote.  Donald Trump had been so clever to stoke fervor in those states with an inordinate representation in the Electoral College.  This author’s home state of South Dakota is just one such jurisdiction.  Despite a low population, South Dakota punches above its weight with three Electoral College votes.  Trump’s surprise win inspired a closer look at demographics, economics and social trends on a state-by-state basis.

The analysis uncovered hate groups and tendencies to solve problems with violence.  When the post was first published, some readers thought it nonsense.   Fast forward to today, few would deny the popularity of Donald Trump among members of hate groups.  Videos of the U.S. Capital Building under siege on January 6, 2021, make it clear that the Trump team solves problems with violence.  Donald Trump, with his tough talk of revenge and dictatorship, continues to stoke the fire burning in the bellies of hate groups.  As a consequence, in November 2024 as it was in November 2016, it is all about HATE.    

 


The 2016 presidential election was two months ago and one might think it should be treated like so much water under the bridge.  Yet last week just one day after Trump took the oath of office, over a half million people swarmed into Washington DC to remind the new president that his campaign to ‘make America great again’ would not be allowed to roll over social and economic progress made over the last few decades.  Mostly women, they came wearing pink hats and carrying signs against racism, sexism and hate.  Over 400 marches of the same sort were simultaneously held in communities around the country.

Friday, December 29, 2023

Happy New Year!

 





"Learn from yesterday, 

live for today, 

hope for tomorrow." 

        —    Albert Einstein



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