What is Happening to Pacific Biosciences Stock?

Someone once said that bankruptcy happens very slowly, then all of a sudden. That’s about how you’d describe the one stock we held until bankruptcy – Invitae (NVTA) – as it quickly went from growth story to deadly trap. Fortunately, we limit the amount of money we invest in any given stock to avoid chasing falling knives.

Today, we’re going to discuss a stock we last looked at just over a year ago – Pacific Biosciences (PACB) – a play on the exciting future of long-read sequencing.

The Long-Read Sequencing Thesis

Traditionally, genome sequencing has been performed using short-read sequencing (SRS) machines of the type produced by the undisputed short-read technology leader, Illumina (ILMN). While SRS provides accuracy, a more expensive type of sequencing – long-read sequencing (LRS) – allows for comprehensiveness as the name implies. That’s all set to change according to ARK Invest which expects the cost to sequence a whole human genome with LRS technology will drop to $100-$200, its accuracy superior to SRS across all variant types by the end of 2025. By that time the market will be worth $5 billion which is just over the $4.5 billion Illumina saw in 2023 revenues. Speaking of which, the Illumina Complete L