Has anyone heard of biotech analyst Mark Schoenebaum?

Unfortunately, he passed in 2019. This article speaks so highly of him. Is this type of analyst common in ER?

https://news.yahoo.com/mark-schoenebaum-best-biotech-analyst-175140199.html 

Mark Schoenebaum was a brilliant and successful Wall Street research analyst who fundamentally changed the way sell-siders cover biotech stocks. More importantly, Mark was a remarkably nice guy. Wall Street is not known for warm and fuzzy people, but Mark smashed that mold. He was kind and funny. He was gregarious and uncommonly generous to colleagues, friends, and even strangers.

Most of the biotech investment community first heard about Mark’s death via a gut-wrenching email sent by his friend and former colleague Umer Raffat on Sunday evening.

“We’ve all looked up to him as the very best equity research analyst there has ever been on Wall Street,” Raffat wrote. “But that was only part of who he was: he was an absolute standout individual who touched so many lives, and whose strength of character showed in his sheer humility despite his absolutely unprecedented success.”

As news of Mark’s untimely death spread on Twitter, others took time to post their own fond remembrances. In all of these tweets, there was a common thread: Mark’s humanity, thoughtfulness, and generosity. He made time for people. He was a mentor. He offered guidance, help, advice.

This tweet, from @SanderDuncan, memorialized Mark so well: “I was 24 and completely useless to Mark, but he didn’t hesitate to help.”

This is also the Mark that I knew. As a reporter covering the intersection of biotech and Wall Street, Mark was an invaluable source of information, context, and analysis. He knew everything — and seemingly everyone — that was going on in biotech. While other sell-side analysts walled themselves off for the sake of paying institutional investor clients, Mark made himself astonishingly accessible. He freely shared his research reports with journalists. You were invited to listen to his conference calls and log into his webinars. He was quick to return texts and emails. And if travel or his insanely busy schedule got in the way, he would apologize for taking so long to respond.

I’m heading into my 20th year covering biotech, which makes me 1) very old, but 2) uniquely qualified to place Mark’s Wall Street career in its proper perspective. So, I say this without a hint of hyperbole: Mark was the most influential sell-side analyst that I’ve ever known.

There are a lot of smart people in this business, but Mark’s genius was understanding the changing role of sell-side health care research on Wall Street. Investors wanted an honest information broker, not a stock picker. Mark understood that investors didn’t care about his buy or sell recommendations, or his price targets. What they needed, even craved, was fast access to clinical data, analysis, and historical perspective.

Mark was the best at his job because he was the guy on Wall Street whom health care specialists and generalist investors turned to most for understanding the why of biotech investing. He made the complex easy to understand. He sent emails — lots and lots of emails. Really, so many emails. He used big fonts and rainbow colors. He was like a slightly nerdy but exuberant biotech teacher. He loved biotech and it was that passion that made us all love attending his class.

Mark exited Wall Street and biotech research in the middle of 2017. By the time he left, other analysts were emulating his style and methods. It’s a testament to Mark’s mentoring abilities that Umer Raffat, his former associate and pupil, has succeeded to become the industry’s top biotech and pharma analyst.

Last December, I sent Mark a “let’s catch up” email after he had posted on LinkedIn about considering a return to biotech. In typical Mark fashion, he responded to my email as if I was doing him a great honor by bugging him with questions.

“Hey Adam! So great to hear from you my friend. How you doing? I’m on vacation till the end of the year. Let’s try to touch base before or after the JP Morgan conference. Sound like a deal? I can’t thank you enough for the email. Very thoughtful of you. Sorry I have not done a better job of staying in touch with you over the last few years.”

We finally had a chance to speak with each other in February. We spent about an hour on the phone, catching up. He was excited about the possibility of getting back into the biotech world in some fashion, perhaps running a startup or joining a company as CFO. He sounded relaxed, well rested, at peace.

He sounded like the old Mark — the guy we all miss so much.