Platinum Partners to Shut Down Main Fund; Here Are Its 5 Stock Picks

#3 Pedevco Corp (NYSEMKT:PED)

 – Shares owned by Platinum Partners (as of March 31): 3.41 million

 – Value of holding (as of March 31): $631,000

Moving on, Platinum Partners inched up its stake in Pedevco Corp (NYSEMKT:PED) by 1% during the first quarter. Last May, the company had priced its secondary public offering of 5.6 million shares at $0.50 per share, which had caused its stock to slump by 25%. Within a few days of that the stock fell further, by over 10% after Pedevco announced that it had agreed to acquire the U.S assets of Dome Energy in an $87 million all-stock deal. The rally in crude oil prices this year has helped most oil companies’ stocks to post positive gains, but Pedevco Corp (NYSEMKT:PED)’s is still trading down by nearly 3% year-to-date and by almost 95% from its mid-2013 highs.

#2 Echo Therapeutics Inc (NASDAQ:ECTE)

 – Shares owned by Platinum Partners (as of March 31): 829,183

 – Value of holding (as of March 31): $1.08 million

With Platinum Partners making no change to its stake in Echo Therapeutics Inc (NASDAQ:ECTE) during the first quarter, the company continued to remain the fund’s second-largest equity position. The only other hedge fund in our system that held a stake in Echo Therapeutics Inc (NASDAQ:ECTE) at the end of March was billionaire Ken Griffin‘s Citadel Investment Group, which initiated its stake in the company during the first quarter, purchasing 27,954 shares. On May 20 the company reported its first quarter financial results, declaring a loss per share of $0.23, an improvement from the loss per share of $0.72 that it reported a year earlier. The company spent $0.7 million on R&D during the first quarter, $0.1 million less than what it had spent during the same quarter of the previous year.

#1 Navidea Biopharmaceuticals Inc (NYSEMKT:NAVB)

 – Shares owned by Platinum Partners (as of March 31): 15.57 million

 – Value of holding (as of March 31): $14.71 million

Platinum Partners boosted its stake in Navidea Biopharmaceuticals Inc (NYSEMKT:NAVB) by 352% during the first quarter. Shares of the biopharmaceutical company have fallen significantly since May and are currently trading down by over 55% year-to-date. A large part of the decline came after the company’s accounting firm, BDO USA, LLP resigned on May 3, which analysts and investors took as a sign that something was wrong with the company’s financials. The company later disclosed in a regulatory filing that it had lost its request for temporary injunctive relief against financier Capital Royalty Partners II. L.P. In April, Capital Royalty Partners had informed Navidea Biopharmaceuticals that it had defaulted on its loan agreement with the financing firm. However, Navidea Biopharmaceuticals Inc (NYSEMKT:NAVB) has so far denied that is in default. Citadel Investment Group reduced its stake in the company by 69% to 12,279 shares during the first quarter.

Disclosure: None