Thestreet.com reiterates Sell recommendation--Which is a contrarian signal to Buy

Adam Feuerstein is the biotech analyst at Jim Cramer's Thestreet.com.  He had a Sell recommendation on Dendreon ("DNDN"), before it subsequently soared from $3 to $58 after its prostate cancer drug Provenge was approved by the FDA on April 29, 2010.  (Editor's note:  shares of DNDN have subsequently plummeted back to $5.28 as of today due to commercial uptake issues).

Feuerstein has also had multiple Sell recommendations on another battleground biotech company, Arena Pharmaceuticals ("ARNA").  Shares of arena have also soared from its 52-week low of $1.23 to its 52-week high of $13.50 upon FDA approval of its anti-obesity drug Belviq ("Lorcaserin").  Today, Thestreet.com reiterated a Sell recommendation on ARNA, with the shares trading around $8.72.

http://www.thestreet.com/story/11800338/1/arena-pharmaceuticals-inc-stock-sell-recommendation-reiterated-arna.html

With the benefit of hindsight, any investors listening to Thestreet.com's recommendations would have lost money--or worse, missed out on spectacular returns of more than 1000%.

Meanwhile, Thestreet.com settled Federal civil charges of accounting fraud.  In typical Wall Street fashion,

TheStreet Inc. and the three executives neither admitted nor denied the allegations but agreed to refrain from future violations of the securities laws.

This outcome occurred despite these shenanigans by the company's executives:

The company filed false financial reports throughout 2008 which reported revenue from sham transactions at the subsidiary, which it acquired in 2007, the SEC said. The subsidiary conducts promotions such as sweepstakes on the Internet.

The agency said Alwine and Barnett made the phony transactions and also fabricated and backdated documents to enable the fraud.

Here is a link to the story:  http://finance.yahoo.com/news/thestreet-com-company-3-executives-182033815.html;_ylt=A2KJjb3ILNtQwGgApCSTmYlQ

Meanwhile, shareholder value of Thestreet.com has plummeted over the years.  Here is a price chart of TheStreet ("TST") shares from 1999 to December, 2012:

http://finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=TST+Interactive#symbol=tst;range=my;compare=;indicator=volume;charttype=area;crosshair=on;ohlcvalues=0;logscale=off;source=undefined;

Shares have plummeted from $45 to $1.61.  How this firm has been accused of and prosecuted for accounting fraud, and has consistently put out wrong directional investing recommendations, and is now trading as a penny stock--but can still stay in the business of stock-picking is beyond me.  But wait--we have our answer:  Jim Cramer, the clownish host on CNBC's Mad Money show is Thestreet.com's co-founder.

In hindsight, TheStreet.com should have put a Sell recommendation on itself 13 years ago.  As for Thestreet.com's reiteration of a Sell recommendation for ARNA, you be the judge.