At 0827 GMT, the FTSEurofirst 300 index of top European shares was up 0.7 percent at 850.29 points after falling in the previous two sessions. The index, which slumped 45 percent in 2008, has jumped 31 percent since falling to a lifetime low in early March.

Elan rose 6.6 percent after the Sunday Times newspaper said that Novartis was in talks to buy parts of Elan, including its flagship multiple sclerosis products and its Alzheimer’s disease pipeline. Novartis was down 0.3 percent.

A spokeswoman for Elan said it did not comment on speculation. A spokesman for Novartis declined to comment.

Novo Nordisk gained 4.4 percent, clawing back most of last week’s losses, on expectations that sales of its modern insulins will benefit from concerns over the safety of Sanofi-Aventis’s rival product Lantus.

Sanofi rose more than 1 percent, levelling out after plunging last week on concerns about imminent new research findings on Lantus and cancer. Details of four European trials highlighting a possible link were made public after the market close on Friday.

But despite Monday’s gains, the European index is on track to close the month in a negative territory after advancing in the previous three months.

“It’s quite clear that we have lost momentum over the last week or so. The strong rally that we saw in cyclicals through the early part of the second quarter has started to fade,” said Darren Winder, head of macro and strategy research at Cazenove.

“But I don’t think this is the beginning of a downward trend. The markets are basically in a trading range at the moment and are looking for signs of economic recovery. And those signs are not going to be there in a very visible way until the autumn.”

UBS fell 1.7 percent. The bank is to pay 3 billion to 5 billion Swiss francs ($2.77-$4.62 billion) in the next two weeks to settle a U.S. tax probe into the bank, Swiss newspaper Sonntag reported.

Other banks were broadly higher. Barclays , Lloyds , Royal Bank of Scotland and Societe Generale were up 0.3-3.2 percent.

Energy stocks were among top gainers on the index as they tracked firmer crude oil prices . BP , Royal Dutch Shell , BG Group , Repsol , Total and StatoilHydro added 0.6-1.7 percent.

Miners got strength from a 1.2 percent rise in copper prices and a 1.3 percent increase in nickel prices. BHP Billiton , Antofagasta , Rio Tinto , Xstrata and Eurasian Natural Resources rose 0.3-2.2 percent.

Anglo American was up 0.4 percent. The Sunday Telegraph reported that the miner was building its defences against a 41 billion pound ($67.74 billion) merger approach from Xstrata by plotting talks about a major Chinese investment.

Across Europe, UK’s FTSE 100 index, Germany’s DAX  and France’s CAC 40  were up 0.5-0.6 percent.

LONDON, June 29 (Reuters)

Here’s my take on what that means…

The scientists at Isis seek to treat disease by first identifying the sequence of a gene known to have a causative role in that disease.

They then synthesize a strand of nucleic acid (DNA, RNA or a chemical analogue) to bind to the messenger RNA (mRNA) produced by that gene and to modify it or in effect, turn the gene “off”.

It’s that synthesized nucleic acid that is called an “antisense”. (The unblocked gene’s mRNA is called the “sense” sequence.)

The folks at Isis have been working with this technology for years. Back in 1998, the company received marketing clearance for the world’s first antisense drug. That same drug, Vitravene (now marketed by Novartis), has been approved by the FDA for the treatment for cytomegalovirus retinitis.

Antisense drugs could prove the key to the treatments of various cancers, diabetes, ALS, Duchenne muscular dystrophy, etc…

But why invest today?

It was announced just this morning that Abbott Laboratories (NYSE:ABT) will be exercising an option to purchase Ibis Biosciences, Inc., a subsidiary of Isis, for $175 million. This is in addition to payments for post-closing sales of Ibis systems and equipment.

This will bring a nice boost to Isis who just last quarter, saw a net profit margin of 5.32%. I know that doesn’t sound like much, but actual profits for drug discovery outfits aren’t always the norm.

I recommend you buy shares of Isis Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ:ISIS) at or under $13 and hold on for double-digit gains.

Source: It’s time to buy Isis Pharmaceuticals (ISIS)

Swiss drug maker Novartis is taking Nestle’s 77% slice US eye-care company Alcon for $39 billion. Yahoo!, meanwhile, is sending smoke signals to Microsoft that it wouldn’t be against a bid if the price is right.

According to CityWire in Britain, the FTSE 100 broke through the 6,000 level “on a flurry of major corporate merger and acquisition reports from across the Atlantic.”

“The deal-making market is a key to the health of the US stock market,” says Jason Simpkins.

“The US buyout market is about to enter a new phase as corporate takeovers pick up where private-equity firms left off last fall. During much of 2006 and 2007, it was the steady stream of private-equity buyouts and corporate mergers and acquisitions (M&A) deals that propelled the key U.S. stock indices to one record high after another.

“When the deals are flowing, investors are willing to pay more for their shares, figuring the odds for a nice payday are higher. And the deal market was white-hot through the middle half of last year. Private-equity firms had amassed huge war chests. They were buying stakes in big companies and were buying smaller companies outright.”