Did the Checkpoint Inhibitor Bubble Just Burst?
Shares of Agenus (NASDAQ: AGEN), a small-cap cancer immunotherapy company, were down by almost 16% at 1:20 p.m. Thursday as a result of AstraZeneca's (NYSE: AZN) Mystic trial missing its primary endpoint for progression-free survival in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Shares of Bristol-Myers Squibb's (NYSE: BMY) , which is pursuing a similar combination therapy for front-line NSCLC, also fell by as much as 6.8% in early morning trading, and were still off by 3.5% at 1:20 p.m.
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When checkpoint inhibitor antibodies work, they tend to be wildly successful, producing remarkable responses against a variety of cancers. The key concern, though, is that they only seem to work for 10% to 30% or so of patients -- which means most don't respond to these potentially game-changing therapies. Pharma companies like Agenus, AstraZeneca, and Bristol were all hoping to solve that problem by combining their checkpoint inhibitors with other anti-cancer agents.
Source: Fool.com