Why Axovant Sciences, The Habit Restaurants, and Silvercorp Metals Slumped Today
Tuesday was a relatively calm day for the stock market, leaving the Dow and S&P 500 little changed and still trading near all-time highs. Investors continue to wrestle with a variety of long-term themes, including the future of monetary policy from the Federal Reserve and ongoing geopolitical tension with North Korea. Yet absent major news on those fronts, market participants seemed content to let the indexes tread water as the third quarter draws to a close at the end of the week. Even with stable conditions, some stocks suffered losses, and Axovant Sciences (NASDAQ: AXON), The Habit Restaurants (NASDAQ: HABT), and Silvercorp Metals (NYSEMKT: SVMLF) were among the worst performers on the day. Below, we'll look more closely at these stocks to tell you why they did so poorly.
Shares of Axovant Sciences plunged more than 70% after the biotech company released phase 3 clinical trial results for its intepirdine candidate drug. Axovant said that its Mindset study didn't meet key primary efficacy endpoints, failing to show statistically significant improvement in cognition or activities of daily living compared to a placebo. CEO David Hung was "deeply disappointed by these trial results," but he noted that intepirdine and fellow candidate drug nelotanserin are still under evaluation for patients suffering from a form of dementia. Nevertheless, the results are another loss in the battle that millions of patients are fighting against Alzheimer's.
Image source: Axovant Sciences.
Source: Fool.com