Over the past week, a few biotech companies made absolutely massive runs. In the past year, the health care sector was on fire from positive trials, U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approvals and mergers and acquisitions.
The companies 24/7 Wall St. has picked stood out from the rest with incredible gains or losses over the course of the past week. We have included information about each company, as well as recent trading activity and the consensus price target.
Aeterna Zentaris
Leading the bulls in last Tuesday’s regular trading session, Aeterna Zentaris Inc. (NASDAQ: AEZS) announced that it has finalized of a co-marketing agreement with Armune BioScience that will allow it to promote Armune’s Apifiny, the only cancer specific, non-PSA blood test for the detection of prostate cancer.
Under the co-marketing agreement, Aeterna Zentaris will promote Apifiny to designated medical professionals in its U.S. territories and will receive a commission for each test performed resulting from its targeted promotion.
Shares of Aeterna closed out Friday at $7.94, with a consensus analyst price target of $12.00 and a 52-week trading range of $3.19 to $89.00. Over the course of the week shares dropped 27%, while year to date shares are down 86%.
Anavex Life Sciences
On Monday, Anavex Life Sciences Corp. (NASDAQ: AVXL) announced the publication of further data for Anavex 3-71 (formerly AF710B) in the peer-reviewed scientific journal Neurodegenerative Diseases. The data provide evidence for a positive, more upstream effect on reducing synaptic loss, amyloid and tau pathologies and neuroinflammation, which is potentially beneficial for the treatment of Alzheimer’s and other neurological diseases.
Shares of Anavex ended the week at $6.33. The consensus analyst price target is $10.16, and the 52-week range is $3.16 to $14.84. Over the course of the week shares increased 16%, while they are down 32% year to date.
Arena Pharmaceuticals
News of an FDA approval prompted Arena Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ: ARNA) shares to jump in Monday’s trading session. The company announced that the FDA has accepted for filing the New Drug Application (NDA) for an extended release formulation of lorcaserin. If this is approved, the extended release formulation will offer patients a chronic weight management treatment in a once-daily dosing option.
Lorcaserin is currently approved as an adjunct to a reduced-calorie diet and increased physical activity for chronic weight management in adults who are obese or just overweight with at least one weight-related medical condition, such as high blood pressure, high cholesterol or type 2 diabetes.
Arena shares closed Friday at $2.07, with a consensus price target of $5.50 and a 52-week range of $1.60 to $6.28. Last week shares rose 3%, while shares are down 37% year to date.
Foamix Pharmaceuticals
On Thursday, Foamix Pharmaceuticals Ltd. (NASDAQ: FOMX) announced positive top-line results from its Phase 2 clinical study of FDX104 (a topical foam containing 4% doxycycline). This drug candidate is used in the prevention of moderate-to-severe skin rashes in patients treated with the epidermal growth factor receptor antibody inhibitors (EGFRI) cetuximab (Erbitux, Eli Lilly) or panitumumab (Vectibix, Amgen) for head, neck and colon cancers, among others. The results showed a statistically significant effect of FDX104 in reducing the severity of the antibody-induced rash.
Foamix stock closed Friday at $8.61 per share, within a 52-week trading range of $5.59 to $14.00. The consensus price target is $19.50. Over the course of the week, shares grew 16%. Year to date, shares are up 24%.
InVivo Therapeutics
InVivo Therapeutics Holdings Corp. (NASDAQ: NVIV) has made massive strides over the course of this year in the development of its spinal cord injury (SCI) treatment. It added to those gains and ran with the bulls on Wednesday morning with news of its most recent strategy.
The company announced a new strategy for the treatment of chronic SCI. InVivo will focus its research efforts for chronic SCI on Bioengineered Neural Trails, which are injectable combinations of biomaterials and neural stem cells delivered using minimally invasive surgical instrumentation and techniques to create trails across the chronic injury site.
InVivo were trading at $8.61 on Friday’s close. The consensus price target is $19.50. The 52-week range is $5.40 to $14.00. Shares increased 28% last week, while shares are up nearly 100% year to date.
Zafgen
This has been a popular stock among traders in recent history, despite being down on the year. Zafgen Inc. (NASDAQ: ZFGN) has been marked with heavy volatility over the course of the year, and last Wednesday was a huge day, considering the most recent development in the beloranib study.
The company provided an update on the open label extension (OLE) portion of the pivotal Phase 3 ZAF-311 bestPWS clinical trial evaluating beloranib in patients with Prader-Willi syndrome. On December 1, Zafgen learned that a patient receiving beloranib as part of the OLE portion of the study was diagnosed with bilateral pulmonary emboli and had died.
Shares of Zafgen closed Friday at $5.63. The consensus analyst price target is $18.57, and the 52-week trading range of $5.54 to $55.36. Over the course of the week shares dropped 66%, while year to date they are down 81%.
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