Biotech Values

[DewDiligence]

Re: AGN’s DARPin program in wet AMD

AGN’s swoon today was not caused merely by the delay of the bimatoprost (Latisse) program in androgenetic alopecia (male/female pattern baldness), but also to bad news in the DARPin program in wet AMD—see #msg-78757012 and #msg-78745948 for background. On today’s CC, AGN said the phase-2 data were not strong enough to advance to phase-3, which may mean that the DARPin program is dead. At a minimum, the program is delayed by a couple of years, which is why REGN is flying today.

For an ophthalmology company, AGN has a hole in back-of-the-eye diseases that the DARPin program was supposed to fill; now, they’ll presumably have to look elsewhere, which could generate buyout speculation for emerging-stage biotech companies who have such an unpartnered program. (This excludes LPTN, whose AMD program is partnered with PFE.)

AGN used to be one of my large holdings, but I sold it one month ago (#msg-86280343). Undue investor excitement over the androgenetic alopecia program was one my reasons for selling.