Tekmira Pharmaceuticals (TKMR) may not have found its next big biotech thing, after all.
After a crazy-good run riding the Ebola scare from obscurity to prominence in just a few months, the company found itself searching for something new to keep investors interested. Tekmira’s betting that hepatitis B will be it.
Shares of Canada-based Tekmira jumped from ~$15 to ~$24 earlier this month on news it teamed up with OnCore BioPharma to work to develop a hepatitis B therapy.
Now, on Tekmira’s recent tepid announcement of dosing one person in its tiny 20-patient clinical trial, shares jumped 2.7% - far short of the long-gone Ebola gains of 280%-plus.
Indeed, Tekmira reminds us of another Ebola treatment-next-big-biotech-thing wannabe that TheStreetSweeper warned investors about, iBio (then $1.88, now ~$0.52).
While other viewpoints about Tekmira are available here, let’s look at some issues surrounding Tekmira’s latest, greatest target.