Shares of
Wave Lifesciences
WVE
were up 25.7% on Wednesday after the company announced a four-year research collaboration with drug giant,
GSK
GSK
.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
The collaboration has been formed to advance discovery and development of oligonucleotide therapeutics focusing on novel genetic targets by bringing together Wave’s PRISMTM oligonucleotide platform and GSK’s expertise in genetics and genomics
Under the discovery component of the collaboration, GSK will advance up to eight preclinical programs and Wave will advance up to three preclinical programs for targets that will be informed by GSK. In addition, GSK will in-license exclusive global rights for Wave’s preclinical RNA editing therapeutic candidate for alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency (AATD) called WVE-00. AATD is an inherited genetic disease that impacts the lungs and liver.
Wave Life Sciences’ shares are up 91.7% in the year-to-date period, while GSK’s stock is down 34.8%. The
industry
has declined 17.6% in the said time frame.
For the deal, GSK will make an upfront payment of $170 million in cash ($120 million) and equity ($50 million) to Wave Lifesciences, with the latter also being eligible for future milestone payments and royalties. For the WVE-006 program, Wave Life Sciences is eligible for up to $525 million in potential development/sales-related milestone payments. For each of GSK’s eight collaboration programs, it is entitled to pay Wave up to $130-$175 million in development and launch milestones and $200 million in sales-related milestones,
Wave will lead all pre-clinical research for GSK and Wave Life Sciences’ programs up to investigational new drug-enabling studies. GSK will get the development and commercialization responsibilities after Wave completes the first-in-patient study.
WVE-006 complements GSK’s own investigational antisense oligonucleotide, bepirovirsen, which is being developed for the potential treatment of chronic hepatitis B infection. Bepirovirsen will soon enter phase III development. GSK has another siRNA oligonucleotide in its pipeline, GSK4532990, which will soon begin phase II studies for NASH.
Zacks Rank and Other Players
Wave Therapeutics currently has a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold), while GSK has a Zacks Rank of 2 (Buy). A couple of top-ranked stocks in the biotech sector include
BioNTech
BNTX
and
Kamada
KMDA
. While Kamada sports a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy) at present, BioNTech has a Zacks Rank #2. You can see
the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here
.
In the past 30 days, estimates for Kamada’s 2022 loss per share have narrowed from 14 cents to 7 cents. During the same period, the earnings estimates per share for 2023 have risen from 26 cents to 42 cents. Shares of Kamada have declined 34.2% in the year-to-date period.
Earnings of Kamada beat estimates in two of the last four quarters and missed the mark twice, witnessing a negative earnings surprise of 62.50%, on average.
In the past 30 days, estimates for BioNTech’s 2022 earnings per share have risen from $34.47 to $35.38. During the same period, the loss per share estimates for 2023 have narrowed from $16.97 to $17.53. Shares of BioNTech have lost 27.8% in the year-to-date period.
Earnings of BioNTech beat estimates in three of the last four quarters and missed the mark once, witnessing a surprise of 58.99% on average.
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