Here's Why Agios Pharmaceuticals Crashed 23% Today
Shares in Agios Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: AGIO) slumped by 23% as of 11 a.m. today. As is often the case with small-cap healthcare stocks, the move isn't so much dictated by what the company is doing as by what a much larger company, Novo Nordisk (NYSE: NVO), reported today.
In case you are wondering, Novo Nordisk stock barely moved today. It's a performance that reflects the relative importance of healthcare companies' sickle cell treatments to their respective bottom lines. Today's news was that Novo's oral, once-daily, pyruvate kinase-R (PKR) activator, etavopivat, is the first in a new class of drugs to meet both co-primary endpoints in the phase 3 HIBISCUS trial, according to Novo's release.
This stands in contrast to the Phase 3 data from Agios (released in November) with its oral pyruvate kinase activator, mitapavit, in sickle cell disease. Improving hemoglobin levels in patients with sickle cell disease helps reduce anemia and, ultimately, should reduce crisis events, including intense pain episodes.
Source Fool.com
