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Shares of biopharmaceutical company Spectrum Pharmaceuticals Inc. slid more than 57% Thursday to mark their worst performance in 17 years, after the company said a mid-stage trial of a treatment for non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) missed its main goal.
The move was the stock’s second-biggest, one-day percentage decline after it tumbled 64% on April 29, 2002.
Henderson, Nevada-based Spectrum SPPI, -58.74% said a phase 2 trial dubbed Zenith20 evaluating its poziotinib therapy in previously treated NSCLC patients failed to meet its main goal in the first group of 115 patients receiving 15 mg a day. Only about 15% of the patients in the trial responded to the therapy, the company said in a statement.
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“While the response rate of Cohort 1 in this trial was lower than we expected, the positive signals observed for this cohort provide support for the continued clinical evaluation of poziotinib in this patient population with significant unmet medical need,” Chief Executive Joe Turgeon said in a statement. “We look forward to providing read outs from Cohorts 2 and 3 in 2020, and plan to provide an update on the overall program strategy during the first quarter of 2020 after a full evaluation of the data from Cohort 1 is completed.”
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In January, Spectrum announced that it was selling all of its U.S. Food and Drug Administration-approved hematology and oncology products to Acrotech Biotpharma, a unit of India’s Aurobindo Pharma Ltd. 524804, -1.16%. The company planned to focus on developing poziotinib and its second key product candidate, Rolontis, a treatment for chemotherapy-induced neutropenia, an abnormally low white blood cell count that is a side effect of cancer treatments.
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It received about $159 million in an upfront cash payment for the drugs and was promised milestone payments of up to $140 million. The company cut about 40% of its workforce following the sale.
On Thursday, Spectrum said its Biologics License Application for Rolontis was accepted for review by the FDA and set a Prescription Drug User Fee Act date of Oct. 24, 2020. If approved, Rolontis is expected to compete with Amgen Inc.’s AMGN, -0.10% blockbuster drug Neulasta, which chalked up $711 million in the third quarter of 2019.
The five analysts that track Spectrum on FactSet have an average buy rating on the stock.
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