Shares of BBIO stock slumped Monday, reversing a premarket gain, as analysts parsed through BridgeBio Pharma's effort to take on Pfizer in treating a heart condition.
On Sunday, BridgeBio spelled out the benefits of its drug, acoramidis, in patients with transthyretin amyloid cardiomyopathy. In this disease, abnormal protein builds up on the heart, and can lead to heart failure. Over 30 months, 81% of acoramidis patients survived, compared with 85% of the general population, based on an age-matched U.S. database.
Mizuho Securities analyst Salim Syed says BridgeBio's results offer an improvement over Pfizer's tafamidis. Tafamidis is the only approved treatment for transthyretin amyloid cardiomyopathy. It sells under the brand name Vyndamax. But RBC Capital Markets analyst Luca Issi was less bullish on BridgeBio's chances of taking on Pfizer.
"Overall, the update was solid, but we think the drug does not materially raise the (effectiveness) bar set by tafamidis, as even the discussant of the (BridgeBio) presentation shied away from concluding so," Issi said in a note to clients.
Investors seemed to side with Issi's view. On today's stock market, BBIO stock toppled 3.4%, ending the regular session at 28.67. Shares of Pfizer stock dipped a fraction to 36.21.
BBIO Stock: Symptom Improvement
One hallmark of cardiomyopathy is that it can lead to a significant number of hospitalizations. In BridgeBio's study, meanwhile, there were a similar number of hospitalizations among acoramidis recipients as there were among the broader U.S. Medicare population.
Notably, 40% of patients who received acoramidis had an improvement in how far they could walk for six minutes — a measure of disease severity — vs. just 24% of the placebo group.
"There's a very credible case (albeit in a cross-study comparison) that BridgeBio's acoramidis is a better drug than Pfizer's tafamidis, and that even patients currently on tafamidis should switch to acoramidis upon its expected approval in the second half of 2024," Syed said in a note to clients.
Leerink Partners analyst Mani Foroohar says the results could be enough for acoramidis to gain Food and Drug Administration approval. But BBIO stock is likely to remain volatile until investors can see a path to profitability for the company.
Notably, BBIO stock is coming back from a number of setbacks last year. Today, BridgeBio has a perfect Relative Strength Rating of 99. This means BridgeBio shares rank in the top 1% of all stocks when it comes to 12-month performance, according to IBD Digital.
Follow Allison Gatlin on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, at @IBD_AGatlin.
