February 8, 2017
By Alex Keown, BioSpace.com Breaking News Staff
BOSTON – Biogen ’s newly-approved spinal atrophy drug Spinraza could be the key driver over the next year.
That’s the prediction of Citi Research, which upgraded Biogen’s stock to buy status on Tuesday. Citi Research said it predicts a 15 percent rally in stock prices over the next year based on Spinraza.
“The real driver of shares over the next 12-18 [months] is uptake of Spinraza, Biogen’s new drug for SMA and our proprietary survey suggests upside to estimates” equity analyst Robyn Karnauskas wrote in a research note, according to CNBC’s report.
Shares of Biogen are up slightly this morning, trading at $268.01. Biogen opened trading at $265.43.
Karnauskas said she estimates Spinraza gaining a 10 percent penetration in the U.S. market, which should bring in about $390 million in sales for 2017. Wall Street has pegged first-year sales of Spinraza between $200 and $300 million. Karnauskas said in her note that she believes the Street has underestimated the potential sales of the drug.
In December, Biogen announced that the first year of treatment with the drug will cost $750,000. Patients will receive six injections in the first year, which is about $125,000 per shot. After the first year, the price will drop to $375,000 per year. Patients will receive injections annually for the remainder of their lives. Following the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s approval of Spinraza in December, Geoffrey Porges, an analyst with Leerink, indicated in a note that Biogen expects about 1,700 patients will begin treatment with Spinraza in 2017 and 2018. There are an estimated 9,000 to 25,000 SMA patients in the United States, according to the SMA Foundation. Spinraza was approved with a broad use label for SMA Types 1, 2, and 3.
Spinraza is the first drug ever approved to treat spinal atrophy, a leading genetic cause of death in infants and toddlers that is marked by progressive, debilitating muscle weakness. Spinraza is an antisense oligonucleotide (ASO) that is designed to alter the splicing of SMN2, a gene that is nearly identical to SMN1. Biogen co-developed Spinraza with Ionis Pharmaceuticals .
SMA is a disorder characterized by loss of motor neurons in the spinal cord and lower brain stem. This results in severe and progressive muscular atrophy and weakness. Over time, patients with the most severe form of SMA can become paralyzed and have difficulty in breathing and swallowing. Patients with SMA do not produce enough survival motor neuron (SMN) protein, which is caused by a defect in the SMN1 gene.
