Regeneron
Pharmaceuticals received approval to offer higher doses of a drug to treat vision loss, raising expectations on Wall Street that the biotech’s stock could move higher, at least in the short term.
On Friday evening, Regeneron (ticker: REGN) said the Food and Drug Administration approved an 8-milligram injection for Eylea HD, a treatment for wet age-related macular degeneration and other vision-related issues. The drug was previously offered in doses of two milligrams. In June, the FDA declined to approve the higher dose, a decision the company attributed to a continuing review of findings from an inspection of a third-party filler, or manufacturer.
The list price of a single-use vial is $2,625, according to the company. Eylea made up more than half of the company’s sales in 2022.
Regeneron was at $821.26, up 1% in premarket trading on Monday.
On Sunday,
Oppenheimer
‘s Hartaj Singh raised his target for Regeneron’s stock price to $1050, implying a 29% gain from Friday’s close, from $950 earlier. He rates the stock at Outperform, saying he believes Eylea could return the company to sales growth in the mid to high single digits in 2024 and beyond, with positive effects on his valuation of the company.
The consensus view among analysts now is that sales growth will be 4.9% this year and 4.5% next year.
RBC Capital Markets Brian Abrahams, who rates the stock at Sector Perform, also raised his target for the price to $830 from $820 over the weekend. “We see shares as having appreciated closer to fair value, though this news does help remove an important overhang,” Abrahams said.
The stock is priced at 18.9 times the per-share earnings expected for the coming 12 months, compared with its five-year average of 15.3 times.
Write to Karishma Vanjani at [email protected].
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