The Dirty Details Behind Pharmacyclics' Slide (PCYC)

The Dirty Details Behind Pharmacyclics' Slide

When investing in stocks, particularly in the biotech sector, there's one thing investors have to understand: expectations.

Consider today's biggest loser in the biotech arena: Pharmacyclics (Nasdaq: PCYC ) . Revenue surged more than 2,700% year over year. Earnings per share shifted from a loss of $0.21 per share to a $1.09 per share gain. Naturally, shares fell as much as 18% during the day.

The reason has nothing to do with today's financial results -- and everything to do with tomorrow's. The company came out with some less-than-positive commentary around its top cancer drug candidate ibrutinib, which is looking to go up against existing multiple myeloma players such as Celgene's (Nasdaq: CELG ) Revlimid, Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ ) and Takeda's Velcade, and a newly approved drug from Onyx Pharmaceuticals (Nasdaq: ONXX ) , Krypolis.

Follow along in the video below as Max Macaluso and Brenton Flynn run through the news in more detail.

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