What happened
Shares of Alpha Tau Medical (DRTS -4.69%) were skyrocketing 23.9% as of 3:26 p.m. ET on Thursday. Trading of the stock was even halted temporarily as part of the market "circuit-breaker" triggers.
The company didn't announce any news, however. Today's move appears to be a continuation of the surge on Wednesday of 17%. That gain didn't have any clear catalysts, either. Instead, investors are piling into the stock seemingly based on nothing but the anticipation that it's headed even higher.
So what
Alpha Tau Medical's shares have been highly volatile since it went public earlier this month following a merger with special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) Healthcare Capital Corp. The company is developing an alpha-radiation cancer therapy called Alpha DaRT.
The precision delivery of the Alpha DaRT therapy enables it to primarily affect tumors while not affecting surrounding healthy tissues. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration granted two Breakthrough Therapy Designations to Alpha DaRT last year, one for treating skin cancer and the other for treating recurrent glioblastoma multiforme (an aggressive form of brain cancer).
Image source: Getty Images.
In January, Alpha Tau Medical announced encouraging results from its first U.S. clinical trial of Alpha DaRT. The company revealed that all the tumors disappeared in all 10 patients in the study with malignant skin and soft tissue cancers. There were no serious product-related adverse events in the clinical trial.
Now what
It's likely that the volatility for Alpha Tau Medical will continue. However, the company could have some real news on the way in the not-too-distant future. Alpha Tau Medical hopes to begin a pivotal U.S. study of Alpha DaRT in treating skin cancer this year.
