What happened
Shares of Agenus (AGEN 4.31%) rose 12.5% on Friday. The stock got a bump as investors pounced on a potential bargain when the clinical-stage biopharmaceutical's stock opened at $2.60 a share. One big buyer was Values First Advisors, a financial advisory firm that bought 10,013 shares of the company and now owns 238,514 shares of Agenus. The stock is down more than 7% so far this year.
So what
Agenus focuses on immuno-oncology therapies that boost the body's ability to fight cancer and infections by activating T-cell immune responses.
The company's lead therapy candidate is botensilimab, an adaptive immune activator that binds to CTLA-4 (cytotoxic T-lymphocyte-associated protein 4), a protein regulator that can slow immune responses in T-cells.
The company is looking ahead to a 2023 phase 2 clinical trial from a combination of its lead therapy, botensilimab, and balstilimab, to fight advanced sarcoma. The combination therapy reported phase 1 data on Nov. 17, saying it had an overall response rate of 46% and a disease control rate of 69%. The company presented the data on Wednesday at the annual Evercore ISI HealthCONx Conference.
Now what
The biotech company reported cash and cash equivalents of $218.2 million in the third quarter. The company also reported revenue of $22.8 million but a loss of $56.7 million. At that burn rate, the company will likely need more funds to continue operations late into 2023. The company is high on the possibilities of botensilimab.
It is in a phase 1 clinical studies as a monotherapy to treat colon cancer and melanoma and has an expected trial to treat pancreatic cancer scheduled by the end of the year. It is also in a phase 2 trial, along with zalifrelimab, as a combination therapy to treat cervical cancer.
