The stock of biotech Crinetics Pharmaceuticals (CRNX 8.03%) wasn't ending the trading week on a high note. In late-session action on Friday, the company's share price was down by more than 8% on a quarterly earnings report that clearly wasn't impressing the market. By comparison, the benchmark S&P 500 index was underwater by only 1.1% at that point.
Gearing up for commercialization
For its third quarter, Crinetics earned $143,000 in revenue, derived fully from a licensing agreement with Japanese pharmaceutical company Sanwa Kagaku Kenkyusho. The deal with the company's Asian peer covers Crinetics' acromegaly treatment paltusotine (brand name: Palsonify), which was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in late September.
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On the bottom line, Crinetics' net loss according to generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) deepened to over $130 million, or $1.38 per share, from the year-ago deficit of under $77 million.
Those figures didn't meet the average analyst estimates, which were $491,000 for revenue and $1.25 per share for GAAP net loss.
In the earnings release, Crinetics quoted founder and CEO Scott Struthers as saying that the commercial rollout of Palsonify was "off to a very good start."
NASDAQ: CRNX
Key Data Points
A time of transformation
"With the approval milestone, we are now a fully integrated pharmaceutical company. Five clinical trials across our deep pipeline are advancing and our financial position remains robust," Struthers added.
The financials of biotech stocks, due to their dependence on the often rocky process of drug development, can be volatile. This is why they're often far from the consensus analyst projections. With Palsonify coming to market, Crinetics seems to be better positioned for success than Friday's investor reaction might suggest.
