Although we don't believe in timing the market or panicking over market movements, we do like to keep an eye on big changes -- just in case they're material to our investing thesis.
What: Shares of Corcept Therapeutics (CORT 1.74%), a biopharmaceutical company focused on developing therapies to treat metabolic and psychiatric disorders, advanced as much as 18% after announcing a new oncology pipeline development program and the filing of its first investigational new drug application for phase 1 studies.
So what: Corcept is apparently planning to broaden its treatment horizon, as the company announced today that it filed for an IND application with the Food and Drug Administration for mifepristone as a treatment for triple-negative breast cancer. According to Corcept's press release, five out of eight relapsed metastatic triple-negative breast cancer patients demonstrated a partial or complete clinical response when treated with mifepristone in combination with Celgene's Abraxane in a recent study. Mifepristone is also approved under the brand name Korlym to treat hyperglycemia secondary to hypercortisolism in adults with endogenous Cushing's syndrome.
Now what: Obviously the results above are extremely encouraging but quite limited given the eight-patient subset. However, what appears to have Wall Street and investors really excited today, beyond just the fact that Corcept is introducing an oncology drug development program, is the fact that there are no triple-negative breast cancer targeted therapies approved by the FDA -- just global chemotherapy treatments. If Corcept were to somehow develop this drug and beat everyone else to market, it would be in great shape with little to no competition. Clearly we're a long ways off from that point in time, but investors certainly deserve their moment of elation today.
