I have followed the VMAT2 area since the cloning of the protein by Beth Hoffman's lab at the NIMH. She then left to go to LLY as a program leader and manager. It is important to consider the role of VMAT2 not in 'normal' people, but in patients treated with dopamine antagonists or those with 'naturalistic' movement disorders.
As you likely know, the VMAT2 program is being pursued for monoamine related movement disorders such as in tardive dyskinesia. These arise in many patients that are being treated with dopamine antagonists, such as in schizophrenia patients, due to the complexities of dopamine antagonist biology and adaptation of intrinsic dopamine systems (of which the biology has been amply studied, but not necessarily well understood). The VMAT2 program is not understood well by the street, and of course it is early stage with only a modest # of patients treated with the drug candidate. The compound appears to have credentials of a qd drug, important in the schizo population. I am eager to see the company go beyond the Canadian cohort initially studied (open label) with NBI-98854. That will happen later this year. NBIX has been watching expenses lately and that is likely the reason for the Canadian TD cohort study. The VMAT2 program is of course quite early, so it is not being valued at all at the present time, but I do like it and there is limited competition in this space.
However, the elagolix program is where the value is right now for NBIX, and I am bullish on this program for fibroids and more. ABT is the right company for that program. That is the reason as to why I picked NBIX for the charity contest (though maybe a bit early for strong news flow for elagolix).
As an aside, I have been late to the PCYC party for the BTK program. But after some DD, I have been picking up some PCYC shares since the end of the year. Nice to see the breakout in that stock the past few days.
BJ |
