Why Did Monopar Stock Swing So Wildly Last Week?
The stock price of Monopar Therapeutics (NASDAQ: MNPR), a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company, skyrocketed from levels of $5.25 on Monday, October 21, to $32.66 on Thursday, October 24, before falling to around $17 now. The 6x rise in a matter of days can be attributed to a major licensing development for Monopar. Separately, within the healthcare sector, Intuitive Surgical Is No Dud Either — Here’s Path To 10x.
What’s Driving MNPR Stock Higher?
The company entered into an agreement with Alexion for an exclusive license to develop and commercialize ALXN1840 – a late-stage clinical trial drug for the treatment of Wilson Disease. Now, Alexion acquired Wilson Therapeutics for $855 million in 2018, giving it ALXN1840. Alexion was acquired by AstraZeneca for $39 billion in 2021. Over the years, ALXN1840 has advanced to phase three of clinical trials and looks like a promising candidate to treat Wilson Disease. If approved, ALXN1840 can bring in a few hundred million dollars in annual sales. Monopar will pay Alexion an upfront payment in cash and an equity in Monopar, while future royalties and milestone payments will depend on sales of the drug. [1]
Looking at the company’s pipeline, it has shown promising results from its Phase I imaging trial for MNPR-101-Zr last month. [2] Separately, it has advanced MNPR-101 to phase 1a clinical trial. MNPR-101 is Monopar’s proprietary antibody that targets the urokinase plasminogen activator receptor (uPAR). MNPR-101 targets uPAR to deliver a radiopharma therapy that kills cancer cells.
For clinical stage pharmaceutical stocks, the movement largely depends on developments around their pipeline drugs. The stock surged 6x last week to levels of over $32, which was much higher than the $18 average of analysts price estimate. The correction towards $17 on Friday makes the stock more aligned with that average.
While MNPR stock has had a dream run with 800% gains this year, it was not the case in recent years. Notably, MNPR stock has performed worse than the broader market in each of the last three years. Returns for the stock were -48% in 2021, -26% in 2022, and -86% in 2023. In contrast, the Trefis High Quality (HQ) Portfolio, with a collection of 30 stocks, is less volatile. And it has outperformed the S&P 500 each year over the same period. Why is that? As a group, HQ Portfolio stocks provided better returns with less risk versus the benchmark index; less of a roller-coaster ride, as evident in HQ Portfolio performance metrics.
| Returns | Oct 2024 MTD [1] |
2024 YTD [1] |
2017-24 Total [2] |
| MNPR Return | 126% | 797% | -82% |
| S&P 500 Return | 1% | 22% | 160% |
| Trefis Reinforced Value Portfolio | 0% | 15% | 763% |
[1] Returns as of 10/28/2024
[2] Cumulative total returns since the end of 2016
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- Monopar Therapeutics Press Release, Oct 24, 2024 [↩]
- Monopar Therapeutics’ Press Release, Sep 12, 2024 [↩]