Biotech Stocks to bet on: Prima Biomed Ltd. (NASDAQ:PBMD), Opexa...

Biotech Stocks to bet on: Prima Biomed Ltd. (NASDAQBMD), Opexa Therapeutics Inc (NASDAQ:OPXA), Immunomedics, Inc. (NASDAQ:IMMU)

• By Ramona Marshall
• • September 1, 2015

They say good things come in threes. If so, biotech companies could be in for not just another year of outperformance, but another decade. The first era of biotech was a building phase, when companies created their first blockbuster drugs. The second, current one, has resulted in a four-year rally that reflects the sector’s transition from a cluster of one-hit wonders to mature companies with multiple blockbuster products. And now the third is just starting to emerge – Credit Suisse calls it Biotech 3.0 – that looks likely to continue to 2020 and beyond.
For the past four years, biotech stocks have been the top-performing industry in the S&P 500, and the recent outperformance has been notable: a 74 percent gain in 2013 (versus 30 percent for the S&P 500) and a 42 percent gain in 2014 (versus 11 percent). And Credit Suisse Head of Global Biotechnology Research Ravi Mehrotra expects the stocks to beat the market once again this year. “This multi-year outperformance has not been a simple sentiment-driven bull run, but rather a fundamental rerating of the biotech sector,” he writes in a recent report published this year.
On the trading floor, shares of Prima Biomed Ltd. (NASDAQBMD) gained 3.17% to close at $1.20. The $54.89M company on August 14, 2015 announced it will receive an undisclosed clinical milestone payment from its collaboration and licensing agreement with Novartis relating to its Phase I IMP701 LAG-3 antibody. The antibody is being trialled for the treatment of cancer.
Immutep (which Prima Biomed acquired in December 2014) and CoStim Pharmaceuticals (which Novartis acquired in February 2014) entered into a commercial licensing and collaboration agreement in September 2012, under which CoStim obtained a licence to develop and commercialise antagonistic LAG-3 antibodies.
Novartis has full responsibility for the continued development of the antibody program and Prima is eligible to receive further potential development-based milestone payments and royalties on sales following commercialisation of the products.​