By Senad Karaahmetovic
Mirati Therapeutics (NASDAQ:MRTX) fell over 30% yesterday after the company's lung cancer therapy (adagrasib) disappointed investors.
Mirati held an Investor event yesterday to brief investors on the data presented at the ESMO Immuno-Oncology Annual Congress.
BMO analysts cut the rating to Market Perform from Outperform as the MRTX story is "far from crystal clear."
"The more you have to explain... the tougher the story becomes. While adagrasib may have additive efficacy when combined with pembrolizumab, we see a long, expensive, and challenging path to Phase 3 data. We think MRTX is likely dead money until we get Phase 3 data (could be years), and possibility for an acquisition is likely off the table for now (an acquirer would have to spend a significant sum to run these trials)," the analysts wrote in a client note.
JPMorgan analysts moved to Neutral from Overweight and removed the stock from the broker's Analyst Focus List (AFL) after digesting yesterday’s updates.
"We see a challenging outlook for adagrasib as a combo partner to pembrolizumab in the TPS>1% segment of NSCLC," the analysts said in a note.
They also cut the price target to $65 from $94 per share to reflect "lowered peak sales forecasts in 1L/2L NSCLC and for sitravatinib, as well as POS assumptions for the PD-1 combination therapy with adagrasib."
Mirati Therapeutics is up almost 2% in pre-market Thursday after yesterday's sharp pullback.