Post by Deleted on Jan 20, 2017 4:57:15 GMT
Keith Speights (TMFFishBiz)
Jan 18, 2017 at 10:45PM
Judging by their stock performances over the past six months, Qiagen (NASDAQ:QGEN) has a lot of momentum -- and Opko Health (NASDAQ:OPK) doesn't. But which stock is the better long-term pick for investors? Here's how Opko Health and Qiagen compare.
The case for Opko Health
There are at least three reasons investors should look at Opko Health. The first is the company's diagnostics business. Opko owns Bio-Reference Laboratories, which ranks as the third largest clinical laboratory in the U.S. focusing on genetic testing. Opko also has two diagnostics products, the 4Kscore prostate cancer test and the Claros 1 in-office immunoassay platform.
Then there's Rayaldee. Opko won FDA approval for the drug in treating secondary hyperparathyroidism in June 2016. Sales are picking up for Rayaldee and should grow significantly in 2017. Opko projects that between 70% and 80% of Americans will be covered for Rayaldee by the middle of the year. The drug could reach peak annual sales of around $500 million -- over half of the company's total revenue in the first nine months of 2016.
Last, but not least, is Opko's pipeline. Results from a mid-stage study evaluating a long-acting FVIIa replacement therapy for hemophilia patients should be announced in the first half of this year. Opko expects to start a phase 2b clinical study of oxyntomodulin in treating type 2 diabetes in the second half of 2017.
The wild card in Opko's pipeline, though, is its experimental long-acting human growth hormone product hGH-CTP. Although the primary endpoint wasn't met in a late-stage study targeting adults, Opko saw some outliers in the data that give it reason to be optimistic about moving forward. The company also is proceeding with a study of hGH-CTP in children.
I'd say the bottom line for Opko Health is that good news from any of these three areas in 2017 should send the stock higher. And if it turns out that the company still has a good shot at winning approval for hGH-CTP, the stock should go much higher.
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C L
Jan 18, 2017 at 10:45PM
Judging by their stock performances over the past six months, Qiagen (NASDAQ:QGEN) has a lot of momentum -- and Opko Health (NASDAQ:OPK) doesn't. But which stock is the better long-term pick for investors? Here's how Opko Health and Qiagen compare.
The case for Opko Health
There are at least three reasons investors should look at Opko Health. The first is the company's diagnostics business. Opko owns Bio-Reference Laboratories, which ranks as the third largest clinical laboratory in the U.S. focusing on genetic testing. Opko also has two diagnostics products, the 4Kscore prostate cancer test and the Claros 1 in-office immunoassay platform.
Then there's Rayaldee. Opko won FDA approval for the drug in treating secondary hyperparathyroidism in June 2016. Sales are picking up for Rayaldee and should grow significantly in 2017. Opko projects that between 70% and 80% of Americans will be covered for Rayaldee by the middle of the year. The drug could reach peak annual sales of around $500 million -- over half of the company's total revenue in the first nine months of 2016.
Last, but not least, is Opko's pipeline. Results from a mid-stage study evaluating a long-acting FVIIa replacement therapy for hemophilia patients should be announced in the first half of this year. Opko expects to start a phase 2b clinical study of oxyntomodulin in treating type 2 diabetes in the second half of 2017.
The wild card in Opko's pipeline, though, is its experimental long-acting human growth hormone product hGH-CTP. Although the primary endpoint wasn't met in a late-stage study targeting adults, Opko saw some outliers in the data that give it reason to be optimistic about moving forward. The company also is proceeding with a study of hGH-CTP in children.
I'd say the bottom line for Opko Health is that good news from any of these three areas in 2017 should send the stock higher. And if it turns out that the company still has a good shot at winning approval for hGH-CTP, the stock should go much higher.
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C L