Ionis Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:IONS) is the leading RNA-based biotechnology company, if earnings per share is a guideline. While investors have largely focused on the recent Novartis (NVS) plan to acquire The Medicines Company (MDCO), which has been developing a therapy licensed from Alnylam (ALNY), Ionis has continued to make progress and is, in my opinion, the most attractively priced of the RNA therapy companies.
The following table shows some of the leading RNA therapy companies, their earnings, and market capitalizations as of 12/2/2019. Only Alnylam and Ionis are commercial stage companies generating sales or royalty revenue, but the others have received milestone payments or collaboration revenue.
Ticker | Company | Q3 2019 EPS Non-GAAP | Market Cap, $ Billions |
IONS | Ionis | $0.18 | 9.0 |
ALNY | Alnylam | -$1.92 | 13.1 |
Arrowhead | $0.11 | 7.0 | |
Moderna | -$0.37 | 6.6 | |
DRNA | Dicerna | -$0.45 | 1.7 |
AKCA | Akcea | -$0.34 | 1.8 |
Note that Akcea (AKCA) is majority owned by Ionis.
The rational markets assumption for the market capitalization anomalies, like Ionis not having the largest market cap despite having the highest EPS, is that the rest of the value for each company must be in the drug development pipeline. Pipelines are important, but I believe a better explanation here is irrational investors, pushed by sell-side brokers and analysts into stocks with a next-big-thing story. I believe RNA-based therapeutics will be a major health and profit driver for at least the next few decades, but I still think investors should be picking and choosing based on company details, including the stock price. The rest of this article will focus on Ionis and its subsidiary Akcea.
AKCEA-TTR-LRx Phase 3 study launched in polyneuropathy driven by hereditary TTR Amyloidosis
Ionis and Akcea already have an approved drug for polyneuropathy caused by hATTR amyloidosis, Tegsedi. It is administered once per week by subcutaneous injection. It
