ONCT stock price, Oncternal Therapeutics (ONCT) recently experienced a significant decline in its stock price, plummeting by 60% in response to unexpected layoffs.
Oncternal Therapeutics' stock has sharply declined following the announcement that the company will discontinue its clinical trials and implement staff layoffs to conserve cash.
The U.S.-based biotech firm is halting clinical trials for ONCT-534, a dual-action androgen receptor inhibitor aimed at treating metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer, as well as ONCT-808, a ROR1-targeting autologous CAR-T therapy for aggressive B-cell lymphoma.
ONCT stock price analysis: as a result of this news, Oncternal's stock plummeted by 60%, falling from $4.17 per share before market close on September 11 to $1.70 at the close on September 12, the day the announcement was made.
This decision follows disappointing interim results from the Phase I trial (NCT05917470) of ONCT-534, which involved 20 enrolled patients. The trial did not demonstrate clinically meaningful improvements in disease markers, such as prostate-specific antigen (PSA) levels, despite varying administration schedules and doses across eight dosing cohorts.
Additionally, in December 2023, Oncternal reported a patient death during a Phase I/II dose escalation study (NCT05588440) for ONCT-808. The patient, who received a higher dose, exhibited symptoms indicative of cytokine release syndrome and immune effector cell-associated neurotoxicity syndrome before passing away.
Oncternal's CEO, James Breitmeyer, expressed disappointment regarding the early results from the Phase I/II studies of ONCT-534, noting that the trial was backed by extensive preclinical data and aimed to address significant unmet medical needs for patients with advanced prostate cancer.
While Oncternal Therapeutics plans to explore alternative options for its programs, it will halt all product development activities and implement additional cost-cutting measures, including workforce reductions.
In a filing with the SEC on September 12, Oncternal announced a 37% reduction in its workforce. The layoffs, expected to be completed by the third quarter of 2024, are projected to result in approximately $1 million in charges related to the workforce reduction.
This latest development follows a series of setbacks for the company, which had previously terminated two trials for its tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI) zilovertamab in April 2023 as part of a strategy to conserve cash. One of these trials was a Phase III study evaluating the TKI in combination with Johnson & Johnson’s and AbbVie’s successful TKI, Imbruvica (ibrutinib), for treating mantle cell lymphoma.
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