Allergan has grappled with numerous setbacks and plenty of investor uproar in recent years, but so far it's resisted serious change. But now, the company seems ready to embark on a split, according to analysts.
Now that Allergan chief Brent Saunders has stared down the activists — for now, anyway — the company is back with a $2.5 billion writedown for their failed depression drug rapastinel. The move spiked its net loss to $2.41 billion, or $7.25 a share $AGN — up from a loss of 99 cents a share for the same period a year ago.
Last month, when Allergan’s $AGN once-touted pipeline star rapastinel crashed and burned a slate of pivotal depression studies, it looked like the experimental modulator of the NMDA receptor would be shrouded in a cloak of invisibility — but researchers may have found a way to rescue the experimental drug by repurposing it as a treatment for opioid dependence.
Allergan plc (NYSE: AGN) today announced topline results from three pivotal studies of rapastinel as an adjunctive treatment of Major Depressive Disorder (MDD). In three acute studies (RAP-MD-01,-02,-03), the rapastinel treatment arms did not differentiate from placebo on the primary and key secondary endpoints. In all three acute studies rapastinel was well tolerated without any signal of psychotomimetic side effects. In addition, an interim analysis of the rapastinel relapse prevention study (RAP-MD-04) suggests the primary and key secondary endpoints will not be met.