AstraZeneca: Deutsche Bank downgrades stock

(CercleFinance.com) - On Friday, AstraZeneca shares were the biggest loser on the London Stock Exchange's FTSE 100 index, penalised by a downgrade by Deutsche Bank (from 'hold' to 'sell').


At 11am (London time), the biopharmaceutical group's shares were down over 2.5%, while the FTSE was up around 0.1% at the same time.

In a note, Deutsche Bank analysts express concern about data published this week on bronchial cancer, which they believe raise new concerns in addition to those already raised by the experimental drug Dato-DXd.

For the record, on Monday the group published the results of a Phase III study evaluating the efficacy of Dato-DXd in locally advanced or metastatic non-squamous non-small-cell lung cancer, a disease whose prognosis generally does not exceed more than one year.

The study was statistically inconclusive, with overall survival in the treated group reaching 14.6 months, compared with 12.3 months in the chemotherapy group, an improvement of 2.3 months.

While noting that Dato is not the only major project in AstraZeneca's pipeline, Deutsche Bank points out that its success is key to achieving sales growth of between 5% and 10%, a target which it believes is now being called into question.

The broker has therefore cut is target price from 11,000p to 10,500p.


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