How's everybody feeling today? It was quite the celebratory day yesterday around the country. Personally, I took some time to watch one of my favorite Netflix series yesterday morning - Turn Washington's Spies. If you get a chance, it's really well done, and it's a great series for anyone who has an interest in what actually happened during our Revolution back in the 1700's.
I digress. Stocks are up modestly on the day so far with biotech leading all of the major sectors. It's something we pointed out via our friends over at Elite Opportunity Pro (EOP) weeks ago. You can see one of the big biotech ETF's in BIB doing well now after pretty much flat lining for a good part of the year.
Just goes to show how sectors rotate - taking turns over time and providing strength for the major markets to go higher. Much of healthcare and biotech's recent move can be attributed to the anticipation of our current administration's efforts to put the whole healthcare issue in this country to rest.
It's not like we have a solution yet, but it's pretty common knowledge stocks do tend to trade in advance of what's to come. So, if the smart money is right, we should continue to see both of these sectors do well for the rest of the year.
It's been a long time since either sector has led these markets higher, but the guys over at EOP are still pretty convinced this is going to continue.
It's good for one of our newly featured stocks in Abeona Therapeutics Inc. (NASDAQ: ABEO), which continues to move higher after pretty much being range bound for several months. Just Monday, the stock finally broke out of its recent range, and when stock charts make moves like this, the ensuing breakout is often something traders and investors find extremely bullish.
It's not as if the stock doesn't deserve it either.
The company announced that its EB-101 gene therapy received orphan designation for the treatment of Recessive Dystrophic Epidermolysis Bullosis (RDEB). While this is continued positive news in this program, analysts believe that the progress of ABO-102 in Sanfilippo Syndrome remains the driver of Abeona's valuation and may be overshadowing EB-101's success.
RDEB patients are missing a gene (C7, Type VII Collagen) that anchors the skin to the body. As such, patients have chronic large open wounds that do not close for years, if ever. EB-101 replaces the gene in skin grafts that then closes the wound.
How good is the data? Very good so far. The name of the game in RDEB is not just closing the wound, but keeping it closed. Regular skin grafts for RDEB patients fall off within two months (no collagen 7 anchor). Abeona, in an ongoing P1/2 study has demonstrated in the first 6 patients treated with EB-101 corrected grafts (as large as an iPhone 7) are keeping wounds closed for years (see data below).
In addition, at two years, skin biopsies show the EB-101 delivered gene still expressing at high levels. The P1/2 study has treated the seventh patient and will likely enroll up to 12 patients. More data is expected in 2017.
While so much of the other tech world continues to receive accolades for innovation, the entire biotech sector continues to do the same, but so many of the more promising stocks within the sector continue to be left alone for the most part.
That's going to change, as like I said above sectors rotate, and when it's time for a specific sector to heat up, the broad based returns can be nothing short of impressive. You're seeing it with ABEO right now, and if you start to sniff around the biotech space, you'll see this is starting to happen at every turn.
Oh, and if you get a chance, watch "Turn" it's a fascinating series.