Summary
- Dova has one approved drug that isn’t selling too well.
- Its lead indication has problems with the trial, its patent protection isn’t long, and it isn’t really cash-rich.
- Considering all these factors, we think the stock should be avoided.
- This idea was discussed in more depth with members of my private investing community, The Total Pharma Tracker. Start your free trial today »
- Last year, right around Dova Pharmaceuticals’ (DOVA) PDUFA for Doptelet, we made a bit of money in the stock. But we held on too long to some of the shares, and ended up losing what we made.
Dova is in a bad position today, having shed over 70% of its value since approval last year of Doptelet (Avatrombopag) for thrombocytopenia in adult patients with chronic liver disease or CLD who are scheduled to undergo a procedure; and approaching label expansion in chronic Immune Thrombocytopenic Purpura (ITP) in a few months. Chronic ITP is a vastly larger market than thrombocytopenia in CLD, but while recent competition from Shionogi has been a threat in CLD, Chronic ITP market has stronger and more entrenched competition from Amgen (NASDAQ:AMGN) with its romiplostim or Nplate and Novartis (NYSE:NVS) with its eltrombopag or Promacta. Recently, Rigel Pharmaceuticals’ (NASDAQ:RIGL) Fostamatinib has also been added to the melee. Dova’s product may have some minor advantages, but we found nothing that really differentiates it. That, along with Dova’s poor performance in the previous indication, poor cash balance, untenable IP position, and what we think is problematic trial data, makes it thoroughly avoidable.
Dova is not well-covered on Seeking Alpha, and this is the definitive article so far. We ran Dova through the IOMachine to determine its investibility.
