“The market stinks,” Brian Johnson, a partner and vice chair of Wilmerhale’s corporate practice group, told a U.S. SEC advisory committee Feb. 27, as he painted a gloomy picture of last year’s IPO landscape in the U.S. While the scene was a little brighter than in 2022, a few key indicators could be worrisome, especially the median offering size, which is predictive of the strength of the IPO market, Johnson said
Gene editing firm Metagenomi Inc. priced an IPO raising $93.8 million, while Telomir Pharmaceuticals Inc., a company developing small-molecule therapies targeting inflammatory disease, priced a more modest $7 million IPO. While they mark the second and third biopharma IPOs to price this week, and the sixth and seventh for 2024, the two aptly named companies are the first preclinical-stage ventures to test the public markets this year.
The week closed out with two IPOs on their way in. Alto Neuroscience Inc. (NASDAQ:ANRO) and Fractyl Health Inc. (NASDAQ:GUTS) both debuted on Wall Street with offerings looking to raise combined $238.6 million.
Oncology company Arrivent Biopharma Inc.’s stock (NASDAQ:AVBP) shot up 11% on Jan. 26, its first day of trading, with its upsized IPO pricing 9.72 million shares at $18 each, raising gross proceeds of $175 million.
Despite a barely open IPO window in 2023, 27 biopharma firms went public in the year. It’s the lowest number since 2012 recorded 11 IPOs in the sector. However, encouraging news is that, overall, the U.S. IPO class of 2023 is up an average of 7.48%.
The first IPO of 2024 is a greatly upsized one from CG Oncology Inc., which is selling 20 million shares (NASDAQ:CGON) of its common stock at $19 each. Shares closed Jan. 25 95.6% higher at $37.17 each. The company initially had looked to raise about $200.6 million by selling its shares somewhere from $16 to $18 each but adjusted its thinking before the Jan. 25 debut, now anticipating gross proceeds of $389 million.
Kyverna Therapeutics Inc. disclosed a filing to raise up to $100 million in an IPO, becoming the sixth firm to announce plans for a U.S. listing in the new year, offering tentative hope that the public markets might prove more welcoming to biopharma firms after a lackluster 2023.
Biopharma firms collectively raised $70.97 billion in 2023, a welcome upturn of 17% from the $60.81 billion raised in 2022. Although falling short of the $118.29 billion raised in 2021 and $134.53 billion raised in 2020, by 40% and 47%, respectively, 2023 stands firmly in the third-highest place in BioWorld’s records going back to 2011.
Most categories of med-tech financings peaked during the COVID-19 pandemic, with the highest values seen in 2020-2021. While public/other and private financings have successfully rebounded to pre-pandemic levels, the aggregate financings for 2023 hit an unprecedented low according to BioWorld’s records.
The biopharma industry is still adjusting from the heady days of the COVID-19 pandemic, and nowhere is this so apparent as in financings. The value of financings has returned to what could be called a new normal, down from the surge of capital seen in 2020-2021. However, there are signs that the trend is heading back upward at a steady pace.
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