How a financial misunderstanding can lead to an attractive opportunity
Please note that Arctic Securities is acting as a Joint Bookrunner in connection with the Rights Issue
On Friday a fully underwritten rights issue was launched leaving PCIB fully financed until filing in 2022. We believe the somewhat surprising market reaction can lead to an attractive investment opportunity.
· The company updated the market, and in our view, further de-risked the case. Before the rights issue was launched on Friday, the market valued PCIB to NOK 53/share, well-knowing - we assume - that the company was left was a cash position of some NOK 30m, with an enormous financing risk and great uncertainty regarding pivotal trial design (size and extent). With the rights issues, the company removed the financing risk and provided a number of essential and positive updates, most importantly:
o The study will include a total of 186 patients to be treated with either fimaCHEM + standard of care or standard of care alone. An interim analysis and read-out is expected approx. 36 months after the trial is initiated (1Q22) and, upon a positive read-out, a filing for marketing approval is warranted. Moreover, the company does not need to include all 186 patients before interim read-out and approval, and timelines for approval are in line with our base case scenario.
o A subgroup analysis for the high dose cohort from the clinical phase I study shows – even if in a small number of patients (n=6) - a clearly superior trend compared to the full study cohort. More specifically, patients seem to have been sicker than for the full cohort, but show i) higher objective response rates (60% vs. 33%), ii) longer average duration of response (15.4 months vs. 12.4 months) and iii) longer median overall survival (19.4 months vs. 14.4 months, and vs. standard of care of 12 months (historical control), with 33% of patients still alive (vs. 19%). With these data, if repeated in a larger, randomized trial, we believe the company has a very good change to hit the market in 2022.
o An update from the phase I extension study, to evaluate the safety of repeated treatment with fimaCHEM, shows favorable safety. Therefore, the pivotal study will commence with up to two scheduled treatments of FimaCHEM. Theoretically, this should affect the efficacy of treatment with fimaCHEM positively.
· The principles of Rights Issues explained: In a rights issue, subscription rights are issued to existing shareholders entitling them to buy additional shares in a proportion to their existing ownership. The subscription price is set below the market price in order to transfer part of the value of the share to the subscription right, importantly:
o There is no value loss for the shareholder because an existing shareholder can realize value of its subscription rights either by i) subscribing for its subscription rights and/or ii) selling its subscription rights in the market. Thus, existing shareholders must act on one or both of the two alternatives to avoid value leakage
o A discount to Theoretical Ex-Rights Price (TERP) sets a buffer for a positive value of the subscription right (please find the calculation for this rights issue below)
Thus, in an efficient market, the shareholder should be economically indifferent to the level of the subscription price. With the financing risk removed, one would have expected the share price to increase. Clearly, after the EGM (Sept 14), one would expect it to fall to the TERP.
TERP = 45,61
