Skye Bioscience Shares Gain After Highlighting Safety of In-Development Obesity Treatment

By Connor Hart

Shares of Skye Bioscience gained after the San Diego biopharmaceutical company released a statement Monday highlighting the safety of its in-development obesity treatment compared with other treatments being developed.

The stock was up 15% to $3.60 in afternoon trading. Shares are up 34% since the beginning of the year.

Skye Bioscience's statement comes after Danish pharmaceutical giant Novo Nordisk on Friday disclosed results from a clinical trial of one of its in-development obesity treatments. The treatment, called monlunabant, achieved a statistically significant weight loss compared to placebo, but users reported mild-to-moderate neuropsychiatric side effects, such as anxiety, irritability and sleep disturbances, Novo Nordisk said.

Skye Bioscience on Monday said this adverse event highlights a difference between its in-development obesity treatment, nimacimab, and Novo Nordisk's monlunabant.

Data from a recent nimacimab trial did not show any adverse neuropsychiatric events in users, which the company attributed to the treatment being a large-molecule CB1 inhibitor rather than a small-molecule CB1 inhibitor.

Chief Scientific Officer Chris Twitty said small-molecule CB1 inhibitors lack adequate restriction from the brain, resulting in an increased potential for neuropsychiatric side effects.

"It is clear that with increased restriction from the brain, nimacimab provides a potential clear safety advantage over a small molecule approach," Chief Executive Officer Punit Dhillon said.

Write to Connor Hart at connor.hart@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

September 23, 2024 15:26 ET (19:26 GMT)

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