Right on the heels of a major study win for its star drug Vyvgart, argenx has raised more than $1 billion in cash to support its operations.
Through a transcontinental share offering, argenx has raised $1.1 billion in new funds, the company said in a Wednesday release. The Amsterdam-based company raised the cash by offering American depositary shares that trade on the Nasdaq Global Select Market plus through a "private placement of ordinary shares" in Europe and the U.K. Argenx's ordinary shares trade on the Euronext Brussels exchange.
Argenx expects to sell about 1.59 million new American depositary shares at $490 per share plus about 664,000 new ordinary shares at a price of 436.37 euros per share. The company expects to close the U.S. offering and the European private placement on Monday.
The fundraise follows July 17's announcement that argenx's Vyvgart Hytrulo met its primary endpoint in a phase 2 study in adults with chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy (CIDP). The company said its medicine was associated with a 61% lower risk of relapse versus placebo in patients with the rare and serious autoimmune disease. Argenx plans to present full data from the trial at an upcoming medical meeting.
Before the study win, argenx last year laid out $102 million for a priority review voucher to support a future FDA filing for its "pipeline-in-a-product." At the time, argenx's CEO Tim Van Hauwermeiren said the company had validated the drug's potential in four autoimmune diseases and that it planned to be active in 15 disease targets by 2025.
Argenx's Vyvgart won its first FDA approval in 2021 to treat generalized myasthenia gravis (gMG) in adults who test positive for the anti-acetylcholine receptor antibody. During its first full year on the market, the medicine generated $400 million in sales.
While the original, intravenous version of the drug was responsible for that 2022 sales haul, the subcutaneous "Hytrulo" version just recently won its own FDA approval. That was the version of the drug to succeed in the ADHERE study in patients with CIDP.
Aside from gMG and CIDP, argenx has completed registrational studies of the drug in primary immune thrombocytopenia. It's also running studies of various phases in several other diseases.