With Citigroup analyst Samantha Semenkow calling on Feb. 29 for shares of Editas Medicine (EDIT -1.63%) to rise from their current price near $10 to reach $16 -- an increase of 45% over her prior estimate -- there's a clear consensus about the stock forming on Wall Street. Based on Semenkow's price target, which is effectively the same as the consensus average price target across analysts following the stock, Editas Medicine is looking at a 70% bump.
It could happen. Here's why.
This company just got a huge break from regulators
Per Editas' fourth-quarter earnings report, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is now on board with the company's proposal to run its lead program, reni-cel, as a combined phase 1/2/3 clinical trial. Reni-cel is a gene therapy being developed to treat rare blood disorders sickle cell disease (SCD) and beta thalassemia, and it's intended to be curative or near-curative, just like the therapies recently commercialized by other gene editing companies like CRISPR Therapeutics and Bluebird Bio.
Before the agreement with regulators, the program was in phase 1/2 clinical trials, and it had been reporting very favorable safety and efficacy results. So, there is now a good chance that the biotech will be able to bring its candidate to the market far sooner than anticipated, which is why the analysts expecting the stock to rise are probably correct. However, the combined phases only apply to the SCD portion of reni-cel's clinical trials, not the trials pertaining to beta thalassemia, which are still in early stage clinical testing.
Editas expects to report a significant amount of data from the SCD trial sometime in the middle of 2024. If that data confirms the prior positive findings, expect the stock to rise promptly.
