ABUS Is Abuzz...

(RTTNews) - Shares of Arbutus Biopharma Corp. (ABUS) have gained an impressive 122% year-to-date, thanks to rising investor optimism about the Company's pipeline.

Arbutus is focused on developing and commercializing a cure for patients suffering from chronic Hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection.

The Company's most-advanced product candidate in the pipeline is ARB-1467, which is designed to reduce Hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) expression in patients chronically infected with HBV. Reducing HBsAg is thought to be a key prerequisite to enable a patient's immune system to raise an adequate immune response against the virus.

A phase II triple combination, multi-dose study with ARB-1467, tenofovir, and pegylated interferon is on the cards. This study will enroll 20 people with HBeAg- negative hepatitis B, and will have a treatment period of 30 weeks. Interim on-treatment results are expected in the second half of 2018, followed by final results in 2019.

Another clinical drug candidate in the pipeline is AB-423. Top-line results from phase I study of AB-423 in healthy volunteers have shown that the compound is generally well-tolerated with no serious adverse events following single doses up to 800mg. This compound is expected to progress into a multi-dosing study in HBV patients in 1Q, 2018.

Among the partnered programs of Arbutus, the one that merits mention is Alnylam's Patisiran for treating hereditary ATTR amyloidosis with polyneuropathy.

Alnylam intends to file a New Drug Application for Patisiran in late 2017 and a Marketing Authorisation Application in early 2018.

Arbutus has granted a license to Alnylam to use Arbutus' LNP technology to enable RNAi therapeutic products. Arbutus will receive milestone and royalty payments as and when the LNP-enabled products are developed and commercialized.

Financial Highlights:

Market capitalization: Roughly $300 million Cash as of September 30, 2017: $100.8 million

ABUS closed Thursday's trading at $5.45, up 0.93%. In after-hours, the stock was up another 6.51% to $5.80.

Now, let's take a look at few other pharma stocks that grabbed headlines this week.