Stock Alert: Moleculin Biotech Soars 165% On Potential Treatment For COVID-19

(RTTNews) - Shares of Moleculin Biotech, Inc. (MBRX) surged about 165% on Wednesday morning after the biotechnology company announced a potential treatment for COVID-19.

MBRX is currently trading at $1.49, up $0.9273 or 164.7948%, on the Nasdaq.

The clinical stage pharmaceutical company announced that independent research found 2-deoxy-D-glucose to reduce replication of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, by 100% in in vitro testing.

Researchers at the University of Frankfurt disclosed the findings in their article submitted to NatureResearch on March 11, 2020.

The authors reported that inhibiting glycolysis with non-toxic concentrations of 2-DG completely prevented SARS-CoV-2 replication in Caco-2 cells.

"This is the breakthrough we were looking for, only it came from an unexpected source," commented Walter Klemp, Chairman and CEO of Moleculin. "Normally, we wouldn't have access to data like this until it is published, but the willingness of the authors to pre-release this data will help support our development of WP1122 for treating COVID-19."