ASH 2024 – the BTK degraders are neck and neck

Anyone looking at the post-ASH performance of BeiGene and Nurix stock might think that data on BTK degradation revealed at the conference had allowed the latter to pull away from its bigger rival at last. If anything, however, the results showed Nurix's NX-5948 and BeiGene's BGB-16673 to be closer than ever in terms of patient numbers, efficacy, adverse events and activity in intractable BTK mutations. The results, from mid-stage trials in heavily relapsed chronic lymphoblastic leukaemia, are being closely watched because BTK is one of the few areas where target degradation has yielded successes. Moreover, BTK inhibition is fraught with relapse mechanisms, only some of which are overcome by non-covalent inhibitors like Lilly's Jaypirca, and degradation is claimed to be immune to such mutation-driven resistance. During EHA in June, the BeiGene and Nurix degraders were showing ORRs of 67-72% in CLL, and the ASH update saw response rates climb to around 75%, now with 49 evaluable subjects in each dataset. On Tuesday BeiGene closed down 10%, losing $1.5bn of market cap apparently as a key investor rebalanced its end-of-year portfolio, while Nurix ended the day up 7%, benefiting from an initiation by the investment bank BTIG.

The battle of two BTK degraders

Note: Source: ASH.