St. Jude Medical (NYSE:STJ) finished the day with a nearly 8 percent jump in stock price after announcing the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval of its long-awaited Unify Quadra cardiac resynchronization therapy defibrillator and Quartet Left Ventricular Quadripolar Pacing Lead.
St. Jude’s stock closed at $38.44, up 7.7 percent over the previous day. But was it all Quadra? It was a good day for the stock market overall, though St. Jude’s stock price rose higher than most of its peers: Medtronic (NYSE:MDT) climbed 4.35 percent, Boston Scientific (NYSE:BSX) was up 6.31 percent (Boston Scientific received approval for three cardiac medical devices).
However, STJ’s stock price is still below a spike the stock received after its earnings in October.
A Deep-dive Into Specialty Pharma
A specialty drug is a class of prescription medications used to treat complex, chronic or rare medical conditions. Although this classification was originally intended to define the treatment of rare, also termed “orphan” diseases, affecting fewer than 200,000 people in the US, more recently, specialty drugs have emerged as the cornerstone of treatment for chronic and complex diseases such as cancer, autoimmune conditions, diabetes, hepatitis C, and HIV/AIDS.
Quadra is the cream of a series of upcoming products that excite analysts about St. Jude. The Quadra and Quartet use a pacing lead with four electrodes, which enables more pacing configurations and reduces common problems associated with implantable CRT systems, and ultimately results in fewer surgeries for patients.
“We estimate Quad-Pole technology from Medtronic Inc. and Boston Scientific Corp. are at least one to two years behind Quartet, so St. Jude has a meaningful lead,” Bloomberg quoted Larry Biegelsen, a Wells Fargo Securities analyst in New York, in a note to investors.
