He argued the scale of the share price fall was not evidence of the failure of the drug, his fund’s rationale for holding the stock or AstraZeneca’s overall strategy.
The founding partner of Woodford Investment Management suggested an oversensitive market had failed to place sufficient value on one of the company’s most promising cancer drugs.
“Perhaps, at a time like this when the stock market is in such a febrile state and prone to overreact to news, especially when it is bad, it is important to remind investors that all four of the large immuno-oncology players (Roche, Merck, Bristol-Myers Squibb and AstraZeneca) have all had cancer trial set backs in recent months,” Woodford said.
AstraZeneca’s Chief Medical Officer, Sean Bohen, said while the results of the drug trial had been “disappointing”, the group would continue to assess whether the treatment prolonged overall survival.
The news came as AstraZeneca reported its total revenue had slipped 11 percent to $10.45 billion in the first six months of the year. Product sales were also down 11 percent to $9.78 billion over the same period. Shares in AstraZeneca were slightly higher during Friday afternoon trade.
