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Type ‘dog longevity podcast’ into any app and you’ll find comedians, YouTubers and tech billionaires musing about miracle drugs that could help dogs live longer.
Loyal, the Silicon Valley biotech, has become the poster child for the idea that man’s best friend might one day grow old more gracefully. Yet one name rarely makes it into these conversations: Genflow Biosciences.
While the chatter swirls around American start-ups, this small London-listed company has been quietly advancing a gene therapy programme that could place it years ahead of the pack.
Its SIRT6 treatment, adapted from a gene found in human centenarians, is being trialled in ageing beagles to test whether it can slow physical decline.
The science may sound futuristic, but the stakes are firmly commercial. The animal health market is expected to expand rapidly over the next decade, and Genflow’s work could give Britain an unlikely foothold in the booming business of longevity.
The shares are up 170 per cent in the past week, ostensibly after it rejigged a fundraiser to be less dilutive to existing investors. However, on Friday there was also a positive update on its dog longevity trial.
Specifically, it has administered its SIRT6 therapy for a second time to elderly beagles with no side effects.
Turning to the wider small-cap market, the AIM All-Share ended its three-week winning streak with a six-point loss to 790.57. The performance mirrored that of its larger sibling, the FTSE 100, which marked time.
Sticking with the week’s winners and the life sciences arena, Genflow’s stellar performance overshadowed that of Genedrive, which jumped 75 per cent.
Stake building by David Nugent, who has criticised the company’s funding plans, appears to have lit the blue touch paper under this one. He has taken his stake to over 12 per cent of the shares despite being critical of management.
There were reasons to be cheerful for beleaguered long-term backers of Petro Matad, who have seen the stock collapse 55 per cent over the past year.
A renaissance of sorts has been prompted by the success of the Gazelle-1 well in Mongolia, which exceeded expectations during testing, flowing up to 460 barrels of oil per day without artificial lift.
It is now being prepared for production, with completion and installation of surface facilities under way. The shares ended the week 44 per cent higher.
Now onto the week’s list of casualties, which has an all-too-familiar ring to it.
Futura Medical, ANGLE, Tissue Regenix and Litigation Capital — down 26 per cent, 20 per cent, 16 per cent and 11 per cent respectively — are all feeling the after-effects of historic missteps or bad news. Who says the market has a short memory?
Sareum’s bad news was of a more recent vintage. In an update earlier on Friday, the Cambridge-based biotech told the market it had halted a key toxicology study for its lead autoimmune treatment, SDC-1801, following unexpected safety findings.
The 16-week preclinical study, conducted by a third-party contractor, was terminated after animals in the control group, which received an inactive solution, exhibited a higher rate of adverse effects compared with those treated with the drug itself.
Sareum said this made it ‘highly unlikely’ that the issues were linked to SDC-1801. If we accept this, then the knee-jerk 39 per cent share price fall makes no sense at all — unless investors are fretting that this may destabilise the business.
And finally, Tertiary Minerals is catching eyes in the mining sector after unveiling silver hits that have lit a spark under its share price, up 8 per cent this week and 28 per cent over the past month.
At its Mushima North project in Zambia, drilling has returned 58 metres grading 49 grams per tonne silver, 0.26 per cent copper and 0.16 per cent zinc from just 8 metres down — strong numbers for a shallow polymetallic system. The mineralisation stretches to 84 metres and remains open in several directions, hinting at scale.
Managing director Richard Belcher said the results stack up well against other open-pit silver deposits globally, calling it ‘a significant discovery for the company’.
With Mushima lying just 20 kilometres from Moxico Resources’ Kalengwa mine, the proximity could pay off if toll milling comes into play later. For now, Tertiary looks to be carving out a serious foothold in Zambia’s Copperbelt.
For all the breaking small- and mid-cap news go to www.proactiveinvestors.co.uk
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