Encouraging incremental data by Canadians at ASCO

Dundee Securities summed up some of the Canadian data presented at this year’s clinical oncology conference by AEterna Zentaris (NASDAQ:AEZS; TSX:AEZ), OncoGenex (NASDAQ:OGXI), Tekmira (TSX:TKM) and MethylGene (TSX:MYG) as “encouraging, but mainly incremental.”

Nevertheless, analyst David Martin downgraded MethylGene to “neutral” from “buy,” without a price target. While he called data from the company’s MGCD265 drug encouraging, “it was not out of the ballpark, and in that light, the less than one year cash runway and continuing high burn of the company come more into focus.”

Mr. Martin also noted that Phase 3 data for YM BioScience’s (AMEX:YMI; TSX:YM) nimotuzumab drug had been scheduled, but wasn’t presented by partner Oncoscience AG due to data collection delays.  On the other hand, earlier stage nimotuzumab and CYT997 data were presented.