Week of September 26, 2025

The Week at a Glance:

• Stocks Slightly Fall Over Uncertainty of the Fed’s Policy Direction: Major indices fell an average of 0.4% as stronger-than-expected Q2 GDP growth and steady August core inflation sent mixed signals on future rate cuts, with investors awaiting the October 3rd jobs report for clarity on the likelihood of further cuts

• Pharma’s US Manufacturing Countdown: President Trump threw a wrench in ongoing pharmaceutical tariff negotiations on Thursday night informing all major drug makers that they have six days to break ground on developing a US manufacturing site or face a 100% tariff on branded products outside the US

• Pfizer Bets Big on Obesity: Pfizer announced that it would acquire Metsera for $4.9B upfront and an additional $2.4B in milestones. The deal marks Pfizer’s biggest bet in the metabolic space, acquiring a broad pipeline of injectables in the GLP-1 and amylin categories. Metsera’s lead asset is a GLP-1 RA in Phase 2b targeting obesity yes

• Registration Now Open for 10th Annual Nordic-American Healthcare Conference 2026: The leading US-Nordic healthcare equity conference hosted by DNB//Back Bay will feature expanded programming for this milestone year. Join us in New York on March 25-26, 2026. Register and learn more about the NAHC here.

Markets Overview

• The S&P 500, Nasdaq, and the Dow were down 0.3%, 0.7%, and 0.1%, respectively

  • GDP grew at a revised 3.8% pace in Q2, the fastest rate in nearly two years

The NYSE Pharma Index and the NBI were down 2.2% and 0.6%, respectively

Notable changes in share price:

• Uniqure (NASDAQ: QURE): Shares surged 287.5% after Uniqure reported positive topline results from its pivotal Phase 1/2 trial in Huntington’s disease, illustrating disease-modifying potential

• Metsera (NASDAQ: MTSR): Shares jumped 56.8% on news that Pfizer will acquire the company in a deal valued at up to $7.3B

• PepGen (NASDAQ: PEPG): Shares climbed 172.6% after the company reported positive Phase 1 results in DM1 with its lead asset, PGN-EDODM1, demonstrating strong pharmacodynamic activity

• Fractyl Health (NASDAQ: GUTS): Shares climbed 36.7% after the company reported positive results from its weight-loss maintenance study, demonstrating sustained weight loss following GLP-1 discontinuation

• MBX Biosciences (NASDAQ:MBX): Shares surged 75.1% following the release of positive results from their Phase 2 trial in chronic hypoparathyroidism

Sources: Pitchbook, Biomedtracker, and CapIQ

Equity Markets

IPO Markets:

No companies completed IPOs last week

No companies filed an S-1 last week.

Of 19 companies in the queue, only one (MapLight Therapeutics) intends to raise more than $30.0M in proceeds

So far in 2025, IPOs have delivered a median gain of 17.4%, with ~60% of newly public companies trading above their offer price

Follow-On Offering Markets:

There were six follow-on equity offerings last week totaling $555.3M, including:

• MBX Biosciences (NASDAQ: MBX) raised $199.9M to advance clinical development of its endocrine pipeline, including lead asset canvuparatide (MBX 2109), a parathyroid hormone (PTH) peptide prodrug for the treatment of hypoparathyroidism

• Immuneering Corporation (NASDAQ: IMRX) raised $175.0M to support clinical development of its oncology pipeline, including lead asset atebimetinib (IMM-1-104), an oral, once-daily MEK inhibitor in solid tumor cancers such as pancreatic, melanoma, and NSCLC

• PepGen Inc. (NASDAQ: PEPG) raised $115.0M to fund clinical development of its Enhanced Delivery Oligonucleotide (EDO) platform in neuromuscular disease, specifically advancing Phase 1 FREEDOM-DM1 and Phase 2 FREEDOM2-DM1 trials in myotonic dystrophy type 1

• Fractyl Health, Inc. (NASDAQ: GUTS) raised $60.0M to extend cash runway to 2027, continuing development of continuing development of Revita, and endoscopic procedural therapy to improve insulin sensitivity for type 2 diabetes, Rejuva, a gene therapy platform for durable disease modification in obesity and related metabolic disorders

PIPE/RDO Markets:

• There were four PIPE/RDO deals last week raising an aggregate $169.8M, including:

  • Monopar Therapeutics (NASDAQ: MNPR) raised $135.0M through a registered offering to advance its late clinical stage pipeline of next-generation targeted therapies for Wilson disease and cancer

Licensing

M & A

Venture Financing

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