Lexicon Swings to Loss as Licensing Revenue Drops
Second-quarter revenue fell 97.6% as prior-year licensing income rolled off.
Lexicon Pharmaceuticals (LXRX), a biopharmaceutical company, swung to a second-quarter net loss of $31.8 million, or $0.07 a share, from net income of $3.3 million, or $0.01 a share, a year earlier.
Revenue fell to $0.7 million from $28.9 million a year earlier, when Lexicon recorded $27.5 million of licensing revenue from Novo Nordisk. Revenue also declined from about $21.1 million in the first quarter, as all $20 million of first-half licensing and milestone revenue was recognized before the second quarter.
INPEFA net product revenue dropped 48.6% from a year earlier to $680,000 and declined from about $1.1 million in the first quarter. Meanwhile, research-and-development expense rose 10.8% to $17.4 million on higher external spending for the SONATA-HCM Phase 3 trial, while selling, general and administrative expense increased 4.3% to $9.8 million.
The combination pushed total operating expenses up 8.4% to $27.2 million and produced a $26.5 million operating loss, compared with operating income of $3.7 million a year earlier. The net result also included a $4.3 million loss tied to the early extinguishment of debt.
Lexicon completed enrollment in SONATA-HCM during the quarter, substantially exceeding the trial's 500-patient target after enrollment had passed 50% at year-end. The company continues to expect topline data in the first quarter of 2027.
The expected resubmission of the ZYNQUISTA new-drug application moved to the fourth quarter from the mid-2026 timetable given in May. Lexicon's latest update omitted its earlier expectation that a potential approval could come during 2026. Novo Nordisk's LX9851 program, meanwhile, entered a Phase 1 trial in March and remains scheduled for completion in the first quarter of 2027.
Viatris secured sotagliflozin approval in Bahrain after an earlier approval in the United Arab Emirates and expanded applications beyond Canada, Australia and New Zealand to nine additional markets. Lexicon ended June with $190.6 million in cash and investments, helped by $96.2 million from a February equity sale, and replaced its Oxford Finance debt with a $100 million Hercules Capital facility that provided $55 million at closing and conditional access to another $45 million.