NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – Sequenom, Myriad Genetics, and Affymetrix saw their respective stocks gain more than 20 percent in value during November to lead the GenomeWeb Daily News Index.
Sequenom's shares jumped at the beginning of the month after the firm reported that its third quarter revenues had increased 92 percent from the third quarter of 2012, beating analysts' expectations on the top and bottom line. Subsequent news that former Sequenom President and CEO Harry Stylli had made an arbitration demand with the company seeking more than $1.6 million in damages did little to halt the stock's rise during the month as it finished up 37 percent.
Shares of Myriad Genetics also climbed after the firm surprised investors with strong first quarter results for its Fiscal Year 2014, also easily beating Wall Street estimates. The stock climbed throughout the rest of the month and closed up around 24 percent at $29.75 — though news today that Myriad was being countersued by InVitae led to a nearly 13 percent drop in its stock Monday afternoon to $26.03.
Shares of Affymetrix gained 20 percent in November, partially aided by its third quarter results, which also beat Wall Street estimates. Also during the month, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit upheld a lower court's ruling that Affymetrix and Life Technologies' Navigenics business did not infringe a patent held by E8 Pharmaceuticals and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
The top decliners among the 30 stocks in the GWDN Index for the month were CombiMatrix (-6 percent) and Bruker (-5 percent). Overall, only six of the stocks in the Index lost value during November.
The GWDN Index was up 3.2 percent for the month, just below the gains registered for the Dow Jones Industrial Average (+3.5 percent) and the Nasdaq (+3.6 percent). The Nasdaq Biotech Index jumped around 9 percent and hit a historical high during November.
