Sellas CEO Angelos Stergiou Highlights Pediatric Leukemia Study That ‘Directly Supports’ Scientific Basis Of Regal Trial

Stergiou highlighted a Phase 2 study published in the Blood Advances journal that evaluated a maintenance therapy in 17 children with hard-to-treat acute leukemia following stem-cell transplants.

• The Phase 2 study focused on WT1, a protein found at unusually high levels in leukemia cells.
• The study reported a three-year overall survival rate of 70.6%, compared with a 30% historical benchmark.
• Sellas’ Regal trial has so far recorded 78 of the 80 events needed to trigger its final analysis.

Sellas Life Sciences (SLS) was in the limelight on Monday, after CEO Angelos Stergiou highlighted a new pediatric leukemia study that he believes supports the scientific basis behind the biotech firm’s Acute Myeloid Leukemia therapy, Galinpepimut-S (GPS).

Sellas is currently observing a quiet period ahead of the closely watched Phase 3 results of its Regal trial evaluating GPS.

At the time of writing, SLS shares were up 2.2% and tracking their fifth straight session of gains.

Study’s Similarities With SLS’ AML Therapy

In a LinkedIn post on Monday, Stergiou highlighted a Phase 2 study published in the journal Blood Advances that evaluated Wilms Tumor 1 (WT1) peptide vaccines as maintenance therapy in 17 children with hard-to-treat acute leukemia following stem cell transplants.

WT1 is a protein found at unusually high levels in AML cells. High WT1 levels are often associated with persistent leukemia cells and relapse. Sellas’ GPS uses engineered WT1-derived peptides to train the immune system to recognize and attack WT1-expressing leukemia cells.

The study reported a three-year overall survival rate of 70.6%, compared with a 30% historical benchmark. Patients who responded to the vaccines showed a significant increase in immune cells that targeted WT1.

Stergiou said the study directly supports the scientific basis of Sellas’ Phase 3 Regal trial in adult AML.

Regal Trial Approaches Final Analysis

The Regal trial has so far recorded 78 of the 80 events (patient deaths) needed to trigger its final analysis. After the 80th event, Sellas will lock the database, review the blinded information, conduct its statistical analysis, and unblind the results.

Sellas has said the trial would meet its targeted outcome if GPS extends median survival to 12.6 months from eight months for the standard-treatment group.

Retail Bulls Eye $120

Retail sentiment surrounding SLS on Stocktwits remained in the ‘bullish’ territory over the past 24 hours, amid ‘high’ message volumes.

One user expects the stock to surge past $120 if the GPS data is favorable and a much-speculated buyout eventually goes through. The target price is nearly nine times the current price.

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Another user hopes the stock will break past its $13.5 resistance and climb beyond $15 before any company update.

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SLS shares have surged more than 200% so far this year.

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