Joseph Belanoff
Analyst · America we have Tazeen Ahmad. Please go ahead
Thank you, Charlie and thank you everyone on the phone for joining us. Corcept has never had a better quarter. Our revenue grew to $35.6 million, an increase of 80% from the second quarter of 2016 and 29% more than the first quarter of this year. We generated $12.6 million in GAAP net income. Excluding non-cash expenses, our non-GAAP net income was $16 million. Our cash and investments increased by $10.4 million even as our clinical development programs progressed and we paid down our royalty debt, which in July we retired completely. We have raised our 2017 revenue guidance to between $145 million and $155 million, an increase of $20 million. And we anticipate significant revenue growth in 2018, 2019 and beyond. At a superficial level, it’s easy to explain how we achieved these results. More doctors are writing the first prescriptions for Korlym and when the CLL, the medicine works writing second, third and fourth prescriptions, but I wanted to discuss the trends in medical practice that are driving this change in physician behavior. First and foremost, Korlym is effective. For almost all patients, Korlym works very well. In our pivotal trial, 87% of the patients as adjudicated by independent outside experts experienced significant clinical improvement. The positive outcomes of patients who have received Korlym since its commercial launch have been consistent with these clinical findings. Cortisol is the stress hormone. It’s secreted by the adrenal glands with a rhythm that is essential for health. It peaks just after we wake up and then falls through the day rising again just before dawn. Cushing’s syndrome is caused by a tumor that produces either excess cortisol, or ACTH, a hormone that causes the body to produce cortisol. Cortisol in patients with Cushing’s syndrome does not follow a healthy diurnal rhythm. Instead, these patients have an elevated flat cortisol curve. This is why one symptom of hypercortisolism is insomnia. Other symptoms include impaired glucose tolerance, high blood pressure, central obesity, increased fat around the neck, thinning arms and legs, weak muscles and severe fatigue. Irritability, anxiety, cognitive disturbance and depression are common. Korlym works by competing with cortisol at a glucocorticoid receptor, GR, for short. The receptor to which cortisol binds when levels are elevated. By binding to GR, Korlym turns down cortisol activity causing the symptoms suffered by Cushing’s syndrome patients to abate. Treating hypercortisolism by modulating cortisol’s activity provides important benefits. It helps to restore cortisol’s healthy diurnal rhythm. It directs treatment to the true cause of the disorder, excess cortisol activity at GR. By contrast, drugs such as ketoconazole, commonly used generic antifungal agent that lowers cortisol levels by inhibiting cortisol production, actually interferes with cortisol’s diurnal rhythm. Metaphorically drugs like this simply lower the water in the pool with no regard for cortisol’s natural rhythm. A reduction in the amount of cortisol that spills over into the urine in 24 hours, our test physicians have traditionally used to determine whether a patient with hypercortisolism has improved does not at all mean that a patient has a normal cortisol rhythm. Increasing number of physicians are realizing that using Korlym to modulate cortisol activity is often the optimum treatment for hypercortisolism. When Korlym was launched most patients received Korlym after medications intended to reduce their cortisol levels such as ketoconazole had failed. We still enroll many such patients. It is however increasingly common for physicians, particularly physicians who have used Korylm once to prescribe Korylm straightaway. Second, hypercortisolism is a serious disorder and let them [indiscernible] previously thought, physicians have become more sensitive to the dangers of hypercortisolism which is significantly more common than just the florid cases that until recently defined most doctors understanding of the disorder. Physicians increasingly understand that less severe cortisol excess, a condition until recently many doctors considered not worth treating produces detrimental symptoms. Physicians have begun screening patients who exhibit one or more symptoms of hypercortisolism such as glucose intolerance or hypertension, but who have not responded to conventional therapies for those conditions. They are discovering many patients with clearly excessive cortisol activity who may benefit from Korlym. As I mentioned a moment ago, these patients often have normal 24-hour urine – collections of urinary cortisol, a very blunt test. This cortisol activity fortunately is readily apparent with more sophisticated testing. This trend has support in the peer-reviewed literature. As I did on our last call, I referred those interested two important papers published by Dr. Diana Lopez in the Annals of Internal Medicine in August 2016. And two, one by Dr. Valentina Morelli in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism in March 2014. Both researchers found significantly increased morbidity and mortality in patients with less severely excessive cortisol activity. Third, surgery cures only about half of all patients with Cushing’s syndrome. As it’s always been the case, the recommended primary treatment for a patient with Cushing’s syndrome is surgery. Finding and removing the tumor responsible for patient’s cortisol excess can produce a complete cure. Unfortunately, most cortisol or ACTH producing tumors are difficult to identify and harder to remove. An article recently published in Endocrine Practice by Dr. Eliza Geer of Mount Sinai Medical Center found that surgery, even repeated surgery attempting to resect the same ACTH producing tumor succeeds less than half the time, much less often than the 80% and higher rates claimed by some neurosurgeons and endocrinologists at leading surgical centers including her own. I stress this point, because inflated estimates of surgeries efficacy have caused many physicians and some investors to underestimate the number of patients who are candidates for Korlym. Four, Corcept’s commercial efforts target the physicians who treat most patients with hypercortisolism, community endocrinologists. When we launched Korlym, we incorrectly assumed as many physicians and investors still do that most patients with Cushing’s syndrome are cared for by physicians at leading research centers, some of whom claimed to treat 70 or more patients. Our experiences taught us that no doctor treats that many patients with Cushing’s syndrome on an ongoing basis, certainly not endocrinologists at research hospitals, no matter how expert. It is more common for these doctors to consult with the patient, refer the patient to surgery and then often incorrectly assuming that surgery succeeded lose the patient to follow-up. We are performing well because our experienced, highly skilled clinical specialists spend their time where most patients really receive their care of surgery fails in the community setting. We believe our proprietary CORT125134 now and its Phase 2 trial will greatly expand the market for cortisol modulators as a treatment for hypercortisolism. As many of you know, CORT125134 was safe and well tolerated in its Phase 1 trial where demonstrated in healthy subjects the key attribute of an effective treatment for hypercortisolism. The ability to modulate cortisol’s activity at GR by demonstrating that reverse the effects of prednisone a synthetic analog of cortisol. CORT125134 is a selective cortisol modulator that we believe will offer close benefits, but without some of Korlym’s drawbacks. Korlym modulates activity at the progesterone receptor abbreviated as PR as well as PR. In many women Korlym’s affinity for PR causes endometrial thickening and irregular vaginal bleeding, manageable side effects that patients and physicians would nonetheless strongly prefer to book – to avoid. Even more important, affinity for PR makes the active ingredient in Korlym the abortion pill, a drug that effectively modulates cortisol, but has no affinity for PR and none of the abortion pills medical and political toxicity could be distributed much more broadly than Korlym both in the United States and abroad and should be readily accepted by the physicians who currently do not prescribe Korlym. CORT12513’s Phase 2 trial is an open label single arm study that will enroll up to 30 patients and sites in the United States and Europe. We expect results in the first quarter of next year and begun planning our end of Phase 2 FDA meeting and Phase 3 study. We are also developing a plea of validated assay of gene expression that we believe will be a powerful tool for physicians diagnosing and treating patients with hypercortisolism. As I said earlier, Korlym works by reducing cortisol’s activity which is obvious to doctors as they see their patient symptoms improve. However because GR modulators like Korlym or CORT125134 do not reduce cortisol levels, the patients improving health is not accompanied by a decrease in cortisol levels. Today the test most commonly used to diagnose hypercortisolism and gauge the efficacy of treatment. Measure the amount of excess cortisol in the patient’s urine or saliva, crude proxies for excess cortisol activity that often generate inconsistent and sometimes unreliable results. Even a more sophisticated tool, the dexamethasone suppression test is not sensitive enough to always identify patients suffering from excess cortisol activity. Our hypothesis, which we have validated in healthy subjects and are now studying in patients is that expression of the gene FKBP5 is excessive in hypercortisolism and normalizes as the patient symptoms abate. If we are correct it is hard to overstate the medical advance such an assay will represent a sensitively and accurately measuring the actual cause of every Cushing’s syndrome symptom, excess cortisol activity at GR, our assay should help physicians identify patients with hypercortisolism and arrive at an optimal treatment regimen. We will achieve clear validation of our assay this quarter. Our oncology program will broaden significantly this quarter too. As many as you know in cancers whose tumors express GR such as triple negative breast, ovarian and pancreatic cancer cortisol stimulates genes that retard a apoptosis the programmed cell death as many chemotherapies are intended to provoke. Preventing the stimulation of these apoptosis suppressing genes by adding a cortisol modulator to a chemotherapy regimen should allow that regimen to achieve its optimal effect. Cortisol modulation may also help the immune system to fight cancer. There is much interest in oncologic therapies that stimulate the body’s immune system to fight the disease. Cortisol suppresses the immune system, the physiologic, well and psychological stress of cancer and its treatment raise cortisol activity above normal levels creating even greater immunosuppression. Cortisol modulators counter this effect allowing the immune system to act more potently. Cortisol modulation may also help treat castration resistant prostate cancer which is a particularly series form of the disease because androgens stimulate prostate tumor growth androgen deprivation also known as chemical castration is a common treatment for prostate cancer. Investigators at the University of Chicago have shown and Charles Sawyers group at Sloan-Kettering has confirmed that very early in treatment with the androgen receptor, antagonist enzalutamide colonies of tumor cells emerging which cortisol through it’s stimulation at GR is the primary growth factor. Combining a cortisol modulator with an androgen modulator such as enzalutamide the Astellas Medivation drug XTANDI from the outset of treatment may block this cancer escape route. University of Chicago investigators are leading an 84-patient controlled multi-center Phase 2 study of Korlym combined with XTANDI to treat patients with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer. The Department of Defense and the prostate cancer foundation are funding the trial. Astellas is providing XTANDI. We are providing Korlym and possess the intellectual property for the use of this combination of medications. This quarter, we will advance our proprietary selective coritsol modulator, CORT125281 as a treatment for castration-resistant prostate cancer. Preclinical results have been extremely promising. In September, we will begin a Phase 1 trial in healthy subjects to be followed in November with a trial combining the compound with XTANDI to treat patients with metastatic disease. Following the promising results of our Phase 1/2 trial of Korlym in combination with eribulin to treat patients with triple-negative breast cancer and their own extensive preclinical and clinical studies, investigators of the University of Chicago with funding from Celgene are enrolling patients in a 64-patient double-blind placebo-controlled multi-center Phase 2 trial of Korlym combined with nab-paclitaxel, Celgene’s drug ABRAXANE to treat this disease. We are providing Korlym and again possessed the intellectual property for the use of this combination of medications. We are also advancing CORT125134 to treat patients with a range of solid tumor cancers. Our Phase 1/2 trial is in its dose finding phase with expansion cohorts to open by year end. Pancreatic triple-negative breast and ovarian cancer are likely targets. I am also pleased to announce that we will begin the Phase 1 trial on one of our promising proprietary selective cortisol modulators CORT118335 this month. This compound appears to be particularly potent in the liver. In animal models, it prevents and reverses fatty liver disease and liver fibrosis. It also works well in animal models of antipsychotic induced weight gain. These disorders afflict tens of millions of people in the United States. If CORT118335’s preclinical results translate to humans, this development would constitute a major medical advance. If CORT118335’s Phase 1 trial outcome is positive, we will immediately start one or more Phase 2 trials. To sum up, Corcept had a great second quarter. Our revenues increased 80%. We raised our 2017 revenue guidance for the third time this year to between $145 million and $155 million. We generated a GAAP profit for the quarter of $12.6 million compared to $1 million in the same period last year. Our cash increased by $10.4 million in the quarter even as we advanced our clinical program and paid down our royalty debt retiring it completely in July. We continue to expect significant growth in the years ahead. We will have results of our Phase 2 trial of CORT125134 in Cushing’s syndrome a compound we believe will offer real advantages over Korlym in the first quarter next year. We have begun preparing for our end of Phase 2 meeting with the FDA and our Phase 3 trial. This quarter we will achieve clear validation of our important FKBP5 gene expression assay. Our programs to develop cortisol modulators to treat patients with castration-resistant prostate cancer continue. University of Chicago investigators are actively enrolling patients in their Phase 2 trial pairing Korlym with XTANDI. This quarter, we will start the clinical program of a proprietary compound CORT125281 to treat patients with this disease. With financial support from Celgene, University of Chicago investigators are enrolling patients in a definitive Phase 2 trial of Korlym combined with ABRAXANE to treat patients with triple-negative breast cancer. We expect to open expansion cohorts in our trial of CORT125134 to treat patients with solid tumor cancers by year end. Finally, one of our most promising compounds, CORT118335 will enter Phase 1 this month. If results are positive, we will advance it to Phase 2 for the treatment of metabolic disorders potentially including NASH and antipsychotic-induced weight gain. I will stop now to answer questions.