MannKind shares plunged again today after a bearish report from analysts at Goldman Sachs. The insulin maker’s stock is one of the more volatile ones on Wall Street, and for good reason. Either MannKind’s future is excellent, or it’s horrible and the company is heading for bankruptcy.
Shares of MannKind fell by as much as 5.66% to $3.38 per share today during regular trading hours. On Monday, the stock shot upward in early trades, only to tumble further and further as the day dragged on. This morning MannKind shares shot upward again, but they quickly reversed course and are on track to end the day with a decline.
MannKind still struggling to sell Afrezza
In a report dated Aug. 24, Goldman Sachs analysts Jay Olson, Jami Rubin and Ariel Herman, Ph.D. reiterated their Sell rating and $2 per share price target. Sales of Afrezza, MannKind’s only product on the market, continue to disappoint. Weekly total prescription numbers are struggling to reach half of the number of Exubera prescriptions that are written weekly.
The Goldman Sachs team sees Exubera as the benchmark Afrezza much reach in terms of weekly prescription numbers. In six of the last 10 weeks, prescriptions of Afrezza have been at less than half of Exubera’s prescription numbers. As a result, Olson and team are lower their sales estimates for Afrezza.
As a reminder, MannKind management expects sales of Afrezza to pick up in the fourth quarter.
MannKind struggles with debt
MannKind had $100 million worth of convertible debt due Aug. 15, and analysts had been expecting for some time that the insulin maker would refinance that debt. The refinancing was delayed, however, and the Goldman Sachs team thinks the delay was because of how slowly the Afrezza sales launch is ramping.
The company has been struggling to stay on good terms with its creditors. MannKind management was able to roll $28 million of the debt into new convertible debt due in three years. They had been planning on exchanging $57 million of it in equity, but two days before it was due, they announced that $32 million of that was extended to Sept. 30. At that time, MannKind will attempt to exchange it for equity.
How much does MannKind owe this year?
Because of all these changes, it’s unclear how much of this $100 million in debt the drug maker will have to pay off with cash before the end of the year. MannKind did have $107 million in cash and equivalents as of the end of June, however.
The Goldman Sachs team thinks the insulin maker could receive another $25 million milestone payment from Sanofi at some point during the third quarter in connection with the manufacturing of Afrezza. Also MannKind still has $30 million left that it can borrow from The Mann Group.
Because of all these debt issues, the analysts are concerned about how badly the slowness of the Afrezza launch is damaging the company’s balance sheet.
