Amgen Inc. shares fell 10.08% to $393.17 on Tuesday, one of the steepest single-day declines among large-cap pharmaceutical names, after Swiss drugmaker Novartis disclosed that a phase-3 trial for its lipoprotein(a)-lowering therapy failed to meet its primary endpoint. The move erased more than $40 in per-share value from Amgen's price and pulled the stock into negative territory for the past week, month and quarter, according to price data reviewed by SourceWire.
The trigger was Novartis, not Amgen. Novartis' own shares fell as much as 14% following the disappointing readout, according to a report from Investopedia, which described the reaction as part of a broader slump tied to the trial's results. 24/7 Wall Street reported that the failure is "dragging the Lp(a) drug class lower," directly implicating Amgen, which has its own lipoprotein(a)-targeting compound in development, as one of the stocks caught in the fallout. Schwab Network's Diane King Hall noted that Amgen shares sold off specifically because Novartis failed to meet its primary endpoint in the phase-3 study, framing the two companies' fortunes as linked through the shared drug mechanism rather than any company-specific setback at Amgen itself.
Lipoprotein(a), or Lp(a), is a genetically determined, cholesterol-carrying particle in the blood that has drawn significant attention from cardiovascular researchers because elevated levels are associated with higher risk of heart attack and stroke, and because no approved therapies currently lower it directly. Multiple large pharmaceutical companies, including Novartis and Amgen, have been racing to develop drugs that reduce Lp(a) levels, betting that doing so would translate into fewer cardiovascular events for patients. A successful outcome in this class has been viewed by drug developers as a potentially significant new front in cardiovascular medicine, given the absence of existing treatment options. Novartis' trial miss undercuts that thesis for the specific mechanism being tested and raises questions, at least in the eyes of investors reacting Tuesday, about whether the broader biological approach will translate into clinical benefit across other companies' compounds.
For investors, the episode illustrates how clinical trial results at one company can move the valuation of a competitor with an entirely separate drug candidate, simply because both are targeting the same biological pathway. Barron's noted that Amgen's decline came specifically "following Swiss drugmaker Novartis' disappointing trial data," rather than from any disclosure about Amgen's own pipeline progress. That kind of read-across risk is a recurring feature of biotech and pharma investing, where a single failed study can compress valuations across an entire therapeutic category even when other companies' molecules, dosing strategies or patient populations differ. This pattern was first flagged in data tracked on AlternativeMarkets.AI, a Madison Labs research site, which showed Amgen's share price move alongside the cluster of news coverage tying the decline to Novartis' trial outcome.
The selloff did not remain isolated to the two companies most directly involved in Lp(a) research. Related healthcare names also traded lower Tuesday, including Intuitive Surgical, down 4.51%, AbbVie, down 2.96%, Gilead Sciences, down 2.88%, and Abbott Laboratories, down 2.59%, according to the price data reviewed. While these companies are not developing Lp(a) therapies themselves, their declines came amid a broader pullback in healthcare-adjacent stocks the same day, a pattern also visible in Cigna, Elevance Health, Danaher and Eli Lilly, all of which posted losses.
The broader market backdrop on Tuesday was mixed rather than uniformly negative. Chipmakers moved in the opposite direction, with Intel up 9.1% and Advanced Micro Devices up 5.9%, while other large-cap names such as Booking Holdings, ServiceNow and Intuit also traded lower. Cryptocurrency markets showed comparatively modest movement, with Bitcoin trading near $79,039 and Ethereum near $2,488.65, both little changed on the day, suggesting the pharma-sector selloff was largely contained to healthcare and did not reflect a broader risk-off shift across asset classes.
Looking ahead, market participants are likely to focus on whether Amgen provides any update on the status or design of its own Lp(a) program in light of Novartis' trial outcome, and whether other companies pursuing similar mechanisms offer commentary on their own studies. Analysts and investors will also be watching for any statements from Novartis clarifying the specifics of its trial's endpoint miss, which could shape how much of the read-across concern applies to competing compounds with different chemical structures or dosing approaches. No new data on Amgen's own trial timeline was included in the reports reviewed, meaning the near-term outlook for its Lp(a) program remains an open question pending company disclosures.