Biogen Idec
shares are up 60% since I profiled the company in Forbes in December. The reason's pretty simple: sales of the MS drug Tecfidera are basically destroying what were already very high expectations. Mark Schoenebaum at International Strategy & Investment Group noted on Tuesday that according to data from IMS Health, prescriptions for Tecfidera went up 21% last week. Even if patients start dropping off the drug at a 10% rate and weekly additions slow, sales could still hit $800 million this year, about double what analysts had expected before the launch. This graph is Schoenebaum's, and it compares Tecfidera's launch to those of
Novartis
' Gilenya and
Sanofi
's Aubagio, the other new MS pills.
But that's not the only piece of good news, from Cowen & Company analyst Eric Schmidt. It appears that the MS drug market is growing, not shrinking. Many investors feared that Tecfidera would cannibalize sales of Avonex, another Biogen MS drug. So far, that's not happening. This graph comes from Schmidt:
