Cipher Pharmaceuticals, Q2 2026 shares close -21.39%

“According to the story, Green Lake was once a thriving town beside a real lake, but after Sam was shot and killed in a confrontation with Katherine “Kissing” Kate Barlow, the lake began to shrink, and the area turned into a desert.”

It’s been about two years since a long series of lies blew up Cipher’s best prospect and just over 2 years since the acquisition of ParaPro. The shares have not done well over this period.

In terms of the US handling of spinosad, I think it’s gone about as well as it could have. I’m not a dermatologist so I don’t exactly know what the process entails for commercial adoption of new topical medicines (especially for indications with topical and systemic prescription treatment options). XDEMVY’s (Lotilaner) for demodex mites is a good example of an eye drop becoming a blockbuster phenom within 3 years of launch, but it has the caveat of it being the only approved prescription medicine for demodex blepharitis.

Maybe Cipher should think about reformulating their topical spinosad to compete with lotilaner. If it turns out that spinosad does kill the larvae of demodex mites then it will be a vastly superior topical to lotilaner & there’s not a competitor in sight!

Jokes aside if there are to be any major fundamental challenges to prescriber adoption of Natroba, I would guess that it comes from data used to register the product. Natroba has a significantly higher-than-normal rate of clearance of scabies mites from their placebo Natroba was tested against, which I believe has been caused by an unlabeled scabicidal ingredient, benzyl alcohol. This could in turn be sandbagging the expected efficacy of their topical because a clinician is presented data that shows a placebo adjusted response rate that’s significantly lower than what’s actually on the label.

It’s a little ironic because their partner Moberg is in the exact same camp with the exact same problem.

The reason in general which I think Natroba could have a great future in scabies treatment is its differentiated mechanism of action. Spinosad has a high affinity for the nicotinic acetylcholine receptors in all kinds of bugs and a unique way to kill scabies means resistance becomes less likely to form over the global population. It is especially helpful that it kills the eggs because compliance with topicals is complicated by the eggs hatching & not being properly retreated.

Stocking all US based pharmacies inside Walmart was exciting to hear. This is yet another one of these indications where I pretty much only see benefits in a monograph being changed to enable OTC use of these medicines. Delusional parasitosis is an exceptionally rare psychological condition and among one of the only downsides of enabling further access to prescription topical anti-parasitic medications like Natroba. A man can only dream.

Outside the US the handling of Natroba is essentially incomprehensible. The company bought a medicine which treats conditions primarily endemic to areas of extreme poverty. Craig Mull definitely knew this from the first day the acquisition was made. The only hangup Craig has ever given with respect to out licensing deals with contention about price given to them. The only valid excuse remaining is the royalty and product sales from the licensing deal wouldn’t cover Ciphers own costs. If that’s the case it’s fine because the practice is fundamentally unsustainable, but that’s not what’s been said & instead doing nothing while haggling for impossible sums appears to be his official modus operandi. The majority of people online that discuss Cipher have a good opinion of them as intelligent leaders, but it truly is incomprehensible position to think that they were ever going to be getting a good price for selling products to people that live in sub $5K USD GDP per capita countries.