aibioCuris gets Nasdaq deficiency notice on market value of listed securities
Tickers CRIS
Nasdaq told Curis that its listed securities were worth less than $35,000,000 for 30 consecutive business days. The company has until August 20, 2025 to regain compliance.
Key facts
- Company
- Curis, Inc. (NASDAQ: CRIS)
- News type
- Listings
- Primary source
- CURIS INC Form 8-K filed February 27, 2025 (SEC EDGAR)
Curis, Inc. (Nasdaq: CRIS) received a Nasdaq deficiency notice saying the market value of its listed securities had been below $35,000,000 for 30 consecutive business days. The company disclosed the notice in a Form 8-K filed February 27, 2025. It has until August 20, 2025 to regain compliance. If it does not, Nasdaq will send written notice that its securities are subject to delisting from the Nasdaq Capital Market.
What the filing says
Curis received the notice on February 21, 2025 from the Listing Qualifications Department of the Nasdaq Stock Market LLC. Nasdaq said the company was not in compliance with Nasdaq Listing Rule 5550(b)(2), which the filing calls the MVLS Requirement. MVLS stands for market value of listed securities. The notice gives the company a compliance period of 180 calendar days under Nasdaq Listing Rule 5810(c)(3)(C), and that period ends on August 20, 2025.
To regain compliance, the market value of the company's listed securities must close at $35,000,000 or more for a minimum of 10 consecutive business days. The filing says there can be no assurance that Curis will regain compliance with the MVLS Requirement or keep up with Nasdaq's other listing standards. A missed deadline would trigger the written delisting notice.
The losses and the cash behind them
The most recent annual report in hand, the 10-K for 2023 filed February 8, 2024, is more than a year older than the notice, and the 8-K gives no newer figures. In that report Curis wrote: "We have identified conditions and events that raise substantial doubt about our ability to continue as a going concern."
The net loss was $47.4 million for the year ended December 31, 2023, and the accumulated deficit stood at $1.2 billion. The company said its cash, cash equivalents and investments of $56.3 million as of December 31, 2023 should fund operating expenses and capital spending into 2025. That is the same year in which the Nasdaq compliance period runs out.
Revenue is narrow. Royalty payments from Genentech were $9.9 million in 2023 and $10.3 million in 2022, or 99% and 100% of gross revenues in those years.
The Oberland arrangement
Curis has also pledged much of its royalty cash to outside investors. The 10-K says that for 2023 and 2022, 88% and 87%, respectively, of cash receipts tied to Erivedge were paid over to the purchasers under the Oberland Purchase Agreement. The purchasers are a partnership managed by Oberland Capital Management, LLC, and the agent is Lind SA LLC, also managed by Oberland.
The 10-K warns that alleged events of default under that agreement, or any future allegation of one, could have a material adverse effect on the business, the company's financial condition and its stock price.
The clinical record
The company's lead product is emavusertib (CA-4948), an oral small-molecule inhibitor of IRAK4. The FDA placed partial clinical holds on both TakeAim studies in April 2022, after a serious adverse event in the leukemia study. The lymphoma hold was lifted in August 2022 and the leukemia hold in July 2023. The 10-K says both studies are actively recruiting.
Every emavusertib study named in that report is a Phase 1 or Phase 1/2 trial. The TakeAim Leukemia and TakeAim Lymphoma studies are Phase 1/2 studies, and the AML Triplet study is a Phase 1 study of emavusertib added to azacitidine and venetoclax. The company also deprioritized other compounds, including fimepinostat, to focus on emavusertib.
Who is involved
Chief Financial Officer Diantha Duvall signed the 8-K. The Listing Qualifications Department of the Nasdaq Stock Market LLC sent the notice.
What comes next
Curis must show a market value of listed securities at or above $35,000,000 for 10 consecutive business days before August 20, 2025. The 8-K does not say what the company plans to do, and it does not give a reason for the drop in market value.