Scott Power: ASX health stocks fall in ‘lacklustre week'
The US FDA approves CSL's Andembry to prevent attacks of hereditary angioedema
Clever Culture systems records its second consecutive quarter of positive cashflow operations
Healthcare and life sciences expert Scott Power, who has been a senior analyst with Morgans Financial for 27 years, gives his take on the ASX healthcare sector for the week and his 'Powerplay' stock pick.
The ASX healthcare sector has had what Morgans' senior healthcare analyst Scott Power described as a "lacklustre week".
At lunchtime on Friday, the S&P/ASX 200 Health Care index (ASX:XHJ) was down 1.1% for the past five days, while the benchmark S&P/ASX 200 (ASX:XJO) fell 0.55% for the same period.
Markets have been influenced by global economic and geopolitical concerns, particularly escalating tensions between Iran and Israel.
And it seems US President Donald Trump has not backed down from tariffs on pharmaceutical imports.
A United States Department of Commerce investigation is underway under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962 – a provision that allows the president to restrict imports if they are deemed a threat to national security.
Returning from the G7 Summit in Canada Trump reportedly told media on Air Force One tariffs on the sector were coming.
"We're going to be doing pharmaceuticals very soon," he said.
"That's going to bring all the companies back into America... at least partially back in."
Power said Trump's latest comments were adding further jitters to the sector.
"Until we get clarity there's going to be volatility," he said.
Power's Powerplay – CSL gets FDA approval for Andembry
The ASX's largest healthcare stock CSL (ASX:CSL) has notched a milestone with the FDA approving its Andembry (garadacimab) to prevent attacks of hereditary angioedema (HAE).
Affecting about one in 50,000 people CSL said HAE was the first and only treatment targeting factor XIIa for prophylactic use to provide sustained protection from attacks of HAE in adult and pediatric patients aged 12 years and older.
The approval was based on a pivotal phase III (VANGUARD) trial and ongoing open-label extension study, showing Andembry reduced the median number of HAE attacks by more than 99% (mean 89.2%), compared to placebo.
Andembry is also the only treatment to offer once-monthly dosing from the start for all patients and is administered via an autoinjector.
The drug is already available in Australia, the UK, EU, Japan, Switzerland and UAE.
CSL said Andembry will be launched "immediately", with availability through third-party specialty pharmacy network before the end of June.
In a note to clients, Morgans' healthcare analyst Derek Jellinek wrote that while Andembry's US approval had taken longer than expected, with application filing in December '24, it's good to see the drug greenlit before the end of '25 "despite the ongoing tumultuous environment" at the US Food and Drug Administration at the agency.
"We view Andembry's unique MOA (ie upstream inhibition of key pathways leading to HAE attacks, so broader applicability), favourable safety profile and convenient dosing (every 4 weeks via subcutaneous injection) as key differentiators," Jellinek wrote.
While Andembry is expected to impact Berinert sales – CSL's treatment for acute HAE attacks – Jellinek believes the effect should be modest.
He wrote Berinert's revenue was forecast to remain steady in FY25 at US$242 million, accounting for less than 2% of CSL's total revenue. Sales are projected to ease slightly to US$230m in FY26 and US$225 million in FY27.
However, this is more than compensated by anticipated growth in Andembry sales, which are expected to reach US$120m in FY26 and increase to US$220m in FY27.
Morgans has an add rating on CSL and 12-month target price of $329.26.
Clever Culture Systems delivers clever Q3 FY25 result
Clever Culture Systems (ASX:CC5) has achieved its second consecutive quarter of positive cashflow operations with $500,000 net cash inflow in Q3 FY25 and is on track to achieve break-even or better for H2 FY25.
During the quarter Clever Culture continued to execute on its commercialisation strategy for its APAS Independence instruments
in the pharmaceutical market, building on success with big pharma companies Astra Zeneca and Bristol Myers Squibb (BMS).
The instruments use artificial intelligence and machine learning software to automate the imaging, analysis and interpretation of microbiology culture plates.
Since launching the product in March 2024, Clever Culture said it had completed sales and received orders from pharmaceutical customers for 13 APAS instruments, representing ~$6 million in revenue with a pipeline of 40 qualified opportunities.
Clever Culture finished Q3 FY25 with a cash position of $2.2m.
"Other top 10 pharmaceutical companies are expected to engage with CC5 following the AstraZeneca and Bristol Myers Squibb success," Power said.
Emvision awarded $5 million government grant
EMVision Medical Devices (ASX:EMV) has been awarded a $5 million federal government grant to further development of its First Responder portable brain scanner.
The funds are by way of an Australian government Industry Growth Program (IGP) Commercialisation and Growth Grant.
First Responder is EMVision's second product and distinguishes between bleed and clot strokes at the scene and is designed to be used by ambulances and by paramedics.
The device should shorten diagnosis time, a crucial element in the patient getting the right treatment.
EMVision's first commercial device – the emu bedside brain scanner – is also designed to rapidly diagnose stroke at the point-of-care with a pivotal trial underway to supports US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) de novo (new device) clearance.
Audeara hits record, Micro-X gets milestone payment boost
In other news of the week, specialist in listening solutions for people with hearing challenges Audeara (ASX:AUA) has delivered record revenue exceeding $3.64 million for the 11 months to end of May FY25.
Audeara reported revenue for the 11-month period was up 14% on FY24 total revenue and 25% on FY23, which the company said signalled underlying strength of its ongoing operations.
The company expects additional growth to materialise in coming weeks based on strong June 2025 trading.
And leader in cold cathode x-ray technology for health and security markets Micro-X (ASX:MX1) has received $2.3 million in milestone payments for two projects.
MicroX achieved milestone three under its development agreement with US Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H) and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for a full body CT scanner, delivering $1.4 million.
The company also achieved milestone two under a strategic partnership deal with Billion Prima for a baggage and parcel scanning unit due for completion in 2025, delivering $900,000.
"We are pleased to continue to deliver strong progress on these key development contracts with ARPA-H, DHS, and Billion
Prima respectively, which is a testament to our focus and timely delivery on key projects," Micro-X CEO Kingsley Hall said.
"We are also well advanced with the final stages of our Head CT development as we prepare to enter human imaging trials."
The views, information, or opinions expressed in the interview in this article are solely those of the interviewee and do not represent the views of Stockhead.
Stockhead has not provided, endorsed or otherwise assumed responsibility for any financial product advice contained in this article.
At Stockhead, we tell it like it is. While Clever Culture Systems, Audeara and EMVision are Stockhead advertisers, the companies did not sponsor this article.
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ABC News
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How easy is it to trick the Australian Taxation Office?
Sam Hawley: How easy is it to trick the Australian Tax Office? Well, for fraudsters it's not hard at all and plenty have done it costing taxpayers billions of dollars that have never been recovered. Today, Angus Grigg on his Four Corners investigation into the biggest GST scam in history and how the ATO dropped the ball. I'm Sam Hawley on Gadigal land in Sydney. This is ABC News Daily. Sam Hawley: Angus, you've been hard at work looking into what's going on at the Australian Tax Office. And you've really been having a deep look into this huge GST scam. Now, this unfolded in no other than Mildura in north-west Victoria. So, take me there and tell me about local resident Sarah. Angus Grigg: Yeah. Mildura is a really beautiful town, an irrigation town on the Murray in North West Victoria. And this GST scam really took off in Mildura. And it really was circulating within a sort of population that you might say is low socioeconomic groups, people on welfare, people with addiction issues. And we went to interview one person called Sarah. She was going through quite a bit of financial hardship at the time. I think she'd separated from her partner who was facing pretty serious charges at the time as well. And she was short of money because she needed to have some dental work done. So one of her friends showed her how to use a business that had been registered and an ABN linked to GST to claim GST refunds fraudulently. 'Sarah': The people that I was associating with at that time, they had done it and told me how easy it was to get a large amount of money quickly. And I just thought at the time it was a good idea because I was in a bit of financial trouble. Angus Grigg: She pretended, if you like, to be a hairdresser, despite the fact that she had no hairdressing qualifications. She'd never worked in a hairdresser, hadn't hired premises, had no equipment. And so she logged into her myGov account and first of all, claimed $15,000 and then did it a second time and got another $15,000. 'Sarah': I don't even really still understand how it went through. I was a single parent and then all of a sudden I'm a hairdresser that's getting this return put into my account with no other payments from clients or anything like that to balance it was needed. Like no proof. Angus Grigg: Now, bear in mind, the money went into the same account as her welfare payments and the money went within about 10 days without any verification, without any checks, without anyone from the tax office ringing and saying, what did you spend this money on? Do you have hairdressing qualifications? Have you hired premises? You know, she just absolutely couldn't believe how easy it was. 'Sarah': Yeah, I just couldn't believe it that it was just sitting there on my everyday access debit bank card. Angus Grigg: Now, the other thing to bear in mind, to receive a GST refund of $30,000, she would have needed to have capital expenditure or bought stock and other items for her hairdressing business of about $300,000. Now, surely a single mother living on welfare, getting family tax benefits, that should have been a red flag for the tax office. Sam Hawley: Wow. Okay. So Sarah, which is not her real name, just by the way, you've changed that for this story to keep her anonymous. She just tells the ATO she's a hairdresser and then the tax office falls for it. That's extraordinary. Angus Grigg: It is. And the fact that you don't need a receipt, you don't need any proof of the line of work you're in is extraordinary. And that's because the tax office basically fired most of the humans in the loop and started relying on algorithms or computers, if you like, to make these payments. They wanted to ensure the timely payment of GST refunds to businesses. But in doing that, they really opened the door up to fraud. Sam Hawley: Right. Sure. So the tax office wants to streamline things. But in the meantime, people like Sarah are all of a sudden dabbling in fraud. And as we've mentioned, she's not the only one. There's a lot of other people doing a very similar thing. Tell me about Linden Phillips. What was he up to? Angus Grigg: Linden Phillips, once again from Mildura, for us, he was like patient zero. It looks like he was the really one of the very, very early people in this scam. So what happens is that Linden Phillips gets out of jail in August 2021. And he already has a company registered. And so he reactivates his GST registration through his ABN and his MyGov account. And then within a couple of weeks of getting out of jail, he does what I'd sort of call a test run. And he claims $13,000 in GST refunds from the tax office. Once again, no documents, no receipts, no verification required. He gets that money within a couple of weeks and clearly then thinks, OK, I'm going to go for the big one. And so what he does is he lodges 46 backdated GST claims for an amount of $821,000 in GST. And the real kicker here is that for most of the period those GST claims are lodged, he's actually in jail. Sam Hawley: Oh my gosh. Angus Grigg: I know. He just couldn't make it up. Sam Hawley: What does he do with all that money? Angus Grigg: Well, of course, he spends it, right? Within a couple of weeks, the money's completely gone. He buys himself a second-hand Porsche. Somewhat endearingly, he buys his mother a house. But the really damning thing here is that the tax office notice it. Finally, someone, there's a human in the loop and they pick up the fact that, hey, maybe something's a bit wrong here. And so they ring him up and he says, oh yeah, no, it's all legitimate. I'll get my accountant to call you. The accountant never calls. They send him some emails. They write him some letters. He ignores them all. And the really damning thing here is the tax office does nothing for four months. And in that four month period, this scam absolutely explodes. So what we did is we went back and we deconstructed, if you like, the tax office's narrative. And the narrative was that this fraud took off on social media. The tax office noticed it. They cracked down really hard, really quickly, and they brought it under control. Now we sort about testing that idea. Sam Hawley: So the ATO says it did this great job. It cracked down on this fraud. But what actually happened? Because you actually had a look at that and discovered, in fact, the ATO didn't do much at all. Angus Grigg: No, exactly. So Linden Phillips does finally get caught, but it has absolutely nothing to do with the ATO. It all comes down to the smarts of a local detective in Mildura named Vanessa Power. 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And that is the amount of money or taxes that the ATO has levied, if you like, but not collected. Karen Payne, Inspector General of Taxation, 2019-24: The large percentage of the debts that were due were in fact owned by a very small number of taxpayers or they're related to a small number of taxpayer accounts. So you'd kind of think it's a small number of people you need to be chasing. Angus Grigg: And the point that Karen Payne was making is that if we collected all that tax, perhaps we would not have to pay as much tax, all of us, but also we'd have more money to spend on really basic things like schools, roads and hospitals. Karen Payne, Inspector General of Taxation, 2019-24: The fact that it keeps rising is troubling. So it's fundamental, I think, that we've got good administration of the tax system because the integrity of the tax system is fundamentally important to all of us. It pays for all of the services that we benefit from. 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Why does everyone get sick so often in winter?
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News.com.au
5 hours ago
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Labor to introduce Bill to cap PBS-listed scripts at $25, PM dodges questions on super tax
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