Medivation Shares Plunged: What You Need to Know

Although we don't believe in timing the market or panicking over market movements, we do like to keep an eye on big changes -- just in case they're material to our investing thesis.

What: Shares of drug developer Medivation (NAS: MDVN) were getting pummeled by investors today, losing as much as 10% in intraday trading on lighter-than-average volume.

So what: Medivation announced its second-quarter results after the market closed yesterday. For the quarter, the company reported a loss per share of $0.27 versus a loss in last year's second quarter of $0.21. Analysts were expecting a per-share loss of $0.26.

Now what: Though they're not entirely unimportant, the story with small biopharma companies like Medivation isn't the quarter-to-quarter results. Rather, the key is the company's long-term prospects for developing its drugs and getting them approved and on the market. With that in mind, I think most of the selling action today stems from the pressure on small caps broadly rather than a specific reaction to Medivation's quarterly report.

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