BELLUS Health (BLU) jumpy this afternoon with unusual 5000 January $7.50 calls opening for $2.20, a $520M Canadian Biotech focused on chronic cough and chronic pruritus. BLUE expects a key top-line readout in Q4 and HCW and BTIG raised targets to $14 and $13 in September on increased probability of success. BLU now also seeing 15,000 December $5 puts bought $1.05 to $1.25

Bellus recently announced a positive interim analysis from the Phase IIb SOOTHE study in refractory chronic cough (includes 50% of patients in the main population who completed the trial), signifying that at least one dose of BLU-5937 met the predefined probability of achieving a clinically meaningful reduction in 24-hour cough frequency. Topline data from the SOOTHE trial are expected in December 2021.

Analysts see BLU-5937 with potential to launch in 2026 for refractory chronic cough, and that 2030 global sales total $1.1B.