The Immutep Ltd (ASX: IMM) share price has returned from its trading halt and is sinking lower on Monday morning.
At the time of writing, the biotechnology company's shares are down 16% to 51.5 cents.
Despite this decline, the Immutep share price is still up 22% since the start of the year.
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Why is the Immutep share price sinking today?
The catalyst for the weakness in the Immutep share price this morning has been news that the company has secured commitments for a $60 million two-tranche institutional placement.
According to the release, the placement was undertaken at an issue price of 52 cents per share, representing a 15.5% discount to its last close price. It was supported by multiple institutional investors in Australia and offshore.
Immutep will now seek to raise a further $5 million via a share purchase plan at the same price.
Why is Immutep raising funds?
Immutep intends to use the proceeds received from the placement to fund an expanded clinical program.
This includes a new Phase III registration trial for metastatic breast cancer and a new Phase II trial for a triple combination therapy with efti, anti-PD-1 therapy, and chemotherapy.
Immutep CEO, Marc Voigt, said: "Never has there been a more exciting time to be the leading LAG-3 biotech, following the recent industry validation of this promising new immune checkpoint. Efti has continued to report compelling results from multiple clinical trials over the last year, including from key patient subgroups in our AIPAC study. Efti will be tested in different late-stage randomised settings which is a key step towards potential commercialisation."
"We are very encouraged to have received such strong support from multiple existing and new institutional investors for this financing. The funds will be used to expand our efti clinical development portfolio into late-stage settings, and significantly strengthening our strategic and business development options. They will also support the manufacturing process to reach commercial status as we advance towards registration," he added.
