Moderna Cancer Vaccine Sparks Stock Surge Amid Bitcoin Rally

Moderna's stock surged 176% on Wednesday after the company announced positive results from a late-stage trial of its personalized mRNA cancer vaccine, Intismeran, in combination with Merck's Keytruda for melanoma. The treatment uses genetic information from a patient's tumor to create a customized vaccine that trains the immune system to attack cancer cells.

The phase-three trial enrolled 1,137 patients with high-risk stage IIB to stage IV melanoma whose tumors had been surgically removed. Interim results showed that the combination therapy met its primary goal of reducing cancer recurrence and its secondary goal of preventing the cancer from spreading.

Moderna and Merck plan to present the findings at a medical meeting and share them with regulators. Analysts at Barclays expect the melanoma treatment could generate around $3 billion in annual sales by 2035.