Vertex Pharmaceuticals (VRTX) saw its stock price soar about 10% yesterday with increased options after rumors spread among investors that a Johnson & Johnson acquisition was in the works.

Normal VRTX call volume for a full session is 1,700, but 7,900 of the contracts traded in the first 30 minutes of yesterday’s session alone. The company ended the day up by 9.8% at $31.88.

Vertex presented previously disclosed telaprevir data at EASL which showed that the antiviral can improve cure rates in difficult-to-treat HCV patients who had failed prior treatment with the current standard drug regimen (48-weeks IFN plus ribavirin). No other HCV drug in development has been able to demonstrate an improvement in cure rates for patients new to therapy or patients who have failed prior therapy.

Telaprevir is still in the middle of a Phase 3 trial which won’t be complete until the end of 2009 at the earliest.

VRTX’s stock was still up $0.30 (0.94%) to $32.20 at the time of this post.

Stay tuned…

Image from nehi

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