If you have a high tolerance for risk, then it could be worth considering the speculative ASX stock in this article.
That's because Bell Potter believes that investors could almost double their money in 12 months if everything goes to plan.
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Which speculative ASX stock?
The stock in question is PYC Therapeutics Ltd (ASX: PYC). It is a small cap clinical-stage biotechnology company developing multiple drug candidates for rare inherited diseases.
Bell Potter notes that this week the company has released some data relating to its second drug candidate, PYC-001.
It is aiming to treat Autosomal Dominant Optic Atrophy (ADOA), which is a genetic vision disorder with no approved treatments.
The good news is that the early data is promising for the speculative ASX stock. Bell Potter said:
Safety continues to be very clean with no drug-related adverse events. Regarding efficacy, average visual acuity (number of letters/lines that can be read) was better in treated eyes compared to untreated eyes at both 4 weeks (n=8) and 24 weeks (n=3). Furthermore, 2/3 patients monitored for 24 weeks achieved a ≥10 letter improvement from baseline after receiving the lowest 3µg dose, a clinically meaningful benefit in a short timeframe that wasn't evident in the untreated eye.
Bell Potter acknowledges that it is still early days, but feels this is a very positive start. It adds:
Our view: Strong early data validating broader platform. This is an early-stage readout but undoubtedly a positive one. The trend is clear: vision is improving from baseline in the treated eye, while the untreated eye shows no or little change. And this is after just a single dose. The encouraging ADOA data backs up strong data from PYC's first drug candidate in RP11, showing PYC's peptide-targeted RNA platform has applicability across multiple diseases.
Big return potential
According to the note, Bell Potter has retained its speculative buy rating and $2.30 price target on this ASX stock.
Based on its current share price of $1.26, this implies potential upside of approximately 83% for investors between now and this time next year.
Commenting on its recommendation, which it notes is only suitable for investors with a high risk tolerance, the broker said:
There are no changes to our $2.30 valuation or BUY (speculative) recommendation. PYC is executing on its ambitious yet expeditious multi-product strategy, and the result is a constant flow of clinical data over the next ~12 months. Upcoming clinical catalysts: (1) RP11 Phase 1/2 updates in Q4 CY25; (2) more ADOA Phase 1/2 clinical data in CY26; (3) PKD single- and multi-dose Phase 1/2 readouts in CY26.
The commercially appealing PKD kidney program has also reported very clean safety data in volunteers, and we expect strong industry interest in the near-term in light of recent transactions (e.g. Regulus/Novartis in PKD and ongoing RNA interest in Avidity).
