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Although surging valuations suggest the biotech winter is emphatically over, I have good news for members hesitant to jump in near current valuations. There's a second basket of companies and assets being excluded from the current rally. In fact, they were crucial to thawing the biotech winter in the first place.

BridgeBio Oncology Therapeutics was spun out of BridgeBio Pharma after a new CEO took over, whittled down a bloated pipeline, and refocused the parent business on core assets. That strategic reprioritization meant early-stage oncology assets went to the chopping block. Why commit to spending more than $1 billion to develop a trio of assets when that cash could instead nurture commercial and late-stage assets?

Many companies made similar strategic decisions to reduce costs and bolster investor confidence in an unforgiving capital environment. The sectorwide refocusing cast hundreds of molecules into the wilderness, the arms of spinouts, or simply parked on a shelf to collect dust. Hidden among them are assets that will eventually earn regulatory approvals, but are being overlooked now. They're not all duds.

Does BridgeBio Oncology have a winner among its trio? I don't know. The company was spun out so quickly it didn't even have a chance to rebrand itself with a sexier name. Instead, I now have to write out "BridgeBio Oncology Therapeutics" every f*nching time.

The drug developer has three drug candidates taking aim at the RAS axis, which includes KRAS and PI3K-alpha. The latter is how it came across my radar, as I'm constantly monitoring the competitive landscape for zovegalisib from Relay Therapeutics. Most assets in the global pipeline are too focused on H1047X mutations or simply copying zovegalisib as an attempt at a "me-better" molecule. But BridgeBio Onc-… BBOT has a unique approach that intrigues me.

To be clear, I don't yet see BBOT as a serious threat to zovegalisib. It has no meaningful clinical data. It doesn't provide the same level of preclinical data as Relay Therapeutics did. It won't have phase 1 data comparable to zovegalisib plus fulvestrant until mid-2028, which is when the pivotal ReDiscover-2 study is expected to have a topline data readout. Heck, I don't even know if the damn approach will work! But it's interesting enough for a small watch position.

Zovegalisib and its merry band of copycats is a small molecule pan-mutant inhibitor of PI3K-alpha. That means it binds to mutant PI3K-alpha to disrupt its biological function. BBOT brings a drug candidate named BBO-10203, which is a RAS:PI3K-alpha breaker. That means works through steric blockade, or physically blocking the interaction between RAS and PI3K-alpha. That's interesting. On paper.

If you can stop RAS from activating PI3K-alpha, then you may not need to directly bind to it. That could preserve more of the function of PI3K-alpha (potentially reducing hyperglycemia rates), be more selective against other PI3K isoforms (potentially reducing side effects like diarrhea), and have promising combination potential. Very early phase 1 data demonstrated no hyperglycemia at low doses for the monotherapy, although so did zovegalisib at a similar point in development.

In essence, BBOT might have only the second molecule to follow in the footsteps of zovegalisib (tersolisib from Eli Lilly was the first).

On the one hand, investing on novel mechanisms is a crapshoot. For example, multiple companies tried to develop antibody drugs that only activated in the tumor microenvironment based on pH gradients. That seemed too obvious to me, but none of them worked. Centessa Pharma pivoted to orexin-2 receptor agonists (good move apparently). BioAlta just went bankrupt.

On the other hand, BBOT is valued at $700 million. That's not absurd in the current environment. It has a decent cash runway. And maybe a RAS:PI3K-alpha breaker molecule is just the asset to prove my overlooked-assets-from-biotech-winter-reprioritization hypothesis correct.

The other two drug candidates in the pipeline take aim at KRAS G12C mutations (BBO-8520) and KRAS ON/OFF (BBO-11818). The former has to compete with promising drug candidates from Revolution Medicines and Erasca, while the latter doesn't look very competitive in early dose escalation. Investors will receive updated clinical data for all three assets before the end of 2026. There's also potential to evaluate combinations of these three assets in various indications.

To be blunt, this is a likely-too-early position. I'm just watching it and really only started it after a Discord bet to spice up a relatively boring, slow summer for the coverage ecosystem. I have no intention of buying more shares anytime soon. If it rips on exuberance or KRAS hype, then I might even exit. If the data readouts later this year disappoint, then this position could tank 50%. But it's only $500, which is a tiny share of Finch Trades. It won't make-or-break Finch Trades, but it could break RAS:PI3K-alpha interactions.

The Trade

BridgeBio Oncology Therapeutics is considered a Future Compounder position. I purchased 57.23 shares at $8.73 per share on July 8, 2026. The total transaction value was $500.

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Outperformance Scenarios

Investing in individual stocks can be reduced to a simple question: "If I invest $1 in this individual stock at this price, will it outperform an equal passive investment in the S&P 500 at this level?" If you keep emotions and expectations in check, then you might be surprised to learn you don't need to swing for the fences.

Here's how shares of BridgeBio Oncology Therapeutics will need to perform for the money invested in this Finch Trade to outperform passive investing in the S&P 500 in the next five years.

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Assumptions:

• The S&P 500 index gains 10% per year with dividends included – its historical average since 1990.
• S&P 500 closing level at time of purchase on July 8, 2026 = 7,483.2
• BridgeBio Oncology Therapeutics purchase price on July 8, 2026 = $8.73 per share

Further Reading

• July 8, 2026 real-time announcement on Discord