Esperion scores an approval. Its stock gets hammered 

Esperion’s new cholesterol drug won approval from the Food and Drug Administration on Friday. The once-daily pill, formulated from bempedoic acid, is the first non-statin oral drug approved for lowering LDL in about two decades. It’s meant to work as a possible alternative for patients who don’t respond to statins — and don’t want to fork out a huge sum for the costlier PCSK9 drugs.

That, for Esperion, was the good news.

But the safety profile for the drug, called Nexletol, isn’t particularly fantastic — and as a result, Esperion’s stock price took a big hit, dropping about 10% on the news. The drug’s label will have to indicate that Nexletol could cause elevated uric acid levels, and an increased likelihood to rupture tendons.