As Forte fails, who might yet improve the image of reverse mergers?

The cynical view of reverse mergers – takeovers of failed groups that have little more to offer than their market listing – is that they provide weak private companies a back door to the stock exchange. A quick scan of the biopharma groups that listed this way certainly reveals more disappointments than success stories.

Forte Biosciences, which reversed into Tocagen last year after that group's collapse, is the latest to join this sorry group. The misfire of its lead atopic dermatitis project last week prompted an 83% share price collapse. With only $51m in the bank perhaps Forte's short public existence will end the way it began, with the company becoming a reverse merger target itself.