Pfizer Stock: This Pharmaceutical Stock Just Got a Huge Shot in the Arm

Pfizer Stock Gains on Vaccine Announcement

For what feels like months now, we’ve been closely following the race to develop a COVID-19 vaccine. From among the top pharmaceutical stocks looking to bring an end to the pandemic, one has made a big announcement that puts it ahead of the pack: Pfizer Inc. (NYSE:PFE). Pfizer stock saw modest gains as the company announced it was “likely” to release a coronavirus vaccine to the public before 2021.

Even better, this is setting up PFE stock for massive gains if it’s able to follow through.

Remember that there are a number of competitors in the pharma stock space looking to be the company that produces the first viable vaccine to counter COVID-19. Companies like Moderna Inc (NASDAQ:MRNA) and Gilead Sciences, Inc. (NASDAQ:GILD) have long been rumored to be among the companies closest to developing a vaccine, but Pfizer Inc has soared ahead with its most recent announcement.

In a Face the Nation interview, Albert Bourla, Pfizer Inc.’s CEO, said that it’s “likely” the U.S. will get a coronavirus vaccine treatment to the public before the end of the year. He went on to say that company was already preparing for a positive outcome. (Source: “Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla on Face the Nation,” CBS News, September 13, 2020.)

With the speed of the vaccine’s development, there is concern over what the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) will do regarding approval, but considering that there is an election coming up and that millions of Americans (and people around the globe) are eager for things to go back to something resembling normal, this could weight heavily in the favor of fast-tracking the medicine.

“I cannot say what the FDA will do,” Bourla said. “But I think it’s a likely scenario, and we are preparing for it.”

The scenario, he elaborated, would involve distributing “hundreds of thousands of doses.”

The FDA received a proposal from Pfizer Inc. on the 12th that would expand its late-stage trial to 44,000 participants, up from the 30,000 target. (Source: “Pfizer stock rockets as potential COVID-19 vaccine delivery by end of 2020,” Yahoo! Finance UK, September 14, 2020.)

While there’s no certainty that PFE stock is going to be the ultimate winner of the vaccine sweepstakes, things are certainly looking up for it.

Consider that Pfizer stock is just now hitting its stride, while other competitors, like MRNA stock, may have seen their best gains already.

Chart courtesy of StockCharts.com

Moderna stock, as seen in blue above, has experienced a steep decline from a few months ago. I’ve been talking about MRNA stock since March; investors who got in on it at the right time may have seen huge gains to their portfolio after the company leapt to lead position in the coronavirus vaccine race.

But with many competitors now edging MRNA out, all those early gains are going to render the company fairly volatile, something else I predicted.

Pfizer stock, meanwhile, is a much more stable buy. First of all, it’s not solely dependent on the coronavirus vaccine outcome for its future stock performance; this is a huge pharma stock that has a number of other drugs on offer, not just this one-shot deal.

And, again, as seen in the chart above, PFE stock (black) is just now getting going.

While PFE stock received relatively little attention early on in the vaccine race, it is now hitting its stride at just the right moment. That means that the heights that Pfizer vaccine can attain are potentially greater than those of its competitors simply because it didn’t have all those big lead-up gains. Instead, it’s saving it all for the real thing.

This means that the company isn’t as overvalued as the others, leaving room for even higher gains should it be the developer of the first COVID-19 vaccine.

Also See: Health Catalyst Inc: Why This May Be the Perfect Healthcare Stock Regardless of Election

The final bit of good news is that some of the media signals that the company has sent in the past have implied that it felt confident about its progress with a COVID-19 vaccine.