Biotech Stocks Swing on Coronavirus Vaccine Hopes - The Wall Street Journal

Shares of Moderna Inc. spiked 7.7% Monday before erasing those gains during the next few trading days. Photo: cj gunther/Shutterstock

Jan. 31, 2020 7:00 am ET

Biotechnology stocks that surged last week on hopes for a coronavirus vaccine have since shed their gains, highlighting the risks investors take when they invest in the volatile sector.

Several biotech stocks surged after the companies said last Thursday that they were developing vaccines against a deadly new strain of coronavirus that emerged in Wuhan, China. Shares of Novavax NVAX -1.64% Inc. climbed 20% in the sessions following the announcement, but have since shed those gains. Shares of Moderna MRNA -4.14% Inc. popped 7.7% Monday before erasing those gains during the next few trading days, while Inovio Pharmaceuticals Inc. INO -5.15% shares shot up 25% Monday before paring most of the advance Tuesday.

While some buyers may have pegged their hopes on the possibility of a quick vaccine, others were likely making “fast-money trades” off the coronavirus headlines, said Jared Holz, health-care equity strategist at Jefferies. Investors betting that the companies will bring a vaccine to market during the current outbreak will probably be disappointed, he said.

“They buy the hype, sell it when others sort of follow suit, and move on,”  said Mr. Holz.

“These new diseases happen and the biotech industry races to figure out if there’s anything they can do. But by the time their phase-one trials come to anything, it’s too late and the virus has moved on,” he said.

These companies face a long, expensive and ultimately uncertain road, industry researchers said. Developing a vaccine and ushering it through the regulatory process can take years and the outbreak could fizzle out before they can bring it to market.

If the outbreak were to wane, companies would have difficulty running the type of large-scale studies necessary to show a vaccine’s efficacy, a problem that emerged during the Zika virus outbreak of 2015. Several companies started vaccine-development programs in response to the epidemic, but were unable to show the vaccine’s efficacy after the virus faded in 2016.

“It’s a lot easier to start a program like this than to finish it,” said Mark Feinberg, president and chief executive of the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative and former chief public-health and science officer at Merck & Co.s vaccines division.

Inovio, of Plymouth Meeting, Pa., is developing a DNA-based vaccine, and Chief Executive J. Joseph Kim said that human testing could begin by summer. Cambridge, Mass.-based Moderna is working on a vaccine with the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease. The institute’s director has said a vaccine could be ready for an early-stage clinical trial in about three months, though full testing and regulatory approval would take much longer.

Challenges for travel and leisure stocks, slower economic growth and a weaker Chinese yuan are among the new market implications investors are dealing with as the new coronavirus spreads rapidly. Photo: Bloomberg/Qilai Shen

Novavax, of Gaithersburg, Md., has said it expects to take roughly three months to develop a vaccine. Gregory Glenn, head of Novavax’s research-and-development unit, said in an emailed statement that there are regulatory routes the company could pursue to speed up the process of getting the vaccine to the public.

Although infectious-disease experts praised the companies for taking on the task, they cautioned against putting too much stock into a quick turnaround. There are a lot of unknowns,” said Dr. Feinberg.

Health-care giant Johnson & Johnson has also joined development efforts. The company announced Wednesday that its Janssen pharmaceutical unit had begun working on a vaccine. Shares rose 0.7% that day, then slipped 0.1% Thursday.

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