Astrazeneca sells part of its equity investment in Moderna
Astrazeneca gives a new push to its finance with USD +1 Billion , Astrazeneca sold part of its stocks in Moderna, Shares of Moderna achieved a good jump in the last months on the back of its coronavirus vaccine breakthrough.
Astrazeneca sold a part of its 7.7% of Moderna’s stocks after it was considered the second largest investor in the last year. The cash from this deal is expected to bolster Astrazeneca’s finances for its next moves, it plans to acquire Alexion pharmaceuticals Boston-based company in one of its biggest acquisitions at the value of $39 billion to expand its business in the field of rare-diseases drugs.
Astrazeneca achieved a big part of its equity portfolio sales from Moderna sales according to the annual report, Astrazeneca portfolio sales was at the value of $1.38 billion in 2020.
Moderna surged +5 times in the last year
Moderna’s shares jumped exponentially to reach more than 5 times of its price in 2018 it started working on Covid-19 vaccine using mRNA technology and was able to get the emergency approvals is U.S.A last December, Moderna’s vaccines outperforms Astrazeneca/Oxford vaccine in helping body’s immune system to build its immunity more rapidly, also Astrazeneca’s vaccine is not authorized to be used in U.S till now.
Moderna said it’s expected USD +18 billion in sales from coronavirus vaccines and producing at least 700 million doses this year, that big change would put Moderna on profit track for the first time since 2010, Astrazeneca started equity investment in Moderna in 2013 with $240 miooion and scaled up till 2019 to acquire 7.7% of Moderna’s shares, Astrazeneca is retaining the partnership with Moderna in other disease treatments and they are currently working in 19 projects in multiple approaches including cardiovascular, oncology, renal and metabolism.
Astrazeneca is developing its vaccine in partnership with Oxford University and considered one of the top 2 vaccine distributors worldwide, it has the major share in COVAX program initiative.
Why Astrazeneca sold part of its stocks in Moderna
There is no official comments now about this, so we can guess what can be the reason behind this sale. Astrazeneca might need to refresh its financial status with cash to achieve its business goals and strategic objectives or this sale might give them a boost in the acquisition of Alexion pharmaceuticals, but by selling just a part of its stocks, Astrazeneca will remain in partnership with Moderna in other drugs and would remain to still achieve profits in other projects.
