Tag Archives: abbv

Netflix, Schlumberger Stocks Just Did This, While Apple Falls Short

Netflix ( NFLX ), Schlumberger ( SLB ), AbbVie ( ABBV ) and MasterCard ( MA ) all rose above their 200-day moving averages Tuesday, while Apple ( AAPL ) shares continued to close just below that support level. It’s not a huge surprise that several big-cap stocks retook their 200-day lines. The Nasdaq also did so on Tuesday. The Dow and S&P 500 have been above that level for weeks. Still, it’s a key step on the road to recovery. Netflix Netflix, which reports Q1 earnings on Monday, rose 4.2% on the stock market today to 107, its best level since late January. Netflix had run into resistance for several sessions just below  the 200-day. Netflix has been consolidating since peaking at 133.27 on Dec. 7. Schlumberger Schlumberger rallied along with the energy sector, as crude futures rose above $42 a barrel to a 4-month high. Schlumberger rose 2.7% Tuesday to 75.90, topping its 200-day line for the time since last June. AbbVie AbbVie rose 2.4% Tuesday, just getting above its 200-day line. It hasn’t been consistently held above that level since last August. Late Monday, the FDA approved a leukemia drug by AbbVie and Roche ( RHHBY ) unit Genentech. MasterCard MasterCard rose 0.4% Tuesday to 93.86. The stock has been finding support at or above its 200-day line for the past few weeks. The stock is forming a cup-with-handle base going back to Nov. 11. Apple As for Apple, shares rose 1.3% to 110.44, just below the 200-day line at 110.78. Apple crossed its 200-day on April 4 intraday, but has yet to close above that level since early October.

Gilead Sciences Stock Rises As Analysts Still Like HCV Franchise

Big biotech Gilead Sciences ( GILD ) hit a two-month high Monday after two analysts delivered bullish outlooks for the company. On Sunday, RBC Capital Markets analyst Michael Yee lifted his Q1 EPS estimates due to a stock buyback and noted several recent pieces of “incremental” good news. For one, he cited late Friday the successful patent suit brought by Merck ( MRK ) and Ionis Pharmaceuticals ( IONS ), which had resulted in a somewhat lower damages award ($200 million) than Wall Street had expected. He also noted that weekly prescription data from IMS Health ( IMS ) suggest Gilead’s hepatitis C drugs, Sovaldi and Harvoni, were holding up reasonably well in the face of competition from Merck’s Zepatier, which launched in late January. This point was made more emphatically Monday in a research note by Leerink analyst Geoffrey Porges, who called Merck a “pretender to the HCV (hepatitis C  virus) throne.” Porges noted that a survey of top payer plans backed this up. “Seven weeks after the launch of Zepatier, Sovaldi and Harvoni retain a relatively favorable position in 65% of the top 20 largest commercial plans and 70% of the top 10 largest government plans relative to AbbVie ’s ( ABBV ) Viekira Pak (20%, 30%, respectively) and Zepatier (0%, 10%),” Porges wrote. “Further, in the top 20 Medicare plans, while Harvoni is covered by 100% of plans, 85% of plans do not cover Viekira Pak, and none cover Zepatier.” Porges affirmed his outperform rating on Gilead stock, with a price target of 127. In midday trading on the stock market today , Gilead stock was up more than 2%, near 93, and earlier rose above 94. The stock has climbed about 14% from the 20-month low it hit on Feb. 2, but still has a weak IBD Relative Strength Rating of 29, meaning the stock’s performed in the lowest 29% of all stocks the past 12 months, with an emphasis on the most recent six months. Merck stock was down a fraction midday Monday.

AbbVie Bolsters Immunology Business, Acquires Boehringer Drug

Big pharma AbbVie ( ABBV ) said Monday that it was acquiring rights to two immunology drugs developed by German counterpart Boehringer Ingelheim, but its stock was flat as Goldman Sachs warned of increasing competition. AbbVie agreed to pay $595 million upfront plus undisclosed milestone payments and royalties for the right to commercialize BI 655066, a drug in late-stage testing for psoriasis, and in earlier testing for Crohn’s disease, psoriatic arthritis and asthma. A phase-two trial comparing BI 655066 head to head with Johnson & Johnson ’s ( JNJ ) Remicade found that after nine months of treatment, 69% of patients on Boehringer’s drug had clear or almost clear skin, compared with 30% in the Remicade arm. AbbVie also acquired rights to BI 655064, an earlier-stage drug that attacks the CD40 protein, which may be connected to lupus nephritis, Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis. AbbVie said in its press release that it will decide whether to go forward with that drug “after completion of certain undisclosed clinical achievements.” AbbVie said that its success in developing and commercializing Humira, currently the world’s top-selling immunology drug, gives it the expertise to do the same with Boehringer’s products. Humira is nearing the end of its patent life, leading to much speculation on Wall Street about when biosimilar competitors might launch and how much of an impact they might have. Goldman Sachs analyst Salveen Richter took a pessimistic view of the matter Monday, saying that the current political focus on lowering drug prices will probably encourage cheap Humira knock-offs. “We are not changing our 2016-2020 AbbVie forecasts and continue to believe that Humira will remain a durable asset free of U.S. biosimilars, at least until the end of the decade,” Richter wrote as he removed AbbVie stock from his Conviction Buy list and cut his price target to 68 from 80.  “However, we adjust our terminal value growth rate (from +1% to 0%) and model a faster decline curve post introduction of Humira biosimilars in the U.S. after 2020 through 2025.” AbbVie stock fell as much as 2.4% in early trading on the stock market today , but by midday it was flat, near 56. Meanwhile, Richter put BioMarin Pharmaceuticals ( BMRN ) on his Conviction Buy list in AbbVie’s place, setting his price target at 129. BioMarin, Richter noted, has guided that it will go into the black next year even without a contribution of its recently FDA-rejected muscular-dystrophy drug Kyndrisa, “showing opex restraint and a commitment to profitability.” He added that several data releases this year could bring upside for medications including BioMarin’s gene therapy for hemophilia and treatments for the rare diseases achondroplasia and phenylketonuria. BioMarin stock was up 2.5% midday Monday, near 89. Image provided by Shutterstock .