Moderna, BioNTech Gain Amid Broader Selloff On Virus Worries
By Dhirendra Tripathi
Investing.com – Moderna (NASDAQ:MRNA) and BioNTech (NASDAQ:BNTX) stocks rose in a broad market selloff fueled by worries that the rapidly-spreading Delta variant could stall the reviving global economy.
Moderna was up 7.6% and BioNTech 3%. Pfizer (NYSE:PFE), which is BioNTech's partner in making their Covid-19 vaccine, was down 1% though.
S&P 500 was down 1.8% and Dow Jones Industrial Average 2.4%.
Moderna and BioNTech vaccines, based on the new-age mRNA technology, have proven to be the most effective of all in the world. The companies already have more than a billion doses each tied up in negotiated supplies through the next year and longer.
Shares of Johnson&Johnson (NYSE:JNJ), the third American company to have a Covid-19 vaccine in the market, were also lower by 1%. J&J’s is the only single-dose vaccine.
The Delta variant is twice as contagious as earlier iterations of the virus. The virus raged in India in April and May and claimed thousands of lives there. It is now spreading its net in other countries just when many of them were reopening.
According to Reuters, new U.S. Covid-19 cases surged 70% this week compared with the prior seven days to an average of 30,000 new infections a day, fueled by the Delta variant. Deaths rose 26% week-over-week to an average of 250 lives lost a day, mostly in unvaccinated patients, the news agency reported.
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