BofA biotech scorecard: Two buys and odd one out

Picture 3 students turning successful exams connected the aforesaid day, covering the aforesaid material. Two locomotion distant with precocious marks. The 3rd has been raising his grades each semester, yet inactive gets flagged for summertime school.

That is astir the dynamic wrong the BofA probe enactment connected biotech I received connected the 13th, wherever Amgen (AMGN), Gilead Sciences (GILD) and Vertex Pharmaceuticals (VRTX) stock a leafage but permission with precise antithetic grades.

The note, published Aug. 12, walks done second-half catalysts crossed BofA's biotech sum list. Gilead and Vertex some transportation Buy ratings, and Vertex is 1 of the bank's 2026 apical picks.

Amgen keeps its Underperformrating and a $317 terms objective, beneath wherever its shares were already trading.

That divided says thing astir however BofA weighs momentum against pipeline risk. A beardown 4th unsocial doesn't determination a rating.

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Amgen's banal has outrun its ain standing

Amgen reported second-quarter gross of $10.1 billion and adjusted net of $6.29 a share, some up of Wall Street's forecasts. The institution raised its full-year guidance instantly after, according to an net telephone transcript published by Investing.com.

Shares climbed connected the people and person present gained much than 20% this year, putting the banal adjacent its 52-week high.

That benignant of tally usually earns a standing upgrade, not a reiterated Underperform. TD Cowen raised its ain Amgen terms people aft the aforesaid net report, Investing.com noted.

BofA held its crushed instead, which says little astir Amgen's 4th and much astir what the slope thinks happens next.

BofA's valuation leans connected Amgen's adjacent procreation of maturation drivers, olpasiran, an experimental cause designed to little a familial signifier of atrocious cholesterol, and the obesity cause MariTide, alternatively than the commercialized products already fueling those beat-and-raise quarters. Neither programme has pivotal information owed until 2027.

The catalyst that matters astir for Amgen belongs to a rival

BofA's ain connection explains the gap. Analysts telephone the biggest near-term lawsuit for Amgen investors a proceedings Amgen doesn't adjacent run: Novartis and Ionis Pharmaceuticals' Phase 3 HORIZON survey of pelacarsen, a rival cause targeting lipoprotein(a), a familial cardiovascular hazard origin that statins cannot touch, arsenic CNBC has reported.

Amgen's competing drug, olpasiran, volition not station its ain late-stage outcomes information until 2027. Until then, pelacarsen's results relation arsenic an aboriginal referendum connected whether lowering Lp(a) really prevents bosom attacks astatine all.