LONDON (Reuters Breakingviews) – Conciseness of world finances in the Covid-19 era.
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TUNNEL VISION. AstraZeneca tries to focus on vaccines. While the $ 130 billion group has created one of the most important Covid-19 coups in the world, questionable effectiveness for those over 55 and supply chain snafus in Europe have created headaches for the chief executive Pascal Soriot. Thursday highlighted the success of the core business, where sales of new drugs outnumber old drugs and projected revenues will increase by a low percentage of teens by 2021, excluding vaccine deployment.
Starting in the first quarter, AstraZeneca will eliminate vaccine sales from its core business, reflecting its decision to sell cost shots during the pandemic. This should help reassure investors who have pushed stocks up 11% since last September, when the company was forced to stop a vaccine trial. AstraZeneca is still trading at 20 times advanced gains, well above peers like GlaxoSmithKline. Soriot will not want the vaccine to infect his premium rating. (By Aimee Donnellan)
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