I bought 100 shares so I can sell calls against the underlining. This Stock moves a lot based on any vaccine news so the premium is high. I am collecting around $100/wk from calls. Current price point is $57.37/share. Not sure if anyone else has traded this company but it has been as high as $87/share and as low as $46/share over the past three weeks.
Our most sharing stock trader is back!
Yea!
Thanks for moving it where it needed to be.
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https://finance.yahoo.com/news/moderna-vaccine-business-could-bigger-165756024.html
But here's the problem with that (for investors). The urgency of the need means that there will be intense pressure upon the companies, that discover COVID-19 vaccines, to distribute them regardless of whether they make a profit -- or even give their vaccines away for free. (Witness, for example, Gilead Sciences' commitment to distribute its first 1.5 million doses of the remdesivir anti-viral drug free of charge).
And how is a company supposed to make a profit off of that kind of business model?
The answer, as 5-star Chardan analyst Geulah Livshits explains in her latest note on Moderna (MRNA), could include the ability to use lessons learned from making one vaccine at low or no profit, to the production of other vaccines for a profit.
Moderna, you see, is working to get U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval of its new mRNA vaccine candidate (mRNA-1273) to prevent infection with the novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. In so doing, Moderna is perfecting such processes as using DNA plasmid templates, along with enzymes and buffer systems, "to assemble nucleotides into mRNA, which can then be formulated into lipid nanoparticles (LNPs) that can then be filtered, fill-finished into vials, and quality controlled" to produce safe, effective vaccines against COVID-19.
In previous notes, Livshits has cautioned that Moderna's work on mRNA-1273 might produce only "modest" sales and perhaps even weaker profits. However, Moderna should be able to take expertise, generated in creating vaccines from mRNA without the need to grow chemicals in live cells, and apply it to the development of other vaccines in its pipeline. Such pipeline products include the company's vaccine against cytomegalovirus, which can cause permanent neurological injury in newborns, its Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) vaccine, and other vaccine programs aiming to defend against autoimmune diseases -- all of which may have longer-lived commercial potential than a COVID-19 vaccine.
This is more than just a theory, by the way. As Livshits explains, Moderna has already used lessons learned from its Chikungunya (a virus transmitted by mosquitoes) vaccine program to optimize mRNA stability when manufacturing long mRNA strands such as those used to create the SARS-CoV-2 vaccine. Taking lessons learned from creating its coronavirus vaccine, and applying them to the creation of yet more vaccines against other diseases, would just be adding one more link in the chain, ultimately resulting in "faster production and easy switching from 1 program to another" -- and hopefully, reducing development costs and enabling fatter profit margins in the process.
Overall, based on the 10 Buy ratings vs just 2 Holds assigned in the last three months, Wall Street analysts believe that this ‘Strong Buy’ is a solid bet. It also doesn’t hurt that its $89.33 average price target implies nearly 50% upside potential from current levels. (See Moderna stock analysis on TipRanks)
The thing I like about it the most is the premium. You can get $100 a week for a call well outside the money. Right now my call strike is $65. It is similar to how much premium you could get in SPCE earlier this year. One day I'll do a right up on everything I did to get that stock for free.
The premium is proportional to the volatility and potential for a strong move/spike up or down.
So the seller of pricey options is getting rewarded handsomely because they are taking on more risk.
Yes sir. That stock is very volatile and risky. It was in the mid 20s earlier this year. If the vaccine doesn't work it will probably go back to that level.
grant,
madmechanic has a question that is more cut out for you:
Stock trading platform?
Started by madmechanic - June 4, 2020, 2:17 p.m.
I have now rolled the call three times and my price point is below $55 a share.
Well as you saw in the news with the vaccine trial Moderna surged well past my call so I closed the position. Made 29% on my investment in a couple of months. I'll take it.
Congrats Grant!
That sort of return in such a short time frame sounds like futures trading with the 20 times higher leverage that our money gives us (-:
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/moderna-mrna-stock-more-fuel-162922235.html
With the public desperate for a solution to COVID-19, Moderna’s (MRNA) status has increased to such an extent that any good news coming out of its HQ ripples across the whole market. Moderna can take partial credit for the S&P 500’s uptick on Wednesday, following news of the positive development in its COVID-19 vaccine program.
A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that in the Phase 1 study of the biotech’s experimental vaccine mRNA-1273, all 45 patients produced antibodies to the coronavirus.
Moreover, participants who received two 100-microgram doses of the vaccine (patients were given either 250, 100, or 25 micrograms) produced antibody levels more than twice than those of people who had recovered from COVID-19. Antibodies are key in preventing the virus’ infection.
The good news sent Moderna shares rising again. Over the past week the stock is up by over 31% and overall, by 315% year-to-date.
While the data is no doubt positive, keeping a lid on expectations, Needham analyst Alan Carr said, “We view the data favorably, but note that immunogenicity data from subjects over 55 as well as more data around durability of immune response will provide more insight into potential utility of the vaccine.”
With a phase 2 study currently in progress, Moderna will begin a phase 3 trial of mRNA-1273 on July 27. Interim data from the Phase 3 study is expected to be released before the year’s end, and, therefore, Carr will “continue to assume the vaccine may be available around YE20.”
Moderna management said it remains on track to produce 500 million doses of the vaccine per year, and possibly up to 1 billion doses, beginning in 2021.
Despite the cautious approach, Carr has a “favorable view towards the vaccine,” and further said, “We continue to project revenue from mRNA-1273 in 2021+. We acknowledge the stock has performed well lately, but believe there is still upside opportunity for investors with a long-term perspective.”
Accordingly, Carr rates Moderna a Buy along with a $94 price target. Investors could be pocketing a 17% gain, should the analyst’s thesis play out over the coming year. (To watch Carr’s track record,
Last on MRNA...........1 year chart below.
