Reuters (December 2)
“The good news is that drugmakers are already increasing their manufacturing capacity, which should reduce vaccine hoarding.” Moderna, J&J, AstraZeneca and Pfizer “are expected to produce 12 billion doses between them next year, enough to give two jabs to 75% of the world’s population.” The bad news is “getting shots into arms is a bigger challenge. Many developing countries lack the trained staff to administer doses, or the kit and infrastructure to ship them in the right conditions.”
Tags: AstraZeneca, Capacity, Challenge, Developing countries, Drugmakers, Infrastructure, J&J, Moderna, Pfizer, Trained staff, Vaccine hoarding
Chicago Tribune (May 11)
“COVID-19 vaccines finally are headed for more kids as U.S. regulators Monday expanded use of Pfizer’s shot to those as young as 12, sparking a race to protect middle and high school students before they head back to class in the fall.”
Tags: 12, Class, COVID-19, Expanded use, High school, Kids, Middle school, Pfizer, Protect, Race, Regulators, Students, U.S., Vaccines
Financial Times (November 10)
“After the long night of Covid-19, a faint glow is visible on the horizon.” Pfizer’s 90% efficacy is more than we could dream for in a vacine, but the “euphoria should be tempered; any return to normality will take time…. Science has made a breakthrough. But don’t throw away your face covering just yet.”
Tags: 90%, Breakthrough, COVID-19, Efficacy, Euphoria, Normality, Pfizer, Science, Tempered, Time, Vaccine
Financial Times (August 1)
Wall Street is enthusiastic about all things pet. “The growth of pet versions of everything from health food to personal service and new drugs is luring investors.” For example, “Zoetis, the animal pharmaceuticals company, has strongly outperformed its former owner Pfizer since being spun off in 2013; shares in Chewy, the online pet supplies retailer rose by 50 per cent on its first day of trading in June.” Consistency makes the pet industry stand out. The sum Americans spend on pets “has risen steadily at around 5 per cent annually for two decades, even following the 2008 financial crisis, when people bought less for themselves.”
Tags: Chewy, Drugs, Enthusiastic, Health food, Investors, Personal service, Pfizer, Pharmaceuticals, Wall Street, Zoetis
Washington Post (April 4)
“The Treasury Department on Monday took aim at U.S. companies moving their headquarters overseas to lower their tax bills, issuing aggressive new rules intended to make such moves less profitable and throwing a potential wrench into Pfizer’s recent $160 billion proposed deal to combine with Allergen and become an Irish company.”
Tags: Allergen, Headquarters, Ireland, Overseas. Taxes, Pfizer, Rules, Treasury, U.S.
Washington Post (December 2)
Pfizer’s planned tax inversion highlights a dilemma “of almost-impenetrable complexity and contentiousness: How to tax multinational companies?” To minimize their taxes, “large global firms…are becoming more aggressive.” At the same time, governments are “increasingly desperate to raise tax revenue to pay for aging societies and cover persistent budget deficits.”
Tags: Aging societies, Budget deficits, Dilemma, Governments, Inversion, Multinationals, Pfizer, Taxes
New York Times (November 24)
If successful, the planned $160 billion merger between Pfizer and Allergan will “be the biggest deal in what has been a banner year for mergers, driven in part by consolidation in the health care and pharmaceutical sectors.” It also promises to focus more attention, mostly negative, on tax inversions, the practice it will be using to lower its tax bill by relocating its post-merger tax home to Ireland.
Tags: Allergan, Consolidation, Health care, Ireland, Merger, Pfizer, Pharmaceutical sectors, Tax inversions
Financial Times (May 12)
There’s little obvious business sense to Pfizer’s proposed takeover of AstraZeneca. Strategically, there’s not much to be gained aside from effecting a change of tax domicile. “Pfizer’s dealmaking history is moreover a deeply dispiriting one…. Despite having spent some $240bn on three big acquisitions since 2000, its market capitalisation is just $185bn today. Meanwhile the Dow Jones index is more than 40 per cent higher.” AstraZeneca’s directors must proceed warily. This is about more than the potential short-term profit to existing shareholders.
Tags: Acquisitions, AstraZeneca, Dealmaking, Directors, Dow Jones, Market-cap, Pfizer, Profit, Shareholders, Short term, Strategy, Takeover, Tax domicile
USA Today (May 2)
“You know something is wrong when major U.S. companies are fleeing to Europe to pay less in taxes.” If Pfizer succeeds with plans to move its tax domicile, its effective tax rate will drop from 27.5% to 20%. “The U.S. corporate rate of 35%, with an average of 4.1% added by states, is the highest in the world.”