Adding ~$171.2B to their market capitalization, Major pharma companies have outperformed their smaller counterparts in Q2 2021, according to an analysis by Evaluate Vantage.
Thanks to investor interest in its Alzheimer’s candidate, donanemab, Eli Lilly (NYSE:LLY) has posted the biggest gain among big pharma companies with a rise of nearly $59B in its market cap in the first half of the year.
AstraZeneca (NASDAQ:AZN), Sanofi (NASDAQ:SNY), and GlaxoSmithKline (NYSE:GSK) were also among the biggest gainers, according to the analysis.
Meanwhile, the renewed attention on Biogen (NASDAQ:BIIB) after FDA approval for its Alzheimer’s therapy Aduhelm was not enough for the company to outdo Moderna (NASDAQ:MRNA) in the category of big-cap players.
The analysis included data from a little over 700 pure-play drug developers with over $250M of market cap at the start of the year. The combined market cap of the group has risen $327B in Q2 2021 compared to $664B in the previous year's quarter.
As the graph from Evaluate indicates, the smaller drug companies as a group have lagged biggest players in Q2, marking a sharp contrast to their performance in Q1 2021.
However, adding $8B to the market cap this year, Intellia Therapeutics (NASDAQ:NTLA) was a notable gainer thanks to positive early-stage data for its gene-editing candidate TLA-2001 in rare disease, transthyretin amyloidosis ("ATTR").
According to the share performances in the first half, Eisai and Eli Lilly were among the top five gainers among large-cap pharmaceutical companies.
