Over the course of the year, many companies have come into focus as possible coronavirus plays and one of those is Sorrento Therapeutics (NASDAQ:SRNE). The stock made significant gains after the company claimed to have come up with a COVID 19 vaccine, however, over the past month, it nosedived by as much as 40%. The recent news about COVID 19 vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna could be a major factor behind the crash.
Roller-Coaster Ride
At one point this year the stock had managed to hit $19 a share but Sorrento is far away from those heady days now. At this point, some of the bigger companies like Johnson & Johnson, Moderna, and Pfizer are working hard to get approvals for their coronavirus vaccines.
All those companies will be seeking emergency use authorization from the United States Food and Drug Administration. On the other hand, Sorrento may have come up with a pair of COVID 19 products but none of those are currently in Phase 3 of clinical trials.
The decline in the stock in recent weeks is quite understandable. On top of that, in the third quarter financial results announced earlier this month, Sorrento reported revenues of only $11.8 million.
It is an improvement on the $5.8 million generated last year but remains a modest figure considering the fact that Sorrento commands a market cap of $1.7 billion. In this sort of situation, it is not hard to see why investors do not feel particularly enthusiastic about the stock.
CEO Comments
While the stock has been taking a beating over the course of the past weeks, the Chief Executive Officer of the company Henry Ji participated in a discussion with a financial website back on November 12.
In this regard, it needs to be kept in mind that Sorrento has fallen way behind some of the other companies which are working on a COVID 19 vaccine. However, Ji revealed that Sorrento has not actually changed its approach in any pronounced way with regards to its vaccine.
He stated that the company’s approach to development is not the reason behind Sorrento falling behind its competitors. On top of that, he went on to state that the antibodies developed by Sorrento could actually be more active than the ones produced by Pfizer or Moderna. While this is a bold claim, most experts believe that investors could do well to avoid the Sorrento stock at this point.
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