Amgen is a well-known biotech company as it is known for immunology, cancer, and kidney drugs. Currently, the COVID pandemic is at the forefront of the developments in the healthcare and pharmaceutical industries. That has led Amgen to analyze and study its products that can be used to fight the coronavirus. One such product, Otezla, has shown some promise. The product was acquired from Celgene and is among the top psoriasis pills used by patients during recent months.
Partnerships with other top biotech stocks to buy
Amgen is not only evaluating its own products for the pandemic, but also partnering with other top biotech companies. It has a partnership with Adaptive Biotechnologies to develop antibody drugs for COVID treatment. Recently, Amgen announced a partnership with Eli Lilly to help scale up the global supply of its antibody treatments. The drugs are currently undergoing trials and awaiting regulatory approval. According to David Reese, R&D chief for Amgen, “We are impressed with Lilly’s data, in particular the reduction in hospitalizations, and are enthusiastic about the potential for these neutralizing antibodies as a therapeutic for Covid-19.” Eli Lilly’s COVID antibody treatment is expected to reduce the rate of hospitalization for moderate COVID patients.
Amgen stock performance
Amgen is marginally down 0.23% since the collaboration was announced. However, the stock has been up 3.1% since the start of 2020. In the last month, Amgen is up 5.06%. On a longer-term basis, the stock is up 78.66% in the past 5 years. Amgen is one of the world’s largest independent biotechnology companies and is often considered to be one of the best biotech stocks. Industry heavyweights like Pfizer, Gilead, Bristol-Myers Squibb, and Novartis are considered to be the peers of Amgen Inc.
Pfizer is down 7.38% year-to-date and up 13.67% in the last 5 years. Gilead, meanwhile, is down 2.81% since the beginning of 2020 and down 36% in the last 5 years. Bristol-Myers is also down more than 7% this year and down 2.46% in the last 5 years. Stock performance-wise, Amgen still looks like one of the best biotech stocks 2020.
