EBS - Is Vaxart Stock a Buy?
Vaxart (NASDAQ: VXRT), a biotech company focused on the development of oral vaccines, had an underwhelming performance in the stock market in 2019 with its shares dropping by more than 80%. But largely thanks to the company's efforts to develop a vaccine for COVID-19, the stock has soared by more than 2,000% this year. And the company now sports a market cap of more than $800 million after ending 2019 with a market cap of less than $20 million.
Vaxart's stock could see even better days ahead if it manages to develop a vaccine for COVID-19. The biotech also has at least one non-COVID-19 program worth mentioning. On the flip side, though, investors have to consider the genuine possibility that its coronavirus vaccine efforts will flop, and the stock will lose much of its gains as a result. With this backdrop in mind, should investors be jumping on the Vaxart bandwagon, or is it best to avoid the company's shares?
In late March, Vaxart announced that it had developed five potential oral COVID-19 vaccines, and the company went on to initiate pre-clinical trials for these candidates. These pre-clinical tests went well, with several of the vaccine candidates generating immune responses in "all tested animal models after a single dose," the company said.