Gilead Sciences: The M&A Question


JPMorgan is hosting its health care conference this week, which has provided opportunities for companies to provide updates on their pipelines, profits and even M&A plans before a captive audience. And of course, Gilead Sciences (GILD) was there, and its management spoke to analysts about its business, including the possibility for…M&A, which we don’t need to remind you is much on investors’ minds. Mizuho’s Salim Syed offered his takeaway on the subject:

A box of Gilead’s antiretroviral drug Truvada Agence France-Presse/Getty Images

ONCOLOGY PIPELINE/M&A. Alessandro Riva was in attendance and spoke briefly how the company is thinking about oncology. The company will not look at single assets. It plans to tackle oncology from in integrated perspective and noted it will “take time.” …

TAX REFORM / REPATRIATION. Access to cash would help for M&A, but the company does not need tax reform for M&A given it’s current cap structure. Believe changes would be more impactful to 2018, not 2017.

Of course, Donald Trump took on the health care industry in his press conference today, so Gilead’s shares–and just about every other biotech and pharmaceutical company–are getting smacked down. Its stock fallen 2.4% to $25.03 at 3:30 p.m. today, while the iShares Nasdaq Biotechnology ETF (IBB) has fallen 2.9% to$278.49.

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