BioCentury
ARTICLE | Finance

Ebb & Flow

March 1, 2004 8:00 AM UTC

Even though the market had expected approval of Genentech's Avastin bevacizumab, that expectation wasn't fully loaded into the stock. DNA was up $12.57 (13%) to $107.89 on the week after Thursday's FDA approval of Avastin as a first-line treatment for metastatic colorectal cancer in combination with 5-fluorouracil (5-FU). That translated into a $6.6 billion market cap gain.

To put that into context, DNA gained roughly the equivalent of a MedImmune (MEDI; $6.4 billion) on the week. DNA now stands valued at $56.5 billion, which is $37.1 billion (191%) above DNA's market cap of $19.4 billion last May, before the first major Avastin data were announced(see BioCentury, May 26, 2003). The weekly move included gains of $7.02 to $103.10 on 10 million shares on Thursday's news and $4.79 on 14.7 million shares on Friday. ...