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Noubar Afeyan speaks onstage on the 2019 Aurora Forum in Armenia.
Victor Boyko/Getty Images
Moderna
inventory has rocketed on prospects for its Covid-19 vaccine, and the biotechnology agency’s co-founder and chairman, Noubar Afeyan, has been promoting giant blocks of shares.
Moderna (ticker: MRNA) shares rose extra 5 instances in worth final yr, in contrast with a 16.3% rise within the S&P 500. This yr, shares are up one other 35%, whereas the S&P has gained 9.9%.
The firm has been making new versions of its vaccine to battle variants of Covid-19. While reporting a powerful fourth quarter, Moderna introduced that the corporate’s chief medical officer, Dr. Tal Zaks, would leave the company in late September.
From Feb. 22 by means of Feb. 24, Afeyan offered 6.5 million Moderna shares for a complete of $986.four million, at a mean worth of $150.88 every.
Afeyan then offered one other 3.eight million Moderna shares from March 29 by means of March 31 for a complete of $455.7 million, a per-share common worth of $121.43.
According to forms filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Moderna chairman offered the shares by means of models of Flagship Pioneering, a life-sciences venture-capital agency that he based and serves as CEO. Flagship now owns 20.6 million Moderna shares, whereas Afeyan holds 2.1 million shares in a private account. Flagship is now Moderna’s third-largest shareholder, based on S&P Capital IQ.
Moderna didn’t reply to a request to make Afeyan obtainable for touch upon his inventory gross sales.
Flagship supplied a press release to Barron’s:
“Our gross sales over latest weeks and months have been pursuant to a 10b5-1 plan put in place final December and executed in two installments following the passage of 60 days from the unique submitting. As per our kind four submitting, this program coated 10 million shares, and is now concluded. At the time Moderna spun out from Flagship 10 years in the past, Flagship held roughly 60 million shares, and since 2019 it has periodically made distributions of roughly half that sum to its buyers. We at the moment retain 20 million shares of Moderna inventory.“
This story has been up to date to incorporate a press release from Flagship.
Inside Scoop is a daily Barron’s characteristic protecting inventory transactions by company executives and board members—so-called insiders—in addition to giant shareholders, politicians, and different outstanding figures. Due to their insider standing, these buyers are required to reveal inventory trades with the Securities and Exchange Commission or different regulatory teams.
Write to Ed Lin at edward.lin@barrons.com and comply with @BarronsEdLin.
