Moderna reins in 2023 COVID vaccine forecast, shares tumble

Patrick Wingrove and Leroy Leo
Updated 3 min read
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By Patrick Wingrove and Leroy Leo

(Reuters) -Moderna on Thursday said its 2023 sales would only hit the low end of its $6 billion to $8 billion forecast, reflecting weaker demand for COVID-19 vaccines, and its shares slumped 8%.

The vaccine maker also pushed back to 2025 the launch of its flu shot, which it had previously said it expected to be available in 2024.

Analysts had estimated over $100 million in sales for each of Moderna's not yet approved vaccines against RSV and flu in 2024, according to LSEG data.

Concerns around waning demand for COVID vaccines and anticipation of a loss this year has led to a 60% drop in the company's shares year to date. The stock on Thursday plunged as much as 18% to a three-year low of $62.55 in early trade before trimming some of those losses.

Moderna said its $6 billion 2023 revenue forecast was based on the expectation that at least 50 million COVID-19 vaccines would be administered in the United States. Moderna's COVID-19 vaccine is its lone marketed product.

TD Cowen analyst Tyler Van Buren in a research note said he is not convinced Moderna's full-year expectations for the overall market is achievable.

COVID vaccine sales have declined in recent weeks, he said, citing IQVIA data, adding that Moderna's expectations of roughly 50 million shots in the U.S. are only achievable if sales stay roughly flat from here on out.

The company reported third-quarter sales of $1.8 billion, topping analysts' estimates of $1.32 billion, according to LSEG data.

U.S. market share for Spikevax, the COVID vaccine's brand name, had increased to 45% from 36% in 2022, according to Moderna.

So far, more than 15 million people in the U.S. have received an updated COVID-19 shot, including Pfizer's rival vaccine, according to the Department of Health and Human Services. That compares to around 23 million by this time in last year's campaign, which started 10 days earlier.

Moderna said it expects to return to sales growth in 2025 with the help of new vaccines and break even the following year.

The Cambridge, Massachusetts company forecast $4 billion in revenue next year from sales of its COVID and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) vaccines. Moderna hopes to launch the RSV vaccine in 2024 based on positive data from a late-stage trial.

Analysts, on average, are looking for nearly $6 billion in revenue next year.

Moderna's 2025 sales growth expectation is based on anticipated revenue from those shots, as well as from a forthcoming combination COVID-flu vaccine, Chief Financial Officer Jamey Mock said in an interview.

"We believe 2024 is the low point, and we laid out some of the pieces to that. We're going to launch two or three new products on top of that in 2025, and have RSV out in 2024, and it'll continue to grow thereafter," he said.

The company posted a third-quarter net loss of $3.6 billion, driven by non-cash charges of $3.1 billion related to manufacturing capacity resizing and on a tax reserve it had to take.

The resizing, which included scaling down production by contract manufacturer Lonza, will improve future cost of sales, Moderna said.

A $9.53 per share loss for the quarter was much larger than expectations for a $1.93 loss, according to LSEG data.

(Reporting by Patrick Wingrove and Michael Erman in New York and Leroy Leo in Bengaluru; Editing by Sriraj Kalluvila and Bill Berkrot)

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