Image Source: Pixabay

Wednesday was another mixed day with oil stocks and foreign telcos up from demand rising--but US telcos going their own ways, with AT&T (T) up, and Verizon (VZ) down because it lost wireless subs. There were hints of recovery with all the US indexes in the plus column early in the session. Giving the way later to a more nuanced treatment of Tech stocks in particular because of Netflix (NFLX) disappointing.

*Roche (RHHBY) gained 2.6% in Swiss trading today after it reported sales of CHF 14.9 bn ($16.2 bn) in Q1 2020, a 1% drop from the sales a year earlier (CHF 15.1 bn) but a 3% rise in constant currencies because of the strong Swiss franc. It rose 2.12% at the US opening. And now is up 2.48%.

In a statement, Roche said that relative sales weakness in the first quarter was due to the comparable period in 2020 being largely unaffected by the pandemic. COVID-19 only started to have a significant impact from April 2020, 

Roche’s mainstay drugs business was hampered by the pandemic because lockdowns led to a decline in demand for medicines that require regular visits to doctors and hospitals. This was partly balanced by additional sales of drugs used to treat COVID-19, such as treatments for coronavirus-associated pneumonia.

Pharma sales which account for over 2/3 of revenues fell 9% at constant currencies from 2020 levels to CHF10.6 bn. New medicines saw strong growth, except for a drop of CHF 1.6 bn from generics for its cancer drugs, now off-patent.

The smaller diagnostics line gained from covid-19 tests with sales up 55% to CHF 4.3 bn. RHHBY did particularly well looking for mutations of the virus. Its antibody trial is on track.

“The uptake of our recently introduced diagnostic tests and medicines remains strong, while we continue to see the expected impact from biosimilars on sales of our established medicines,” said CEO Severin Schwan. “The upcoming acquisition of GenMark underlines our commitment to help control infectious diseases and antibiotic resistance.” GNMK-Q is a diagnostics specialist.

*Fellow Swiss Novartis rose 0.9% on the news, NVS was bought by Cathie Woods Monday and sold today.

*Finnish Sampo Oij (SAXPY), crashed 2% at the opening and is now down about 1.3%. There is no news except in Finnish, which I cannot decipher as my Finnish marketeer has retired.

*Energy Fuels (UUUU), which I have written a lot about lately, has taken further steps to boost its position in rare earths by a deal with unlisted Hyperion on monazite sands, found with uranium in various US sites in Utah and Tennessee. Today it signed a deal for Tennessee with miner Chemours (CC), which is aiming to go green. The duo plan to produce 15,000 kilotonnes/yr of monazite sands.

UUUU was up 5.16% at the opening here and now is up over 4.7%. CC is up 1.6% but also was higher at the opening.

Chemours, which reports on its Q1 May 3, is a specialist chemical firm with positions in titanium production, thermal and special products, advanced performance materials, and specialty chemicals.

With a deep-pocket partner like Chemours, Energy Fuels is now viewed as more likely to be able to compete with the Chinese rare earth monopoly. A negative on the deal came from an anonymous writer on seekingalpha.com, using the pseudonym Gold Panda, probably backing China where pandas live.

Druggies

*Teva (TEVA) gained all of 0.15% at the open today which boosted the Israelis and plenty of other pharma firms. It is now up 1.1%, a big change.

*Compugen (CGEN), another Israeli, gained 0.7% at the opening.

*BioLine RX (BLNEF) opened up 8% but fell back and is only up 5.9%.

*Enlivex (ENLV), rose 6% at the open but lost about 0.7% of that by now.

*Novacure (NVCR) rose 3.6% on no news and is over $200/sh again.

*Cathie Woods today sold diagnostic tester Thermo Fisher (TMO), my largest holding and TMO fell $1.64 to $480.65. It is buying PPD for $47.5, now looking a bit steep.

*Zymeworks of Canada gained 1.5%, as did Astra-Zeneca of the UK. ZYME and AZN are both bellwethers for their sector. Both rose later in the day, ZYME by 2.6%.

*UK Glaxo (GSK) rose 1.3% at the opening. Novo Nordisk (NVO) was up half that. Drugs are back.

*Danish Novo Nordisk rose 0.8% on news that it will begin phase III trials for its oral semiglutide drug for obesity.

*Eisai (ESALF) of Japan which I bought more of yesterday because of its Alzheimer drug at $67.06 was up 0.5% today. Unfortunately, I had to pay a commission to do my trade because TD Ameritrade forgot it offers free trading. Takeda (TAK) rose 0.21%. I bought the wrong Japanese.

*Dr Reddy's (RDY) gained another fraction because India is suffering a huge outbreak of Covid-19 because everyone headed to the sacred Ganges to bathe.

*The exception to the boom in bio is Grifols (GRFS) of Spain, which dropped 1/2% today. Its plasma to treat Covid-19 failed but I still like the immunoglobulin space.

*AbCellera is getting into antibody finding, and ABCL is now only down 43% from our basis.

Tech & Tel

*Between Netflix and crackdowns the tech sector was not in good odor today. Coupang (CPNG), the Amazon of South Korea, lost 1.5%. Mercado Libre (MELI), another Amazon clone, gained back 2.25%.

*Naspers of South Africa lost 0.6%. Prosus of the Netherlands ditto. NPSNY and PROSY are treated as backdoors to Tencent, but they are really more important in other areas now.

*Taiwan Semiconductor (TSM), a new buy yesterday, is up along with Israeli-American Tower Semi.

*Tel is better. Ericsson (ERIAF) gained 5.95% today. Nokia (NOK) rose 1.2%; Vodafone (VOD) gained half that. 

*BCE of Canada is up 0.7%.

Miners

Gold is again near $1800.

*SPDR Gold (GLD) is up another $1.56, 0.9%. Kirkland Lake (KL), our mining pick from Canada, opened up 3.2% but fell back after it announced its AGM to be held May 6 after the market closes at which it will present its Q1 results which will also be available before the opening. The toll-free number for the results is 833 968 2113.  

Palladium is at an all-time high which is good news for Johnson Matthey (JMPLY), in Britain.

Financials

*Santander's latest drop of 1.32% today was blamed on the Spanish bank's equity and bond underwriting, suffering because of market drops. It also lost because the potential rival to the UEFA soccer league, the Super League, has been removed from the scene by protests from fans. This means SAN still has to fund Real Madrid ads. After 2 days of non-stop coverage of soccer teams by the BBC, I am delighted that Real remains with Spain.

*CBOE now recommended by Barron's, rose another 0.35%. It is becoming a global leader in new trading sites but I hesitated to promote it here because it is very much an institutional favorite.

*Sweden's Investor rose 1.2%. IVSBF owns Nasdaq (NDAQ) stock up 1/2%.

*Mitsubishi Financial (MSBHF) rose 1% today in US trading. Sumitomo Mitsui Financial (SMFG) gained 0.14%.

Energy

*Algonquin rose 1.2%. Its part sub, UK green fund Atlantica Yield (AY) rose 1.75%.

*British BP plc gained a half percent.

*Royal Dutch Shell (RDS-B) started out down but now is up a half percent.

*Schlumberger Ltd (SLB) of the Dutch Antilles also fell at the start of the day but is now up 1.27%. Morningstar published a note about the cheapness of energy stocks today.

*Chinese solar producer Canadian Solar (CSIQ), rose 2.2%. I think it is gained worldwide acceptance of its solar panels, starting with Japan. It was tipped by Max Deml in a green letter from Austria. I am lunching with Max's son today.