Moderna Executives Cash Out $89 Million in Stock Sell Off in 2020

Modern has received a lot of positive attention with the push for a corona vaccine. They jumped into the gold rush to produce a vaccine as Trump's Operation Warp SPeed held the promise of lucrative contracts for vaccinating the entire nation.

_Source

Moderna was the first vaccine maker to rush to human trials for their new mRNA-targeting vaccine. A news release on the Phase 1 of the trial on May 18 was a victory lap. They accounced 8 people potentially developing antibodies. The stock soared.

A well known site called STATNews that advocates for the biopharma industry, was not so excited about the Phase 1 results.

The silence of the NIAID

The National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases has partnered with Moderna on this vaccine. Scientists at NIAID made the vaccine’s construct, or prototype, and the agency is running the Phase 1 trial. This week’s Moderna readout came from the earliest of data from the NIAID-led Phase 1.

NIAID doesn’t hide its light under a bushel. The institute generally trumpets its findings, often offering director Anthony Fauci — who, fair enough, is pretty busy these days — or other senior personnel for interviews.

But NIAID did not put out a press release Monday and declined to provide comment on Moderna’s announcement.

The new "Vaccine Czar", Moncef Slaoui -- appointed by Trump to lead and fast track Operation Warp Speed -- was on the board of Moderna until he took the new government position. He sold $12 million in stock when it jumped up. He's not the only insider to get out of the illusory success of what appears to be a sinking ship.

Moderna has never put a single product into the marketplace. Last year, it lost $514 million. It took in $60 million. But it’s somehow worth billions.

So far this year, Moderna insider sales of the stock have profited them over $89 million.

_Source

The first 5 months of 2020 have seen more than 3 times as many stock transactions than all of 2019. Are they selling while the selling is good, knowing the trial for a COVID vaccine won't pan out?

Another good example is Tal Zaks, Moderna’s chief medical officer,

Tal Zaks, Moderna’s chief medical officer, began the year with nearly 100,000 shares of the company. In late February, days before Moderna announced that its coronavirus vaccine was ready for human testing, he began dumping 10,000 shares a week. Over the next 11 weeks, as the pandemic pushed Moderna’s share price from $18 to $50, Zaks liquidated his entire position, making $3.4 million in the process. Once he ran out of stock, he began exercising options priced at $12.21 per share. Over the next two weeks, he sold more than 250,000 more Moderna shares at an average price of $67. Zaks profited more than $18 million from his 2020 trades. He currently holds zero shares of Moderna stock.

Other examples abound. They inlclude:

• Juan Andres, Moderna’s chief technical officer: $12 million
• Chief Financial Officer Lorence Kim: $37 million
• President Stephen Hoge: $2.4 million
• Stéphane Bancel, Moderna’s CEO: $13.6 million

Since Moderna announced the Phase 1 trial results, the sell-off has continued pretty hard. The stock is worth less than before the announcement.

_Source

It looks like a bunch of people who jumped on the "good" news will be left holding the bag. I though insider trading was illegal, but I suppose they did things "above board" and "by the book" as these are allegedly "prescheduled through a legal program that allows company insiders to buy and sell shares at a later date".

If you have set dates for news releases, and set up these scheduled sell offs at that time, it would make for some easy profits. People didn't read the news properly to see how the results weren't that great, and stocks jumped, making the Moderna execs tons of money.