Business Strategy & Outlook
BioMarin is amassing a portfolio of genetic-disease therapeutics, making historical comparisons with Genzyme (acquired by Sanofi) difficult to avoid. Commercialization and research and development expenses have kept BioMarin in the red, but in the profit-generating power of its rare-disease treatments, and BioMarin’s turn to profitability looks maintainable. With a deep in-house pipeline and the ability to supplement growth with strategic acquisitions, BioMarin is in a strong position.
BioMarin’s life-saving therapies may serve only a few thousand patients globally, but with six-figure price tags on most products and high barriers to entry, one can see this as a very attractive marketplace. Genzyme (now Sanofi) and BioMarin formed a 50/50 joint venture to market BioMarin’s first drug, Aldurazyme, for the treatment of mucopolysaccharidosis I, or MPS I. BioMarin’s MPS VI drug, Naglazyme, is maturing, but still seeing solid growth due to use in emerging markets like Brazil and higher (more expensive) dosing as young patients mature; the peak sales will surpass $400 million. BioMarin is also well positioned to treat the entire spectrum of patients with phenylketonuria, or PKU, one of the world’s most common metabolic disorders. While generic versions of Kuvan (mild to moderate PKU) launched in the U.S. in 2020, more potent drug Palynziq launched in 2018 in the U.S. to serve adult patients with PKU, including patients with more severe disease. PKU is well diagnosed thanks to state-mandated newborn screening programs, and no alternative drug therapies exist.
Financial Strengths
BioMarin ended 2021 with roughly $1.4 billion in cash, cash equivalents, and investments and $1.1 billion convertible debt. Given its recent turn to profitability, the firm will have plenty of cash on hand to pay down its convertible debt coming due in 2024 ($495 million) and 2027 ($600 million). The current free cash flow estimates suggest that BioMarin will not need external financing to fund its operations going forward.
Bulls Say
- BioMarin’s approved drugs have been granted orphan-drug status in the U.S. and European Union, providing them with at least 7 and 10 years of market exclusivity, respectively.
- BioMarin’s drugs target rare chronic conditions that often require treatment from a very young age, and while locating eligible patients on a global level is challenging, the firm has high patient retention rates.
- With a growing portfolio in an attractive rare-disease niche—and acceleration of profit growth beginning in 2022—BioMarin could be an acquisition target for pharmaceutical firms with pipelines to fill.
Company Description
BioMarin’s focus is on rare-disease therapies. Genzyme (now part of Sanofi) markets Aldurazyme through its joint venture with BioMarin, and BioMarin markets Naglazyme, Vimizim, and Brineura independently. BioMarin also markets Kuvan and Palynziq to treat the rare metabolic disorder PKU (in addition to long-standing U.S. rights, BioMarin has reacquired international rights for Kuvan and Palynziq from Merck KGaA). Voxzogo (vosoritide) was approved in achondroplasia in 2021. BioMarin’s Roctavian (hemophilia A gene therapy) is poised to potentially launch in the 2022-23 timeframe.
(Source: Morningstar)
DISCLAIMER for General Advice: (This document is for general advice only).
This document is provided by Laverne Securities Pty Ltd T/as Laverne Investing. Laverne Securities Pty Ltd, CAR 001269781 of Laverne Capital Pty Ltd AFSL No. 482937.The material in this document may contain general advice or recommendations which, while believed to be accurate at the time of publication, are not appropriate for all persons or accounts. This document does not purport to contain all the information that a prospective investor may require. The material contained in this document does not take into consideration an investor’s objectives, financial situation or needs. Before acting on the advice, investors should consider the appropriateness of the advice, having regard to the investor’s objectives, financial situation, and needs. The material contained in this document is for sales purposes. The material contained in this document is for information purposes only and is not an offer, solicitation or recommendation with respect to the subscription for, purchase or sale of securities or financial products and neither or anything in it shall form the basis of any contract or commitment. This document should not be regarded by recipients as a substitute for the exercise of their own judgment and recipients should seek independent advice. The material in this document has been obtained from sources believed to be true but neither Laverne and Banyan Tree nor its associates make any recommendation or warranty concerning the accuracy or reliability or completeness of the information or the performance of the companies referred to in this document. Past performance is not indicative of future performance. Any opinions and or recommendations expressed in this material are subject to change without notice and, Laverne and Banyan Tree are not under any obligation to update or keep current the information contained herein. References made to third parties are based on information believed to be reliable but are not guaranteed as being accurate.
Laverne and Banyan Tree and its respective officers may have an interest in the securities or derivatives of any entities referred to in this material. Laverne and Banyan Tree do and seek to do business with companies that are the subject of its research reports. The analyst(s) hereby certify that all the views expressed in this report accurately reflect their personal views about the subject investment theme and/or company securities.
Although every attempt has been made to verify the accuracy of the information contained in the document, liability for any errors or omissions (except any statutory liability which cannot be excluded) is specifically excluded by Laverne and Banyan Tree, its associates, officers, directors, employees, and agents. Except for any liability which cannot be excluded, Laverne and Banyan Tree, its directors, employees and agents accept no liability or responsibility for any loss or damage of any kind, direct or indirect, arising out of the use of all or any part of this material. Recipients of this document agree in advance that Laverne and Banyan Tree are not liable to recipients in any matters whatsoever otherwise; recipients should disregard, destroy or delete this document. All information is correct at the time of publication. Laverne and Banyan Tree do not guarantee reliability and accuracy of the material contained in this document and are not liable for any unintentional errors in the document.
The securities of any company(ies) mentioned in this document may not be eligible for sale in all jurisdictions or to all categories of investors. This document is provided to the recipient only and is not to be distributed to third parties without the prior consent of Laverne and Banyan Tree.
Business Strategy & Outlook
Change Healthcare offers variations of over a dozen financial and administrative services to support healthcare payers and providers improve administrative efficiency related to submitting and reimbursing medical and dental claims. The company’s revenue is generated by payers and providers with a split of roughly 40% and 60%, respectively. These processing services are focused on administrative accuracy with relatively low fee rates. As a result, there are no material customer concentration issues and no one customer represents more than 4% of revenue. As these various outsourced services address niche needs, there are no direct comparable peers. These services generally fit into three segments; Network Solutions, Software Analytics, and Technology-enabled Services.
Most of the company’s services were likely born from its Network Solutions segment as it is a medical and dental claim clearinghouse that services both payers and providers. This highly commoditized service drives scale and reach within healthcare claims processing and enables the company to identify incremental tools and evolving needs across its broad customer base. The company’s clinical and healthcare network manages roughly one third of U.S. healthcare claims from 2,200 government and commercial payers, 900,000 physicians, 118,000 dentists, 33,000 pharmacies, 5,500 hospitals, and 600 laboratories. Having connectivity to all these payers and providers will be critical in creating value with incremental software tools bundled from the other two segments. There is some crossover of the provider and payer services within the two segments, Software & Analytics and Technology-Enabled Services. The Software & Analytics segment supports plans covering 100 million lives, provides payment accuracy solutions to 19 of the top 20 U.S. payers, 4,600 hospitals, and nine of the top 10 Medicare advantage plans. The Technology-Enabled Services segment is focused on providing outsourced revenue cycle support and covers $34 billion in annual charges and $9.2 billion in annual collections across 207 million annual cases/procedures.
Financial Strengths
As a spinoff from a larger entity, Change Healthcare was burdened with a significant debt balance of $5.8 billion, or 6 times fiscal 2020 adjusted EBITDA. The company was largely leveraged to fund the integration and investment in its more targeted strategy. The company has a strong revenue base of $3 billion and gross margins and operating margins in excess of 60% and 15%, respectively. Even with the necessary strategic investments, the company would try to pay down some of its debt with free cash flow, which is forecast to be in excess of $250 million annually. The subscription nature of the company’s business will provide stability in revenue and cash flows to expand its leading position in the niche medical claims market. The management may make small tuck-in acquisitions through available cash and cash flows. Even in this scenario, there’ll be an increasing liquidity, as the firm’s reserve of cash should continue to increase.
Bulls Say
- Its medical claims data and IT focus should enable the company to become a meaningful contributor with the increased focused toward value-added reimbursement and interoperability policies.
- The company’s focus on developing new tools and analytics should further entrench it into mission critical operations of customers, making it increasingly challenging for competitors to gain a foothold.
- Change Healthcare’s broad claims network provides broad connectivity and significant amounts of data to captive customer audiences.
Company Description
Change Healthcare is a spin-off of various healthcare processing and consulting services acquired by McKesson over numerous years. Recently, these processing assets were contributed to a joint venture and in June 2019 public shares were issued with McKesson retaining the majority interest. As of the end of the March 2020 quarter, McKesson distributed all its interest in the public processor. Core services consist of insurance (healthcare) claim clearinghouse for healthcare payers in addition to administrative and consulting services to assist healthcare providers improve reimbursement coding, billing, and collections.
(Source: Morningstar)
DISCLAIMER for General Advice: (This document is for general advice only).
This document is provided by Laverne Securities Pty Ltd T/as Laverne Investing. Laverne Securities Pty Ltd, CAR 001269781 of Laverne Capital Pty Ltd AFSL No. 482937.The material in this document may contain general advice or recommendations which, while believed to be accurate at the time of publication, are not appropriate for all persons or accounts. This document does not purport to contain all the information that a prospective investor may require. The material contained in this document does not take into consideration an investor’s objectives, financial situation or needs. Before acting on the advice, investors should consider the appropriateness of the advice, having regard to the investor’s objectives, financial situation, and needs. The material contained in this document is for sales purposes. The material contained in this document is for information purposes only and is not an offer, solicitation or recommendation with respect to the subscription for, purchase or sale of securities or financial products and neither or anything in it shall form the basis of any contract or commitment. This document should not be regarded by recipients as a substitute for the exercise of their own judgment and recipients should seek independent advice. The material in this document has been obtained from sources believed to be true but neither Laverne and Banyan Tree nor its associates make any recommendation or warranty concerning the accuracy or reliability or completeness of the information or the performance of the companies referred to in this document. Past performance is not indicative of future performance. Any opinions and or recommendations expressed in this material are subject to change without notice and, Laverne and Banyan Tree are not under any obligation to update or keep current the information contained herein. References made to third parties are based on information believed to be reliable but are not guaranteed as being accurate.
Laverne and Banyan Tree and its respective officers may have an interest in the securities or derivatives of any entities referred to in this material. Laverne and Banyan Tree do and seek to do business with companies that are the subject of its research reports. The analyst(s) hereby certify that all the views expressed in this report accurately reflect their personal views about the subject investment theme and/or company securities.
Although every attempt has been made to verify the accuracy of the information contained in the document, liability for any errors or omissions (except any statutory liability which cannot be excluded) is specifically excluded by Laverne and Banyan Tree, its associates, officers, directors, employees, and agents. Except for any liability which cannot be excluded, Laverne and Banyan Tree, its directors, employees and agents accept no liability or responsibility for any loss or damage of any kind, direct or indirect, arising out of the use of all or any part of this material. Recipients of this document agree in advance that Laverne and Banyan Tree are not liable to recipients in any matters whatsoever otherwise; recipients should disregard, destroy or delete this document. All information is correct at the time of publication. Laverne and Banyan Tree do not guarantee reliability and accuracy of the material contained in this document and are not liable for any unintentional errors in the document.
The securities of any company(ies) mentioned in this document may not be eligible for sale in all jurisdictions or to all categories of investors. This document is provided to the recipient only and is not to be distributed to third parties without the prior consent of Laverne and Banyan Tree.
Business Strategy & Outlook
AstraZeneca has built its leading presence in the pharma and biotech industry on patent-protected drugs and a developing pipeline that adds up to a wide moat. The replenishment of new drugs is offsetting the past patent losses on gastrointestinal drug Nexium and cholesterol reducer Crestor, and the company is well positioned for growth. AstraZeneca’s pipeline is emerging as one of the strongest in the drug group, and the company is developing several key products that hold blockbuster potential. In particular, the company’s recently launched cancer drugs Tagrisso and Imfinzi are well-positioned based on leading efficacy in hard-to-treat cancers. These drugs should also carry strong pricing power, driving the potential to expand Astra’s margins. Also, Astra is well-positioned in the respiratory and diabetes spaces, but these areas tend to have poor pricing power relative to cancer drugs.
In addition to internal development, AstraZeneca has aggressively pursued acquisitions, with mixed results. The ZS Pharma acquisition yielded an interesting hyperkalaemia drug, but delays in getting the drug to the market have been concerning. However, the partial stake in Acerta looks to be developing well with new blood cancer drug Calquence, and joint development with Daiichi Sankyo on cancer drug Enhertu looks promising. Also, the recent acquisition of Alexion looks like a solid strategic move done at a reasonable price. As Astra’s next generation of drugs launch, there are expected operating margins to improve based on the strong pricing power of the new drugs and the operating leverage the firm should attain as the new drugs reach critical mass. Also, as the new drugs launch, Astra is reducing the asset divestiture strategy it employed to help bridge the massive patent losses facing the firm over the past few years until the newer drugs were ready. While the asset sales helped prop up earnings and support the dividend during a challenging time, the strategy is not maintainable. As new drugs gain traction, Astra will likely continue to reduce the asset sales, which is strategically sound but will likely create a minor headwind to earnings growth.
Financial Strengths
Astra continues to generate robust cash flows, and the firm’s balance sheet is in solid shape, closing 2021 with debt/EBITDA of close to 4 times, a bit higher than normal due to the recent Alexion acquisition. While the acquisition added significant debt, it is expected the strong acquired drugs to produce robust cash flows to quickly pay down the acquisition-related debt. A projected debt/EBITDA ratio of 1.0 times by 2024 with the cash flow derived from acquired drugs and the robust sales growth of Astra’s other drugs.
Bulls Say
- The company is expanding its oncology presence with several important pipeline products. In particular, the company’s EGFR drug Tagrisso holds major blockbuster potential in lung cancer.
- The management team is focusing the pipeline toward unmet medical need, which should increase the odds of success and bring strong pricing power for the new drugs.
- AstraZeneca has a large presence in emerging markets and should benefit from these markets’ fast growth prospects.
Company Description
A merger between Astra of Sweden and Zeneca Group of the United Kingdom formed AstraZeneca in 1999. The firm sells branded drugs across several major therapeutic classes, including gastrointestinal, diabetes, cardiovascular, respiratory, cancer, and immunology. The majority of sales come from international markets with the United States representing close to one third of its sales.
(Source: Morningstar)
DISCLAIMER for General Advice: (This document is for general advice only).
This document is provided by Laverne Securities Pty Ltd T/as Laverne Investing. Laverne Securities Pty Ltd, CAR 001269781 of Laverne Capital Pty Ltd AFSL No. 482937.The material in this document may contain general advice or recommendations which, while believed to be accurate at the time of publication, are not appropriate for all persons or accounts. This document does not purport to contain all the information that a prospective investor may require. The material contained in this document does not take into consideration an investor’s objectives, financial situation or needs. Before acting on the advice, investors should consider the appropriateness of the advice, having regard to the investor’s objectives, financial situation, and needs. The material contained in this document is for sales purposes. The material contained in this document is for information purposes only and is not an offer, solicitation or recommendation with respect to the subscription for, purchase or sale of securities or financial products and neither or anything in it shall form the basis of any contract or commitment. This document should not be regarded by recipients as a substitute for the exercise of their own judgment and recipients should seek independent advice. The material in this document has been obtained from sources believed to be true but neither Laverne and Banyan Tree nor its associates make any recommendation or warranty concerning the accuracy or reliability or completeness of the information or the performance of the companies referred to in this document. Past performance is not indicative of future performance. Any opinions and or recommendations expressed in this material are subject to change without notice and, Laverne and Banyan Tree are not under any obligation to update or keep current the information contained herein. References made to third parties are based on information believed to be reliable but are not guaranteed as being accurate.
Laverne and Banyan Tree and its respective officers may have an interest in the securities or derivatives of any entities referred to in this material. Laverne and Banyan Tree do and seek to do business with companies that are the subject of its research reports. The analyst(s) hereby certify that all the views expressed in this report accurately reflect their personal views about the subject investment theme and/or company securities.
Although every attempt has been made to verify the accuracy of the information contained in the document, liability for any errors or omissions (except any statutory liability which cannot be excluded) is specifically excluded by Laverne and Banyan Tree, its associates, officers, directors, employees, and agents. Except for any liability which cannot be excluded, Laverne and Banyan Tree, its directors, employees and agents accept no liability or responsibility for any loss or damage of any kind, direct or indirect, arising out of the use of all or any part of this material. Recipients of this document agree in advance that Laverne and Banyan Tree are not liable to recipients in any matters whatsoever otherwise; recipients should disregard, destroy or delete this document. All information is correct at the time of publication. Laverne and Banyan Tree do not guarantee reliability and accuracy of the material contained in this document and are not liable for any unintentional errors in the document.
The securities of any company(ies) mentioned in this document may not be eligible for sale in all jurisdictions or to all categories of investors. This document is provided to the recipient only and is not to be distributed to third parties without the prior consent of Laverne and Banyan Tree.
