The head of the American pharmaceutical company Pfizer, Albert Bourla, sold shares of the company worth $ 5.56 million (CZK 125 million) on Monday. The sale took place on the same day that the company released favorable data on the experimental vaccine against covid-19 and when its share price rose by up to 15 percent. Reuters and the CNBC server informed about it.
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Pfizer and Germany’s BioNTech announced on Monday that the covid-19 vaccine they were developing was more than 90 percent effective. Data from a large clinical study were the first to prove this.
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Bourla sold 132,508 shares of Pfizer on Monday for an average of $ 41.94 apiece. According to CNBC, it continues to own 81,812 shares in Pfizer. The transaction was part of a plan approved by Bourla in August, which made the sale conditional on reaching a certain minimum share price, Reuters reported.
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“The sale of these shares is part of Dr. Bourly’s personal financial planning and a pre-determined plan that allows large shareholders of publicly traded companies to sell a pre-determined number of shares at a pre-determined time under the Securities and Exchange Commission’s rules,” said Pfizer, whose shares during Monday’s trading, they added up 15 percent to $ 41.99 apiece.
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Investors have been thrilled by the announcement of the effectiveness of the vaccine, as they promise a quick end to pandemic measures. But, for example, Christine Lagarde, head of the European Central Bank (ECB), doubts the speed of vaccine use. She also said that the ECB would focus on bond purchases and cheap loans for banks in preparing a new package of measures to support the economy.
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“Although the latest news about the vaccine looks encouraging, we can still face recurring cycles of accelerating the spread of the virus and tightening restrictive measures until we have universal immunity,” Lagarde said. “The economic recovery may not be linear, but rather unstable, intermittent and dependent on the rate of vaccine distribution,” she added.
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