Looking For The Best Health Care Stocks To Watch Right Now?
You can’t deny that health care stocks have been in the limelight as of late. Throughout this near-year-long pandemic, the general public has and continues to hear about the importance of health. For investors, this has led to huge gains from digital health care companies on the market. Take Teladoc (NYSE: TDOC) and 111 Inc. (NASDAQ: YI) for example. Both companies are leading telemedicine providers in their regions, and have skyrocketed in share price over the past year. In the same way, investors are steadily flocking towards vaccine companies as well. Moderna (NASDAQ: MRNA) shares are looking at gains of over 58% year-to-date as it keeps distributing its vaccine globally. Of course, these gains are impressive. Accordingly, investors who have yet to make an entry into the industry might be wondering if it still has room to grow.
The answer might be a yes. This is because nationwide vaccination efforts continue to ramp up even as winter weather provides more logistical challenges. Even so, the health care industry will undoubtedly still play a crucial role in the fight against the virus. In that time, could these top health care stocks be your next big investment?
Top Health Care Stocks To Watch
- Lucira Health Inc. (NASDAQ: LHDX)
- MedAvail Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ: MDVL)
- Novavax Inc. (NASDAQ: NVAX)
- Vir Biotechnology Inc. (NASDAQ: VIR)
Lucira Health Inc.
Lucira is a medical tech company that focuses on the development and commercialization of disease test kits. Notably, the company has successfully produced a laboratory-grade COVID-19 home testing kit. The LUCIRA COVID-19 All-In-One Test Kit provides a clinically relevant COVID-19 result within 30 minutes from sample collection. Not to mention, it is the first FDA-authorized diagnostic test that can be self-administered by physicians and patients alike. Given the grave importance of testing at this phase in the pandemic, you could imagine that Lucira would have its hands full. In fact, LHDX stock is up by over 48% since going public earlier this month.
These gains are likely thanks to its recent major announcement last week. Last Thursday, Lucira announced that U.S. physicians and health care providers can now order their test kits online. In detail, each single-use test kit comes at the price of $50 and contains everything needed to conduct a COVID-19 test. By and large, this bodes well for physicians, patients, and Lucira.
As mentioned earlier, the test kit can be self-administered at home without any telehealth or supervised assistance. This would lighten the load on the health care system and make for a steady source of income for Lucira. With all this in mind, will you be adding LHDX stock to your watchlist?
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MedAvail Holdings Inc.
Following that, we have tech-centered pharmacy company MedAvail. The New Jersey-based company provides turnkey services through its proprietary robotic dispensing platform, the MedAvail MedCenter. It also offers home delivery solutions on top of that. Understandably, as social distancing is part of the current norm, MedAvail’s services would transition from a convenience to a necessity. With MedAvail, patients can still adhere to their prescriptions with minimal risk of being exposed to the pandemic. To point out, MDVL stock has also been on a tear lately, surging 13.05% during intraday trading yesterday. This does coincide with a financial update it released.
Particularly, MedAvail announced its preliminary financial and operational results for its fourth quarter and full-year 2020. Impressively, the company expects quarterly revenue to spike 95% year-over-year on the top-line. In terms of full-year revenue, the company is predicting a 260% year-over-year surge. Throughout the year, MedAvail deployed its services to 57 clinics, marking a 185% increase from 2019.
For the most part, I can understand why investors would be keen to jump on MDVL stock after this update. Regardless, the company continues to kick into high gear, expanding into Michigan and Arizona this year. All things considered, do you think MDVL stock is worth watching?
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Novavax Inc.
Next up vaccine giant Novavax. As most would know by now, the company has been making headlines this year. Mainly, this is because its COVID-19 vaccine candidate achieved an 89.3% efficacy in its U.K. phase 3 trial. Since that January 28 announcement, NVAX stock has more than doubled in value. Significantly, Novavax’s vaccine stands out because of its clinical effectiveness against the new U.K. and South African variants of COVID-19. Since then, the company continues to provide major updates which seem to be fueling investor interest in NVAX stock further.
On February 4, Novavax announced that it would start the regulatory approval process for authorization by multiple agencies. These include the U.S. FDA, European Medicines Agency, U.K. Medicines, and Health Regulatory Agency, and Health Canada. Despite only providing non-clinical and early clinical study data, Novavax is working to accelerate the review process.
In turn, this would bring its vaccine candidate closer to market. Even as it works towards regulatory approval, Novavax is already in talks with several countries to produce or supply its vaccine. The likes of which include, Canada, Switzerland, and most recently South Korea. In particular, the company announced an expansion of its existing vaccine manufacturing operations with South Korea-based SK Biosciences last Monday. Could this make NVAX stock a top health care stock to watch? You tell me.
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Vir Biotechnology Inc.
Another health care stock in focus now would be Vir. In brief, it is a clinical-stage biotech company that focuses on developing treatments for serious infectious diseases. Through a combination of immunologic insights and cutting-edge technologies, Vir can do so. To elaborate, Vir has established several technology platforms that work to stimulate and enhance the immune system. More importantly, VIR stock saw gains of over 18% yesterday as it announced some major news regarding its developmental pipeline.
Before yesterday’s opening bell, Vir revealed that it would be expanding its coronavirus collaboration with GlaxoSmithKline (NYSE: GSK). To begin with, GSK is a global pharmaceutical company that researches and manufactures consumer health care products. The duo has been working together since April 2020 to research and develop solutions for coronaviruses.
In this latest expansion, both companies will widen the scope of research to include influenza (flu) and other respiratory diseases. Accordingly, investors could see this as Vir investing in long-term issues. With the flu causing half a million hospitalizations in the U.S. each year, this could translate to long-term growth potential for the company. Do you think this extends to VIR stock as well?
