Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel faced sharp criticism at a US Senate hearing Wednesday over the company’s plan to quintuple the price of its Covid vaccine when it hits the private market.
Moderna intends to increase the list price of its vaccine to $130 for the private market, compared to the $26 per dose the company has been charging the US government. The shots could be available on the private market as early as this fall.
Sen. Bernie Sander, I-Vermont, was the sharpest voice opposing Bancel’s plan.
“Quadrupling the price is huge,” Sanders said to Bancel. “I would hope very much you would reconsider that decision. It’s going to cost taxpayers of this country billions of dollars. Is that something you can do?”
Bancel would not make such a commitment, instead pointing to the changing nature of the Covid vaccine market. As the US government stops buying and distributing shots for the whole country, Bancel expects demand to fall by 90%
Moderna will have to cover the cost of wasted doses, rather than the government picking up the cost. He added that the US vaccination program has provided $5 trillion in economic value and prevented 18 million hospitalizations and 3 million deaths.
“To protect people, we need to make more than we think is going to be needed. We are going to have to pay for it,” Bancel said.
In his opening remarks, Sanders said Moderna is profiteering and that Bancel receives “excessive CEO compensation.”
To that point, Bancel cashed out more than $390 million in stock options in 2022, according to financial disclosures. He held a 7.3% stake in Moderna as of March 8 valued at about $4.3 billion.
The vaccine is Moderna’s only product on the market, and the company has made $21 billion in profits since the shot rolled out in the US in December 2020. That’s after the vaccine was developed in partnership with the National Institutes of Health, and the US government spent $12 billion on research, development and procurement.
Shares of Moderns climbed 1.5% to $150.51 on Thursday morning.
Contact Andrew Kessel at andrew.kessel@proactiveinvestors.com
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