Pharmaceutical stocks were among the rare winners in early trading yesterday as Republicans’ sweeping victory in the U.S. elections eased concerns that Democrats would enact controls on drug prices in the world’s largest market for prescription drugs.
Roche Holding AG, the world’s biggest maker of cancer drugs, gained 4.4 percent in Zurich, France’s Sanofi climbed 2.9 percent in Paris, and Novo Nordisk A/S rose 4.8 percent in Copenhagen. The Bloomberg EMEA Pharmaceutical Index jumped as much as 5.1 percent, the most intraday since 2011, even as the the broader market slumped. Indian generic-drug makers, which sell to the U.S., also climbed.
President-elect Donald Trump has laid out little in the way of health policy plans, though he has called for repealing Obamacare, which extended insurance to at least 20 million people and had buoyed hospitals and insurers. His opponent Hillary Clinton had made drug prices a key aspect of her campaign, and there were concerns that her administration could put substantial pressure on drug prices in the U.S.
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