Pfizer, Moderna bank on price hikes, updated shots to retain COVID vaccine duopoly
carmengabriela

As the pandemicâs impact on public life wanes and vaccine purchases move to a commercial market, Wall Street and independent analysts forecast that Pfizer (NYSE:PFE) and Moderna (NASDAQ:MRNA) could lead a declining, but strong COVID-19 vaccine market thanks to price hikes and their updated shots.
In September, President Joe Biden declared the pandemic was over, a few days after the head of the World Health Organization (WHO) Tedros Adhanom, said that the world has never been in a better position to end the pandemic.
As the pandemic transitions to an endemic phase, London-based data analytics firm Airfinity expects Pfizer (PFE) and Moderna (MRNA) to dominate the COVID-19 vaccine market, which the firm estimates to decline in 2023.
Pfizer (PFE), in collaboration with the German company BioNTech (BNTX), introduced the first FDA-authorized COVID-19 vaccine in late 2020, closely followed by a rival shot from Moderna (MRNA). 
âPfizer/BioNTech and Moderna are continuing to benefit from first to market advantage and will continue to dominate the market for the foreseeable future,â Airfinityâs Analytics Director Dr. Matt Linley said.
In less than two years from the initial vaccine rollout, the messenger-RNA-based vaccine makers launched COVID shots adjusted for the Omicron variant of the virus. 
âThe duosâ new variant targeting jabs are set to cement this status. mRNA technology has proven to be the quickest to update for new variants of concern and therefore demand higher prices,â Linley added.
However, Airfinity projects the COVID-19 vaccine market to decline in 2023 by about 20% to $47B after generating an estimated $60B in global sales this year, in line with 2021. The firm expects vaccine sales to hit 1.6B doses in 2023 after 3B doses this year, a sharp decline from 5.7B doses sold in 2021.
Despite a ~72% drop in sales volumes between 2021 and 2023, the vaccine revenue will only fall 22% due to higher prices, according to Airfinity, which notes that against a backdrop of rising COVID vaccine prices, mRNA vaccine makers have commanded the highest price increases.
As COVID-19 vaccine sales move to a commercial market from government-led purchases, particularly in the U.S., the firm expects the publicly disclosed orders in the private market to arrive in H2 2022.
Airfinity forecasts Pfizer (PFE)/ BioNTech (BNTX) and Moderna (MRNA) vaccines to cost $22 - $42 and $32 - $50 per dose, respectively, depending on the buying country. AstraZeneca (AZN), Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), and Novavax (NVAX) COVID shots are expected to cost $5 - $16, according to the firm.
On Thursday, Pfizer (PFE) said that the company intends to raise its COVID-19 vaccine price by about fourfold to a range of ~$110 â $130 per dose when the government-led procurements end in the U.S. 
Previously, Moderna (MRNA) had said the biotech expected to charge $100 per dose for its vaccine, which was initially priced at ~$16.50 per dose.
President Bidenâs claim about the end of the pandemic will help vaccine makers to raise prices to non-pandemic levels and maintain the topline despite an impending decline in supplies, Airfinityâs Linley noted.
According to the firm, Pfizer (PFE)/ BioNTech (BNTX) will record $32B in COVID-19 vaccine revenue for this year and next, a ~14% decline from $37B in 2021. Moderna (MRNA) will see its 2023 revenue declining ~57% YoY to $12B after a ~24% YoY rise in 2022 to $21B.
Airfinity projects Novavax (NVAX), the last to win FDA authorization for a COVID-19 vaccine, to generate $2.3B revenue in 2022 to claim ~4% of market share. However, with new entrants to the vaccine market unable to take significant market share in 2023, the companyâs market share will drop to ~2% next year, the firm estimates.
Wall Street is also bullish on the prospects of Pfizer (PFE) and Moderna (MRNA) in the COVID vaccine market. Per Refinitive data, the analysts expect the two rivals that dominate the U.S. market to add $16.3B and $7.9B in COVID-19 sales in 2023, respectively, followed by $2.8B from Novavax (NVAX).
The other COVID-19 vaccine maker in the U.S., Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), withdrew the guidance for its vector-based shot early this year, citing a supply glut and uncertainty in demand.
However, Wall Street appears skeptical about the prospects of COVID-19 vaccine markers, irrespective of their market dominance. BioNTech (BNTX), Moderna (MRNA), and Novavax (NVAX), all of which rely on COVID-19 vaccines to drive growth, have sharply dropped this year while Pfizer (PFE) thanks to its diversified topline traded flat, as indicated in this graph.