Investor Steve Weiss prefers Moderna over Merck, says it’s a high quality stock with a bigger pipeline
Stephen Weiss, chief investment officer and managing partner at Short Hills Capital Partners, bought Moderna , and sold Merck — though he still expects the latter is a solid pharmaceutical stock. "I think [Merck's] a good holding," Weiss said Wednesday on CNBC's " Halftime Report . "Some days I regret selling because it's still a cheap stock, still extremely well-run, I think the best-run pharma company." "But on the other hand, I've got Moderna, which with a much bigger pipeline, a much better balance sheet... Moderna's stellar," he added. Moderna shares have recently attracted investors' interest following the announcement of an experimental melanoma vaccine . The treatment, when combined with Merck 's cancer treatment Keytruda, reduced the risk of skin cancer recurrence or death by 44%. This is compared with a treatment of only Keytruda. Shares of Moderna are down roughly 18% this year, while shares of Merck is up nearly 45% in 2022. Joseph Terranova, senior managing director at Virtus Investment Partners, concurred with Weiss's pick, saying investors should pick health-care names — a sector that he says everyone should be in — after reviewing fundamentals. "Steve mentioned Moderna, and I think a lot of the viewers when they hear that, they think of momentum, but I think it's important to understand this is also a stock that has some quality represented on its balance sheet," Terranova said. "It's cheap. There's cash there, and it's more than just momentum." To this, Weiss added that "there's no other drug company, biotech company" with the pipeline that Moderna has. "That's high quality," he said.