{"id":102382,"date":"2026-08-13T01:08:39","date_gmt":"2026-08-13T01:08:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/102382\/"},"modified":"2026-08-13T01:08:39","modified_gmt":"2026-08-13T01:08:39","slug":"brokers-split-on-astrazeneca-merger-talk-as-shares-recover-some-ground-5","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/102382\/","title":{"rendered":"Brokers split on AstraZeneca merger talk as shares recover some ground"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Brokers<\/a> Brokers split on AstraZeneca merger talk as shares recover some ground Proactive uses images sourced from Shutterstock <\/p>\n

Citi has told clients that a large chunk of deal risk is already in AstraZeneca PLC’s (LSE:AZN, NASDAQ:AZN)<\/a>\u00a0share price after Monday’s sharp fall, while Deutsche Bank sees clear parallels with the drugmaker’s Alexion acquisition five years ago. <\/p>\n

The two notes are the second-day response to a Financial Times<\/a> report over the weekend that the FTSE 100 drugmaker is in discussions over a merger with US rival Bristol Myers Squibb. <\/p>\n

Citi, which maintains a ‘buy’ rating, said talks would be a surprise for several reasons. <\/p>\n

The bank argues AstraZeneca’s existing pipeline sets<\/a> it up to beat its $80 billion revenue target for 2030, deliver 15% compound annual earnings growth from 2027 to 2030, and largely offset patent expiries beyond that. <\/p>\n

A deal would likely dilute growth between 2025 and 2030 given Bristol Myers Squibb faces the loss of exclusivity on blockbusters Eliquis and Opdivo in 2028. <\/p>\n

Those two drugs account for around $27 billion of expected sales this year, roughly half the company’s revenue, meaning substantial synergies would be needed just to stand still. <\/p>\n

Citi also flagged potential antitrust problems, since both companies own large oncology franchises including the competing immunotherapies Imfinzi and Opdivo. <\/p>\n

Politics is a further complication if AstraZeneca were to use a deal to move its domicile to the United States. <\/p>\n

The broker does see some portfolio logic, with overlapping therapy areas aiding synergies and a deal potentially supporting growth after 2030, when the company hits its largest patent cliffs. <\/p>\n

With the shares now on 14 times 2027 earnings, Citi believes a good deal of deal risk has been discounted. <\/p>\n

Deutsche Bank, which has a ‘sell’ rating and an 11,500p target, framed the situation as Alexion d\u00e9j\u00e0 vu. <\/p>\n

Analyst Emmanuel Papadakis said a transaction would closely parallel the 2020 deal: a cost synergy-driven acquisition of a value-rated US peer, partly financed by AstraZeneca’s higher multiple, at a moment when its own medium-term revenue targets were looking a stretch. <\/p>\n

He noted that the previous $45 billion target for 2023 was ultimately met only because of the Alexion purchase. <\/p>\n

The shares bounced 2.4%, or 275p, to 11,774p on Tuesday. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Brokers split on AstraZeneca merger talk as shares recover some ground Proactive uses images sourced from Shutterstock Citi…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":102383,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[20662],"tags":[30219,11153,40798,13099,1477,273],"class_list":["post-102382","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-astrazeneca","tag-alexion","tag-astrazeneca","tag-bristol-myers-squibb","tag-citi","tag-deutsche-bank","tag-earnings-growth"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@UnitedKingdom\/117085529899595364","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102382","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=102382"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102382\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/102383"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=102382"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=102382"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=102382"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}