In the ever-evolving world of stocks, the year has seen its share of ups and downs. Currently, the stock market grapples with the headwinds of rising interest rates and the resulting surge in bond yields. At the same time, there is reason for optimism.
Based on historical patterns, Q4 is typically the year’s strongest for US stocks, and investment bank Goldman Sachs is sticking resolutely with its earlier year-end price target of 4,500 on the S&P 500.
“Our baseline view remains that the index will rise to 4500 by year-end,” said the firm’s head of investment strategy David Kostin, “as a result of modest EPS growth and a roughly flat multiple.” Based on current levels, a rise to 4,500 will translate to an increase of ~5% for the S&P.
The bank’s stock analysts are following this thesis, picking out the stocks that they see as ready to gain, and to gain big. Their picks include stocks with potential, in some cases, to double investors’ money. That’s a serious gain by any standard, and the Goldman analysts have explained just why some of their picks may show such a substantial jump. Let’s take a closer look.
Moderna, Inc. (MRNA)
We’ll start with Moderna, a biotech firm working on mRNA vaccine technology. You’ll likely remember mRNA vaccines from the recent pandemic; it was the technology used to create the viable COVID vaccines, and Moderna was one of the first companies to bring such a vaccine to the market. Moderna, however, is much more than just that – the company has a broad portfolio of vaccines under development or in commercialization stages. The company’s 48 pipeline projects include vaccines for flu and RSV, Lyme disease, and even some cancers.
For investors, the most relevant parts of Moderna’s pipeline are those concerned with the next iterations of the COVID vaccines. These are being developed to cope with new strains of the virus, which is showing signs of becoming an endemic seasonal virus in human populations, not unlike the various strains of influenza. In fact, Moderna’s newest COVID vaccine research is designed to…
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