The medtech industry’s seemingly unstoppable rise over the past several weeks shows no signs of slowing down.
For the fourth time in five weeks, and for the third consecutive week, the MassDevice MedTech 100 Index — which includes stocks of the world’s largest medical device companies — hit an all-time high.
Previous highs have largely been a result of the FDA granting Moderna emergency use authorization for its vaccine candidate and its subsequent rollout to the U.S., joining the one made by Pfizer (NYSE:PFE) and BioNTech (NSDQ:BNTX), which began to be administered last month.
The index finished last week at 106.81 (Jan. 8), marking its highest-ever total and a 2% uptick from the 104.67 points registered at the end of the week prior (Jan. 1).
A slight downturn came after the index hit a new high (100.75) on Dec. 4, 2020, beating the mark of 100.65 set on Nov. 9 and setting a new all-time high since the index started being recorded on Jan. 1, 2001. However, stocks have continued to rise ever since.
On Dec. 18, the markets hit their then-highest mark so far at 103.11 points, only to be bettered over the holiday stretch as the industry’s stocks continue to rise amid investor expectations of a better 2021 with hopes of reaching a post-pandemic state.
The index has now climbed more than 14 points ahead of the pre-pandemic high of 92.32, which the market reached on Feb. 19. To date, medtech stocks have increased by 15.7%.
Medtech’s stock performance appeared to mirror overall markets while slightly topping them, with the S&P 500 Index seeing a 1.8% gain, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average fared almost identically to the S&P, climbing by 1.6%.
Medtech’s lowest point during the COVID-19 pandemic remains at 62.13 on March 23. Since then, the industry’s stocks have experienced 71.9% growth in total, as of the end of last week.
The industry continues to plug along and businesses continue to operate through the pandemic. Here are some of the major highlights from the past week:
- Medtech takes a stand on D.C. rioting
- 9 lessons in crisis management from Stryker CEO Kevin Lob
- CES 2021: Medical technologies you need to know
- Stryker acquires OrthoSensor and its knee surgery sensor tech
- Hologic says revenue nearly doubled in Q1
- Dentsply acquires Byte clear aligners for $1.04B
- Smith + Nephew closes Extremity Orthopedics purchase
- Amazon, Berkshire, JPMorgan joint healthcare venture is ending
- PerkinElmer to acquire Oxford Immunotec
- HHS seals plan to sunset regulations 10 years or older
- Henry Schein buys majority of Prism Medical Products
