Gilead Sciences

Gilead Sciences

Gilead Sciences has had a blockbuster start to 2020, thanks largely to excitement over remdesivir, an antiviral originally designed to treat Ebola that the company is now testing in Covid-19 patients.

The stock (ticker: GILD) is up 21.2% this year, beating the iShares Nasdaq Biotechnology ETF(ticker: IBB), which is up 16.3% over the same period, and walloping the S&P 500, down 2.7%.

The company will release its earnings report for the first quarter of 2020 on Thursday after the market close, and has scheduled a conference call for investors at 4:30 p.m. Eastern time.

The report comes a day after the company said that a National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases trial of remdesivir had found that the drug shortened recovery times for Covid-19 patients, spiking the stock and driving up the broader market.

Gilead trades at 12.4 times expected earnings over the next 12 months, above its 5-year average of 9.4 times. S and P 500, a benchmark, is currently @ 17 times earnings.