A Breakthrough Cancer Vaccine Fueled a Biotech Rally. Can It Last? | WSJ’s Take On the Week

Despite a rough past week for the healthcare sector, pharmaceuticals and biotech stocks have outperformed the S&P 500 this year. Investors have gotten excited over cancer treatment breakthroughs for Moderna, Merck and Revolution Medicines—plus regulatory shakeups at the FDA. But is market hype running ahead of reality? Can the rally last? On this week’s episode, co-hosts Telis Demos and Miriam Gottfried are joined by WSJ’s Heard on the Street columnist David Wainer to discuss how AI and competition from China are shifting the market, where pharma M&A is headed next, and how everyday investors should navigate the sector. Chapters: 02:34 - Trump, RFK Jr., and Policy 04:14 - Pharma vs. Biotech, Explained 05:30 - The AI Rotation Into Healthcare 06:10 - Moderna, Revolution Medicines, and Cancer Breakthroughs 11:24 - The Pharma M&A Playbook 13:41 - Can AI Speed Up Drug Discovery? 15:25 - Is Healthcare a Defensive Trade? 18:08 - GLP-1 Wars: Eli Lilly vs. Novo Nordisk 20:36 - Index or Stock Picking? 22:15 - Is China a Threat to U.S. BioTech? 24:24 - A DeepSeek Moment for Pharma? 26:13 - uniQure and the FDA This is WSJ’s Take On the Week where co-hosts Telis Demos, writer for WSJ’s Heard on the Street, and Miriam Gottfried, WSJ’s investing and wealth management reporter, cut through the noise and dive into markets, the economy and finance—the big trades, key players and business news ahead. Have an idea for a future guest or episode? How can we better help you take on the week? We’d love to hear from you. Email the show at takeontheweek@wsj.com. 🎧 Prefer just the audio version? Subscribe and listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts: https://on.wsj.com/3LBGo5Q?mod=WSJ_TOTWPOD #WSJ #Biotech #Pharma