After Pfizer and BioNTech announced a safe and 90% effective COVID-19 candidate on Monday, Live Nation‘s stock price surged to its highest peak since February. The company’s execs believe that the stakeholder optimism comes with good reason. Live Nation CEO Michael Rapino has said that he “expect[s] shows at scale next summer.”
Rapino made the prediction during the company’s G3 2020 earnings call, attributing it not only to the prospect of a vaccine but also testing advances. “We are working on a roadmap to get back to live safely,” he said. “We are encouraged by progress on testing technology treatments and vaccines which will help us build our plans.”
Pfizer and BioNTech’s announcement culminated from a phase 3 study involving 43,538 participants, 94 of whom were diagnosed with COVID-19. Some of the individuals who contracted the novel coronavirus were given a placebo and the others were given the vaccine. Among the latter, a 90% efficacy rate was observed seven days after the second dose. The two companies next order of business is to conduct an interim analysis and continue the study to gather more data.
As trials remain ongoing, Rapino’s positive outlook for Live Nation and music as a whole should not be treated as gospel. He said that the “exact timeline of this return will vary by region, and so we continue to focus on remaining flexible,” adding that “the path to live will not be a straight line.”
Pfizer and BioNTech project that they will be able to produce 50 million global vaccine doses by the end of 2020, and up to 1.3 billion doses in 2021.
Image credit: Alexander Popov
