1
ADDENDUM JUNE 22, 2018
Largest Recent Stock Buyback Announcements
1
Company Buyback Plan Amount Date
Apple $100 billion May 1, 2018 Cisco $25 billion February 14, 2018 Wells Fargo $22.6 billion January 23, 2018 UnitedHealth Group $17.6 billion June 6, 2018 Home Depot $15 billion December 6, 2017 PepsiCo $15 billion February 13, 2018 Oracle $12 billion February 1, 2018 Broadcom $12 billion April 12, 2018
Merck & Co.
$10 billion November 28, 2017
2
Pfizer
$10 billion December 18, 2017
3
Amgen
$10 billion February 1, 2018
4
AbbVie
$10 billion February 15, 2018
5
Qualcomm $10 billion May 9, 2018 Micron $10 billion May 21, 2018 Facebook $9 billion April 25, 2018 Alphabet (Google)
$8.6 billion February 1, 2018
Celgene
$8 billion (combined) February 14 & May 24, 2018
6
Booking (Priceline) $8 billion February 27, 2018 Adobe $8 billion May 21, 2018 Visa $7.5 billion February 1, 2018 Honeywell $6.5 billion December 8, 2017 Applied Materials $6 billion February 14, 2018
Mondelēz Int’l
$6 billion January 31, 2018 eBay $6 billion February 1, 2018 Starbucks $6 billion April 26, 2018 Anthem
$5 billion December 7, 2017 Bank of America $5 billion December 5, 2017 Marathon Petroleum $5 billion April 30, 2018
Lowe’s
$5 billion January 26, 2018 Boeing $4 billion December 11, 2017 Mastercard $4 billion December 6, 2017 NetApp, Inc. $4 billion April 5, 2018 McKesson $4 billion May 24, 2018
1
Senate Democrats,
Since the Republican Tax Bill Passed, Corporations Have Announced More Than $475 Billion in Stock Buybacks
, https://www.democrats.senate.gov/goptaxscam.
2
Merck & Co.,
Merck Announces Increased Quarterly Dividend and $10 Billion Share Repurchase Authorization
, Nov. 28, 2017, http://investors.merck.com /news/press-release-details/2017/Merck-Announces-Increased-Quarterly-Dividend-and-10-Billion-Share-Repurchase-Authorization/default.aspx.
3
Pfizer,
Pfizer Declares First-Quarter 2018 Dividend
, Dec. 18, 2017, https://www.pfizer.com/news/press-release/press-release-detail/pfizer _declares_first_quarter_2018_dividend.
4
Amgen,
Amgen Reports Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2017 Financial Results
, Feb. 1, 2018, https://www.amgen.com/media/news-releases/2018/02/amgen-reports-fourth-quarter-and-full-year-2017-financial-results.
5
AbbVie,
AbbVie Increases Dividend and Announces New Stock Repurchase Program
, Feb. 15, 2018, https://news.abbvie.com/news/abbvie-increases-dividend-and-announces-new-stock-repurchase-program.htm.
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On May 24, 2018, Celgene announced an additional $3 billion stock buyback authorization, on top of a $5 billion buyback announcement made in February. Celgene,
Celgene Corporation Announces Additional $3 Billion Share Repurchase Authorization and Plans to Execute a $2 Billion
2
ADDENDUM JUNE 22, 2018
Pharmaceutical Companies’ Drug Price Announcements
in the Wake of the Tax Law
—
Six Months After Enactment
Company Drug Price Reduction Linked to Tax Law Pfizer
No
Merck & Co.
No
Johnson & Johnson
No
Gilead Sciences
No
AbbVie
No
Amgen
No
Bristol-Myers Squibb
No
Eli Lilly & Co.
No
Celgene
No
Mylan
No
Accelerated Share Repurchase Program
, May 24, 2018, http://ir.celgene.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=1068369; Celgene,
Celgene Announces Additional $5 Billion Share Repurchase Authorization
, Feb. 14, 2018, http://ir.celgene.com/releasedetail.cfm?releaseid=1057467.
3
ADDENDUM JUNE 22, 2018
Statements by Pharmaceutical Companies on First-Quarter 2018 Earnings Calls and at Annual Shareholder Meetings About Drug Affordability
7
Company Q1 2018 Earnings Call or Annual Meeting Affordability Statement Pfizer
“
We also continue to actively engage with industry groups, the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America and others to advocate for policies that support affordable access, incentives for science and innovation and rebate reform
.”
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Merck & Co.
“Certainly, we carefully monitor actions by all governments, but in particular, the government here in the United
States. Because we realize affordability and accessibility of our products and the products of the industry as a whole are critical questions in our society, and therefore, critical questions for elected representatives. You might have seen the President outline the blueprint for drug pricing about 10 days ago. A lot of what that focused on, quite rightly, is the out-of-pocket cost being borne by consumers in recognition that the current system for reimbursement provides some incentives, as the President would say, for high list prices in our industry. As you know, in our industry, substantial rebates are actually paid for putting our products on formularies. The challenge is that, very often, those rebates and discounts, which can be very substantial, are not being passed on to consumers. And the President outlined various statements about the need to address both the high list price problem and the out-of-pocket problem. We have to wait and see what specific ideas there are. There were some requests for information, but we don
’
t yet know exactly what would come out of that. I will say that a lot of the suggestions that were in the blueprint, as you read it, were not inconsistent with what we want as an industry going forward, which is the ability to price our products consistent with the value that they provide to patients and the impact that they have on the health care system overall. Unfortunately, some of the laws that exist in this country were existing for a very different health care system, where people were being paid for volume not for value. And what was very encouraging was some of the suggestions that the government might want to step up to allowing those kinds of negotiations to occur more freely, which is something that Merck really supports. We really do think that our products do provide tremendous value not only to individual patients, but again, impact on the overall health care system, reduce hospitalizations and things like that. So we would be extremely supportive of a system that allowed modern negotiation techniques that are consistent
with us being able to show the true, full value of our products.” “[W]e’
ve been devoted to making greater transparency around our pricing, the difference between our list price and our net price publicly. In fact, I think Merck was the first company to actually do that. And I think when you see some of the things that the President is talking about in terms of high list prices, he
’
s actually addressing that issue. He is aware of that issue. He is aware of the substantial discounts and rebates that are being paid into various actors in the supply chain. Some of whom have really important roles, but others perhaps we can think of an optimal distribution system that might be more efficient. But in any event, what he really cares about is that those discounts should be shared with the actual patients at the counter as opposed to going solely to the businesses that exist in the supply chain. So again, our system is extremely complex. It
’
s hard to make sweeping change to our system. But I think people
now do identify that as a very specific problem.”
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Johnson & Johnson
“We also just rec
ently published our second annual Janssen U.S. Transparency Report, which reflects our commitment to responsible business practices that put patients first, including how we invest our resources, price our medicines and help people who need our medicines get access to them. When we price a new medicine, we consider the value to patients and to society, the importance of maintaining affordable access to medicines for people who need them and the importance of preserving our ability to develop future groundbr
eaking cures and treatments.”
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“
[W]e expect that there
’
s going to be an announcement on pricing by President Trump. That announcement will assemble the drug pricing policies including in the president
’
s budget and the [Council of Economic Advisers] report. Those policies were generally seeking to increase competition and to reduce out of pocket costs for patients while recognizing the body of innovation. We also understand that the announcement will include a request for information from the public on drug pricing issues, and we are looking forward to participate there. Going into our pricing in the US, and to your question on how do we see pricing trends for us in the US, we see that if you exclude [immunosuppressive drug Remicade] and [a] one-time adjustment . . . , we see a continuation of the trends that we have seen in t
he previous quarter. So, we don’t see a big change from what you saw in previous quarters.”
7
Transcripts of earnings calls and corresponding press releases available at https://seekingalpha.com. Transcripts for annual shareholder meetings were located online or through major research databases for Pfizer, Merck, Johnson & Johnson, Gilead Sciences, and Bristol-Myers Squibb.
8
Pfizer Inc. Annual Shareholders Meeting
, Apr. 26, 2018 (transcript produced by Fair Disclosure Wire).
9
Merck & Co.,
Merck & Co., Inc. 2018 Annual Meeting of Shareholders
, May 22, 2018, http://investors.merck.com/events-and-presentations /event-details/2018/Merck--Co-Inc-2018-Annual-Meeting-of-Shareholders/default.aspx.
10
Johnson & Johnson Annual Shareholders Meeting
, Apr. 26, 2018 (transcript produced by Fair Disclosure Wire).