August 10, 2022: -On Monday, Novavax missed its earnings guidance for the whole year, with no current Covid-19 vaccine sales predicted for 2022 in the U.S. or from an international alliance named Covax representing low- and middle-income countries.

The Maryland biotech company has skipped its 2022 sales outlook by almost 50% and is anticipating causing $2 billion to $2.3 billion in revenue. Novavax previously forecasts $4 billion to $5 billion in revenue.

Novavax stock is declining 33% in extended trading. The company is posting a loss of $6.53 for each share and booked revenue of $186 million for the second quarter, less than expectations.

“For the quarter, revenue was $186 million, a huge shortfall from both the first quarter results and, as I said, from the expectations,” CEO Stanley Erck told analysts in the earnings call of the earning. “We are waiting to have no new revenues in ’22 from the U.S. or Covax.”

Erck said Novavax was initially expecting to book sales this year from 110 million doses in the U.S. and 350 million doses from Covax. But Novavax was not so short to the U.S. market, where people are still overwhelmingly vaccinated with Pfizer and Moderna’s shots.

Novavax got the U.S. authorities for its Covid doses for adults earlier this summer, but 77% of people in that particular age group are completely vaccinated with Pfizer, Moderna, and to a minor degree, Johnson & Johnson’s doses. The U.S. has called just 3.2 million doses of the Novavax vaccine.

Erck says that Novavax is struggling as its doses are not yet approved as a booster or for adolescents in the U.S., the core of the remaining market for Covid vaccination in the country.

“We’re hopeful that we can be getting through this in days and weeks, but the lack of these indications slows the global rollout of our vaccine,” he said.

An increase in vaccine supply to Covax limited the alliance’s need for doses from Novavax, Erck added. Covax is having a problem distributing its current inventory to low- and middle-income countries.

Novavax was the original participant in the U.S. race to develop a Covid vaccine in 2020 known as Operation Warp Speed. The company is receiving $1.8 billion in taxpayer funding. But Novavax decreased behind Pfizer and Moderna as it worked to get its manufacturing base in place.

The company manufactures and delivers vaccines. Still, demand for the Covid doses has softened overall. Many people in huge markets are immunized, and the public is not focused on the virus’s health risk despite stubbornly high infections.