Why Did Gilead Sciences’ Stock Rise?

Gilead Sciences (GILD) is one of the top stocks in the iShares Nasdaq Biotechnology ETF (IBB). It has a weight of 7.03% of the entire portfolio. Gilead Sciences is also held by other ETFs like the Health Care Select Sector (XLV) and the First Trust Nyse Arca Biotech (FBT). It has a weight of 5.42% and 2.91%, respectively. For the week ending July 31, 2015, Gilead rose 8.13%.

Gilead announced its 2Q15 results on July 28, 2015. According to the company’s press release, it announced revenue of $8.2 billion—compared to $6.5 billion in 2Q14. It rose ~26%. On a sequential basis, the revenue rose ~8%. The report also stated that the company’s revenue from Europe rose by ~54% to $2 billion on a YoY (year-over-year) basis. Sequentially, it grew by 11.11%.

The net income was $4.5 billion for 2Q15—compared to $3.7 billion for 2Q14. The company also revised its full-year revenue guidance to $29–$30 billion.

Gilead’s competitors like GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) and Pfizer (PFE) announced their 2Q15 results on July 30, 2015 and July 28, 2015, respectively.

The above chart shows the performance of Gilead compared to IBB on a month-over-month basis for 2015.

Gilead closed at $119.53 as of July 31, 2015. It was trading above the 50, 20, and 100-day moving averages. Although the stock is trading close to the upper Bollinger price band, the 14-day RSI (relative strength index) is at 55. This indicates that the stock isn’t in overbought territory.