DATA GRAPHICS | Data Byte
Early pains, late gains for biopharmas on Wall Street
Biotech and pharma indexes reacted to a pair of signals from the White House on tariffs, resulting in a drastic turnaround
April 9, 2025 9:56 PM UTC
In a wild day of trading Wednesday, biopharma indexes sank to 52-week lows after President Trump had signaled his intention late Tuesday to impose tariffs on pharmaceuticals, only to rally after the president’s afternoon announcement of a 90-day pause on most tariffs.
Although the SPDR S&P Biotech ETF (XBI) and NASDAQ Biotechnology Index (NBI) each spiked upward after the mid-afternoon announcement of the pause, neither gained as much as broader indexes on a percentage basis. The XBI added 7.3% and the NBI 5.3%, short of the S&P 500’s 9.5% surge, the NASDAQ Composite’s 12.2% gain, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average’s 7.9% rise...