3 main health actions that can make you richer in 2021 (and beyond)

Despite the prevalence of get-rich-quick programs, those looking to increase their capital don’t need to reinvent the wheel. Investing in stocks remains one of the best ways to achieve this. But not all titles are created equal. With an unlimited number of investment options in the market, choosing the wrong ones could mean goodbye to your hard earned money.

Investing in stocks of large companies is the key to achieving your financial goals. With that in mind, here are three great stocks that should make you richer in the long run if you buy today: Bristol Myers Squibb (NYSE: BMY), Veeva Systems (NYSE: VEEV), and Eli lilly (NYSE: LLY). Here’s why each of these companies deserves a place in your portfolio.

BMY data by YCharts

1. Bristol Myers Squibb

Pharmaceutical giant Bristol Myers has a strong lineup of drugs, a rich pipeline, and a juicy dividend, all of which can help boost revenues and profits while rewarding investors with increased dividends.

The company has at least eight blockbuster drugs, including the treatment for multiple myeloma Revlimid, which saw its sales in the third quarter of 2020 climb 10% year-over-year to $ 3 billion. Bristol Myers got its hands on Revlimid through its acquisition of Celgene in 2019 in a $ 74 billion cash and stock transaction that has bolstered the company’s lineup with other products like Pomalyst, another medicine for multiple myeloma. In the third quarter, Pomalyst sales increased 17% year-over-year to $ 777 million. Bristol Myers also markets the anticoagulant Eliquis, which generated sales of $ 2.1 billion in the third quarter, an increase of 9% from the previous year.

As for the Bristol Myers pipeline, the company has more than four dozen clinical compounds in development and at least as many ongoing clinical trials, including a series of Phase 3 studies. Newly approved products (or new indications for existing products) should boost the drugmaker’s financial results for years to come.

Although its stock has underperformed the broader market of late, the outlook for Bristol Myers looks attractive. The company’s revenues and profits are expected to continue to grow at a good pace. Three of its drugs, Revlimid, Eliquis and Opdivo will be among the top five best-selling drugs in the world in 2024, according to research firm Evaluate Pharma.

Bristol Myers also closed its latest acquisition in November: a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company called MyoKardia in an all-cash transaction worth $ 13.1 billion. The main candidate for MyoKardia is mavacamten, a potential treatment for a chronic heart disease called hypertrophic obstructive cardiomyopathy. Management believes that “mavacamten has a potential of several billion dollars” and could be another long-term growth driver.

Finally, with a dividend yield of 2.80% (against a yield of 1.55% for the S&P 500) and a low cash payout rate of 31.8%, investors can count on Bristol Myers to continue increasing its dividends. All of these factors make this pharmaceutical action an excellent choice for 2021 and beyond.

2. Veeva systems

Veeva Systems’ mission is to help companies in different industries, including the life sciences industry, get their products to market faster and more efficiently while ensuring regulatory compliance. The company works with many leading players in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology sectors, including AstraZeneca, Merck, and Vertex Pharmaceuticals. Veeva Founder and CEO Peter Gassner is a former executive of the cloud-based software giant salesforce.com. Veeva Systems and Salesforce have a long-standing partnership that allows the former to use the Salesforce platform to run its cloud-based services.

Veeva’s product list includes Veeva Vault, which helps drugmakers navigate the complex process of clinical trials. The largest segment of the business in terms of revenue is subscription services. In the first nine months of its 2021 fiscal year, which ended October 31, Veeva Systems reported revenue of $ 1.07 billion, an increase of 34.8% year-over-year. the other. The company’s subscription service revenues accounted for around 80% of its total revenues.

Veeva has an excellent retention rate for its services. For its years 2017, 2018 and 2019, its retention rate was 127%, 121% and 122%, respectively. In addition to this, the company is developing new products to better support its customers. Veeva Systems has expanded beyond the life sciences industry and into other regulated sectors namely consumer packaged products (CPGs), chemicals and cosmetics.

The company’s vision for these sectors is the same as that of the life sciences industry. In the first three quarters of its 2021 fiscal year, Veeva Systems generated approximately $ 30 million in revenue from these spaces, representing nearly 8% of its total revenue.

It also has more than 60 clients from these three industries, and the company sees a growing opportunity, especially given the changing environment of the CPG, chemicals and cosmetics industries caused by the pandemic. Veeva Systems appears to be on track for consistent revenue and profit growth for the foreseeable future, and its share price is also expected to continue to rise.

3. Eli Lilly

Eli Lilly is another pharmaceutical giant with a rich lineup of drugs. Among the company’s top sellers is Trulicity, a diabetes drug that reported $ 3.6 billion in revenue for the first nine months of 2020, a jump of 22%. Other top performers include the insulin product Basaglar and the oral diabetes drug Jardiance. For the first nine months of 2020, the former’s revenue grew 5% to $ 842.3 million, while Jardiance’s sales grew 24% year-over-year to $ 840.3 million. of dollars.

Lilly also has more than three dozen clinical trials underway. One of the candidates in the company’s pipeline is a potential Alzheimer’s disease drug called donanemab. The company recently reported positive results from a Phase 2 clinical trial. There are more than 5 million patients with Alzheimer’s disease in the United States, and no approved drug can treat the cognitive declines there. are associated. While there is still a long way to go for donanemab, investors would do well to monitor its progress.

It is to highlight that BiogenicAducanumab is currently under review by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for this indication. Both aducanumab and donanemab seek to treat the disease by clearing amyloid-beta plaques from patients’ brains, which some professionals believe may help those with Alzheimer’s. But given that an expert advisory group strongly recommended that the FDA not approve the drug, the outlook for Biogen appears unfavorable.

Eli Lilly recently strengthened its pipeline with its planned acquisition of Prevail Therapeutics, a biotechnology that focuses on the development of gene therapies, in a cash transaction valued at around $ 880 million. Lilly already had a long way to go, and the move only made her long-term outlook even more attractive with potential drugs that target Parkinson’s and dementia, conditions for which there is no cure. standard. In short, adding shares of this pharmaceutical giant to your portfolio would be a great bang for your buck.