Allergan navigating choppy waters, as shares rise and fall

By most measures Allergan has not had the most successful of years and one measure, in particular, is usually indicative of a company’s performance, share price. In this case, Allergan’s shares have been on a steady downward trend, from $239 this time last year to $166 today.

There are several reasons for this but the most pressing one for the company is the future of Restasis. It is set to lose patent protection and none of its efforts have managed to deflect this eventuality.

As a company, it was prepared to face heavy flak by attempting a controversial patent deal with a native American tribe in an attempt to deflect an inter partes review. The attempt didn’t wash, as The Patent Trial and Appeal Board rejected the claims of Allergan and the tribe.

All in all, it couldn’t have gone much worse for Allergan – the attempt failed and the bad PR will likely stick to the company for years to come, much like its rival Mylan and its EpiPen pricing scandal.

Recently, the very same rival announced that it was working on developing a Botox biosimilar, alongside Revance Therapeutics – only adding to the pressure on Allergan. This particular piece of news saw its stock sink to a new low of $144.

Allergan has had to come out fighting and it has taken its message to the Barclays healthcare conference that investors have nothing to fear. CEO, Brent Saunders, said that developing a biosimilar would be an "incredibly hard and long process" – suggesting that it could take as long as a decade to bring such a product to market.

Saunders will have to show that he is up to the task of steering the company past the twin difficulties of Restasis competition and potential Botox competition, especially after he received a considerable increase to his annual pay packet.

In filings released, Saunders was shown to be paid $32.8 billion, with a $1.2 million salary, alongside an additional $22.7 million in stock, with the rest being made up of incentive pay. Pay was also boosted across the executive board.

The generous pay packets for those working at the top of the company will likely leave a bitter taste for those who have been released from the company. In January, the company revealed that it would be cutting away 1,000 members of staff ahead of prospective competition to Restasis in order to save on operating costs.

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