You’re probably already familiar with one of this pharmaceuticals giant’s newest products; Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine is the most popular across Europe and the US and has been administered to hundreds of millions of people on every continent. Pfizer makes a lot more than just a vaccine though, and other ‘blockbuster’ drugs contribute to their record profits.
Founded in Brooklyn in 1849 by Charles Pfizer and his cousin Charles Erhart, recent immigrants to the US from Germany, Pfizer initially found success manufacturing antiparasitic drugs and citric acid. By purchasing adjacent properties, they eventually founded a major chemicals plant and expanded their product range. By the turn of the 20th century, the company was achieving sales of $3 million, over 91 million in 2021 dollars. After Charles Pfizer’s death in 1906, his youngest son Emile took the reins and focused the company on innovative methods of chemical production.
During WWII, huge demand for penicillin-based antibiotics saw Pfizer working closely with the American government, setting the stage for their post-war expansion into the global market. The 1970s saw a renewed focus on their research and development efforts, which came to fruition in the 1980s with successful anti-inflammatory drugs and blood pressure medications. The statin (an anti-cholesterol drug) atorvastatin became the biggest selling prescription drug of all time after its launch in 1997. More recently, Pfizer’s COVID vaccine has contributed billions in additional sales, after a very successful 2020 which saw $42 billion in revenue across the company. Other strong revenue generators include tafamidis, which treats a rare heart condition and was recently approved for use in the US and Japan. Pfizer has faced legal challenges for its marketing practices, including $2 billion in penalties in 2009, and it has had mergers blocked by both the British and American governments in the last ten years. With over 100,000 employees, Pfizer is one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in the world.
Pfizer has been a publicly traded company for nearly half its 200-year history, first listing on the New York Stock Exchange in 1942. Shares started trading at $24.75 apiece in what was one of the largest IPOs of 1942. In 2004, Pfizer became one of the constituent stocks of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. Accordingly, the stock is popular with major institutional investors, with Vanguard and State Street the largest single owners.
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Pfizer is a reliable payer of a quarterly dividend, although this remains discretionary and is never guaranteed. You can find full price and dividend history by logging on to your trading platform and searching for Pfizer.
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