GenomeWeb Top 40 Pops 10 Percent After Tariff Pause; Still Down 3 Percent Since Tariffs Introduced

NEW YORK – Stocks of the omics tools and molecular diagnostics companies tracked by the GenomeWeb Top 40 popped 10 percent following President Donald Trump’s announcement Wednesday that he is pausing most of the reciprocal tariffs he announced at the beginning of the month.

Shares of every company in the Top 40 rose on the news, though the Top 40 was still down roughly 3 percent overall since Trump announced the tariffs on April 2. Between April 1 and April 9, 17 companies in the Top 40 saw their stock price rise, while 22 saw it fall, and one company was flat.

The swings tracked the broader market, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average up 8 percent on Wednesday but down 3 percent since the tariffs were announced, the Nasdaq up 12 percent on Wednesday but down 13 percent since the announcement, and the Nasdaq Biotech up 5 percent on Wednesday but down 5 percent since the announcement.

Five Top 40 firms had managed to stay in positive territory even before Trump announced the tariff pause. Between April 1 and April 8, shares of Adaptive Biotechnologies rose 2 percent, shares of Ginkgo Bioworks rose 2 percent, shares of Pacific Biosciences rose 6 percent, shares of Seer rose 8 percent, and shares of Veracyte rose 2 percent.

The other 35 companies in the Top 40 saw their shares decline during this period.

Immunoassay firm Quanterix posted the largest decline from April 1 to April 8, with its shares falling 27 percent over that period. In addition to the impact of tariffs, the company was also dealing with negative investor sentiment regarding its planned acquisition of Akoya Biosciences.

QuidelOrtho posted the second-largest decline between April 1 and April 8, with its shares down 23 percent. In a note to investors, UBS analyst Dan Leonard noted the firm’s relatively high exposure to China, where it generates around 12 percent of its revenues. China had put a 34 percent tariff on US goods, which it raised on Wednesday to 84 percent following the Trump administration’s announcement that despite the broader pause, it is increasing US tariffs on China to 125 percent. QuidelOrtho shares were still down 15 percent from their April 1 close following Wednesday’s rally.

Codexis posted the third-largest decline between April 1 and April 8, with its shares down 22 percent. The company generated around 17 percent of its revenue in China in 2024.

10X Genomics enjoyed the largest pop from the tariff pause, with shares up 21 percent between April 8 and 9. Pacific Biosciences shares also rose 21 percent. Ginkgo Bioworks rose 18 percent.

At the other end of the spectrum, gains from the pause were more muted for Hologic, whose shares rose 1 percent, Maravai LifeSciences, whose shares rose 3 percent, and Fulgent Genetics, whose shares were up 4 percent.

Several large life science tools firms were thought to be particularly exposed to the announced tariff regime.

In a note to investors, TD Cowen analyst Dan Brennan said the bank projected the announced tariffs will raise tools firms' COGS (cost of goods sold) by 2 percent on average, with firms including Agilent and Bruker projected to see COGS increases above that (an estimated 2 percent to 3 percent increase for Agilent and an estimated 4 percent for Bruker).

Investment bank Jefferies projected in a note to investors that the tariffs will decrease earnings per share by an average of 5.6 percent across the tools companies it covers. It predicted a 9.2 percent hit to EPS for Bruker and 7.8 percent hits for both Thermo Fisher Scientific and Revvity.

Agilent shares declined 13 percent between April 1 and April 8 and are down a total of 6 percent from the beginning of the month to yesterday’s close. Bruker shares declined 10 percent in the same period but are up 2 percent since April 1 in the wake of the pause. Thermo Fisher shares fell 13 percent, but like Agilent its shares are now down a total of 6 percent from the beginning of April. Revvity shares fell 12 percent and are now down 2 percent since April 1.