Key Takeaways
- Pfizer (PFE) shares are up 12% in the past month to a 52-week high, while the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq 100 both fell.
- Two FDA approvals, a Phase 3 win in multiple myeloma and new infant-vaccine data, gave investors reasons to pay up as COVID sales fade.
- The forward P/E has risen to 11x while analysts expect earnings to keep falling through 2029, and the stock now trades above Wall Street’s average target.
- Pfizer looks like a hold for its dividend, and buying more makes sense only if launched and acquired products keep growing fast in the Nov. 3 report.
Pfizer is up 12% in the past month and trades at a 52-week high, while the Nasdaq 100 fell more than 7% and the S&P 500 slipped 3%.
That’s quite a run for a drugmaker whose earnings estimates keep drifting lower. Now Pfizer has to back it up in its Q3 report, due before the open on Nov. 3.
A month of approvals and trial wins
The good news kept coming:
- Oct. 7: The FDA approved TUKYSA as a front-line maintenance treatment for HER2+ metastatic breast cancer.
- Oct. 14: Pfizer brought more than 50 infectious disease abstracts to IDWeek.
- Oct. 24: Phase 2 data for its 25-valent infant pneumococcal vaccine showed antibody responses against all 25 serotypes.
- Oct. 26: The FDA expanded TALZENNA plus XTANDI to an earlier stage of metastatic prostate cancer.
- Oct. 27: ELREXFIO beat standard regimens and met its primary endpoint in a Phase 3 multiple myeloma trial.
Scotiabank, JPMorgan, BofA and Cantor Fitzgerald also raised their targets from Oct. 7 to 9, though only Scotiabank’s $33 sits above the stock’s price.
My read: with tech selling off, investors went looking for safety, and a high-yield drugmaker fit the bill. Merck’s earnings beat on Oct. 29 gave big pharma another lift.
TIKR tracks 28 analysts on Pfizer. How many say “Buy”?
See the full breakdown of Buy, Hold, and Sell ratings on Pfizer, along with Wall Street’s revenue and earnings estimates, all in one place. More than 500,000 investors use TIKR to research stocks like this one. See Pfizer’s Analyst Ratings
Investors are paying more for less
None of that has changed the earnings picture much. Analysts expect Pfizer’s normalized EPS to shrink every year from $3.22 in fiscal 2025 to $2.28 in fiscal 2029:
Investors are paying more for them anyway. Pfizer’s forward P/E has climbed from about 9x at the end of 2025 to 11x as of Oct. 30, above its five-year average of 10x:
Part of the reason is that the COVID drop-off is nearly over. Pfizer guides to about $4 billion of COVID revenue in 2026, down from $11 billion in 2024.
What Pfizer needs on Nov. 3
Analysts expect Q3 revenue of about $15.9 billion, down about 5% from a year earlier, and adjusted EPS of about $0.73, down from $0.87.
Pfizer will book a $650 million Innovent charge, about $0.10 a share, in the quarter, which accounts for most of that drop if analysts have included it.
The number to watch is launched and acquired products, which grew 18% operationally in Q2 after 22% in the first.
If they grow near those rates, and Pfizer holds or raises its 2026 revenue guidance of $60.5 billion-$62.5 billion, 11x looks a lot more reasonable.
A slide into single digits would make the stock hard to defend.
I’d hold Pfizer here
The stock now trades above the $29.26 average target of the 28 analysts covering it, whose targets run from $25 at Berenberg and RBC Capital to $36 at Jefferies.
That average has barely budged from $28.81 a year ago, while the shares are up 24%:
The dividend is the reason to stay put. It yields more than 5.5%, and it took a tight 89% of free cash flow over the twelve months to June 28, 2026.
CEO Albert Bourla said on Pfizer’s Aug. 4 call that “even the most stretched scenarios that we are running, we will be able to maintain our dividend.”
So I wouldn’t take profits on a yield like that, and I wouldn’t buy more at a multiple that rose while estimates fell.
Management targets high single-digit yearly revenue growth from the end of 2028 through 2033, but consensus still has revenue falling from $55.0 billion in 2028 to $53.5 billion in 2029.
Of course, a strong launched-and-acquired number on Nov. 3, or a win in the MEVPRO-1 prostate cancer trial due by year-end, could start to close that gap.
So what is Pfizer stock actually worth?
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Disclaimer:
Please note that the articles on TIKR are not intended to serve as investment or financial advice from TIKR or our content team, nor are they recommendations to buy or sell any stocks. We create our content based on TIKR Terminal’s investment data and analysts’ estimates. Our analysis might not include recent company news or important updates. TIKR has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. Thank you for reading, and happy investing!
