Moderna Extends Rally After Two More Cruise Ship Passengers Test Positive For Hantavirus

Moderna shares are up another 7% in premarket trading, as renewed alarm over the hantavirus-plagued MV Hondius cruise ship energizes investor focus on the company's vaccine pipeline.

The latest news catalyst: Two passengers evacuated from the cruise ship on Sunday tested positive, reinforcing concerns that the outbreak remains active.

The Hondius is moored at a port in Spain's Canary Islands.

On Sunday, passengers were escorted off by personnel in protective gear before being flown home on government and military aircraft.

Seventeen Americans were taken to the University of Nebraska Medical Center, with one sent to the Nebraska Biocontainment Unit and the others placed in the National Quarantine Unit for monitoring.

The outbreak has killed three people, with five additional infections among passengers who had already left the ship.

Last Friday, we asked whether the vaccine trade is back, given news from beleaguered Moderna that it had started work on an early-stage vaccine targeting hantaviruses.

The surge in corporate media coverage of hantavirus has sent Moderna shares up nearly 20%. The latest news on Monday sent the stock up another 7% in premarket trading in New York.

Longer timeframe for Moderna stock:

Polymarket odds of a hantavirus pandemic this year are about 8%.

Will hantavirus be enough to change Wall Street's neutral sentiment around the pharma stock? 

Global health officials are honing in on Argentina as the likely source of the virus, since the ship departed from there on April 1. Patient zero was a Dutch man who had traveled in Argentina and South America before boarding the ship. The Dutchman and his wife have since passed.