Vaxxinity Issues Shareholder Letter

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla., April 19, 2024 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Vaxxinity, Inc. (“Vaxxinity”, “we”, “us” or the “Company”) (Nasdaq: VAXX), a U.S. company pioneering the development of a new class of medicines, today announced issued a letter to shareholders from its Co-founder and Executive Chairman, Lou Reese and Chief Executive Officer, Mei Mei Hu.

To Shareholders of Vaxxinity, Inc.:

Earlier today, we announced that we are delisting and deregistering our shares. A few weeks from now, we will no longer be publicly traded on the NASDAQ exchange. It is important to share why we made this decision to “go dark” and why we believe it is in the best interests of the company and our shareholders over the longer-term.

Being a public company is very expensive and incredibly time-consuming. Choosing to go public is a path many pursue primarily to obtain access to greater institutional pools of capital.

Since the company’s IPO in November 2021, the capital markets have been uniquely and historically adverse for biotech. In retrospect, institutional support withdrew from the market, liquidity dried up and we found ourselves in a downward spiral:

• The Biotech XBI index decreased for three consecutive years
• Of the over 40 companies that went public in the second half of 2021, only two are trading positively and the majority have decreased more than 80% from their IPO price
• Overall, IPO proceeds dropped by 93% from 2021 to 2022
  

Even in light of these market conditions, Vaxxinity has achieved remarkable successes and results, including:

• Positive Phase 3 results, validating our platform in COVID
• Generating industry-leading data in Parkinson’s patients
• Receipt of FDA Fast Track designation for Alzheimer’s program
• Two new programs progressing from animal studies into the clinic
• External validation through over $10M in non-dilutive funding from leading organizations
  

As we witnessed first-hand, downward selling pressure often has nothing to do with company performance. Rather, perversely, we saw investors selling because we were their top-performing portfolio company or selling into good news for the relatively enhanced liquidity. That being said, our liquidity is significantly limited by low daily trading volume which makes it difficult to get both in and out. Relatively few shares openly traded on the market can have an outsized impact on our share price.