What if you bought Regeneron in 2003?
US Health · Biotech. The hindsight answer, year by year, against the only benchmark that matters.
Could you have picked it? Play38.9× · S&P 500 same money: $7,727
$1,000 in Regeneron at the start of 2003 would be worth about $38,889 today — 38.9 times your money, and ahead of the S&P 500 over the same stretch.
The story
Regeneron, founded in 1988 by Leonard Schleifer and George Yancopoulos, spent its first two decades as a perpetual promise: clever science, especially genetically engineered mice for discovering antibodies, but few products and a lot of losses. Between 2003 and 2005 the shares halved after setbacks, and by 2010 they were roughly where they had been in 2003.
Then Eylea, an eye injection for wet macular degeneration, was approved in 2011 and became a blockbuster almost immediately. In just a few years the stock rose more than sevenfold, making it one of the best-performing large companies of the decade. Its second act, Dupixent, developed with Sanofi and approved for eczema in 2017, expanded into asthma and other conditions. During the pandemic Regeneron's antibody cocktail made headlines after being given to a sitting president. More recently, competition and biosimilars eroded Eylea's position and the shares fell from their highs. A buyer in 2005 multiplied their money spectacularly; a buyer in 2015 waited years for much smaller gains.
The lesson: Biotech returns are highly lumpy: years of losses can suddenly give way to a single approval that reprices the company, which makes position sizing more important than prediction.
$1,000 invested at the start of each year
| Bought in | Price then | Worth today | S&P 500 would be | Multiple |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2003 | $18.00 | $38,889 | $7,727 | 38.9× |
| 2005 | $9.00 | $77,778 | $5,763 | 77.8× |
| 2007 | $21.00 | $33,333 | $4,789 | 33.3× |
| 2008 | $24.00 | $29,167 | $4,626 | 29.2× |
| 2010 | $24.00 | $29,167 | $6,071 | 29.2× |
| 2012 | $55.00 | $12,727 | $5,312 | 12.7× |
| 2015 | $410 | $1,707 | $3,301 | 1.7× |
| 2018 | $375 | $1,867 | $2,519 | 1.9× |
| 2020 | $375 | $1,867 | $2,092 | 1.9× |
green = beat the S&P 500 · red = lost money
Best entry point in our set: 2005, turning $1,000 into $77,778. The S&P 500 from that same year: $5,763.
Now try it without hindsight. The wheel decides the year and the asset class, you pick the position, ten seconds a pick, and we simulate to today. Regeneron is one of 258 positions on the wheel — including the ones that went to zero.
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