Moderna GF Score 54: Operating Margin Tumbled 320% Since 2021
GuruFocus rates Moderna 54/100, F-Score of 1, operating margin at -149%; AlphaScala's Alpha Score of 56 leaves the pipeline to restore margins.
Moderna (MRNA) carries a GuruFocus GF Score of 54 out of 100, a mid-band reading the research firm says signals poor future outperformance potential. The stock has swung in both directions lately: up 229.08% over three months and down 0.15% in the most recent session, per GuruFocus's data.
GuruFocus builds the GF Score from five components: financial strength, profitability, growth, GF Value and momentum. Each component is scored on its own, then the pieces combine into a single 0-100 figure. The methodology was backtested from 2006 to 2021; GuruFocus said companies with higher scores historically delivered stronger long-term returns than lower-scoring names. The firm frames the score as a probability-weighted summary of a company's fundamental and market characteristics, not a prediction. Moderna's composite lands at 54, which GuruFocus described as neither a ringing endorsement nor a blanket condemnation, citing real strengths in some areas and meaningful weaknesses in others.
Financial strength is the highest reported component at 7 out of 10. GF Value is the lowest at 1 out of 10. Profitability is weak and momentum is soft, GuruFocus said. Those pieces drag the composite down to 54.
Operating margin fell 319.94% over the past five years, per GuruFocus's series: 71.90 in 2021, 48.49 in 2022, -62.09 in 2023, -121.91 in 2024 and -158.13 in 2025. GuruFocus attributes the decline to the sharp unwind of pandemic-era demand, when Spikevax generated extraordinary profits, and to the ramp-up in research and development spending across the broader pipeline.
Gross margin ran a similar course: 84.53 in 2021, 69.84 in 2022, 22.31 in 2023, 48.92 in 2024 and 44.29 in 2025. GuruFocus tied that pattern to the company's struggle to convert revenue into profit.
Moderna's Piotroski F-Score is 1 out of 9. The nine-point scale, developed by Joseph Piotroski, grades a company on profitability and operating efficiency. GuruFocus said the F-Score leaves the financial health looking concerning.
Moderna is a commercial-stage biotechnology company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Its messenger RNA platform instructs cells to produce proteins that can prevent or treat disease. The first commercial product was the COVID-19 vaccine Spikevax, sold to governments and healthcare organizations worldwide. Moderna's pipeline spans infectious disease, oncology, cardiovascular disease and rare genetic diseases, with development candidates in clinical studies, and the company also sells a respiratory vaccine for RSV. Revenue comes from product sales and from collaboration and licensing agreements with partners including Merck and the U.S. Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority. The company distributes products in the United States and internationally. Market capitalization is about $89.69 billion, with trailing sales of about $2.23 billion.
GuruFocus said value investors should weigh whether oncology and rare-disease programs, along with combination vaccines, can restore the margins of 2021 and 2022, or whether the post-pandemic reset amounts to a durable earnings challenge. The answer will determine whether 54 is a temporary trough or a lasting verdict, the firm said.
On AlphaScala's proprietary scale, Moderna holds an Alpha Score of 56 out of 100, labeled Moderate. The full profile is on the MRNA stock page.
GuruFocus lists Moderna's current operating margin at -149.01%.
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