Big Pharma at the turning point: Novartis exits the capital of Roche (and collects 18 billion)

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After 20 years, Novartis leaves the capital of Roche. This concludes the long shareholder affair between the two large Swiss pharmaceutical groups, both with headquarters in Basel. With their respective press releases, Novartis and Roche made that announcement that several times in the past years had seemed to be close at hand and which had not yet arrived.

Now here we are, Novartis sells to Roche itself the stake of about 33%, which it had acquired between 2001 and 2003 and which has never …