The timing of the announcements, and their lack of detail, are raising worries about insider trading and unrealistic expectations.

Who would have thought, a year ago, that at Thanksgiving 2020 the nation would be waiting with bated breath for pharmaceutical press releases? But as companies have released increasingly positive news about their vaccine trials, public interest in these interim results has soared. So have financial markets, hoping for an end to the pandemic.

News alerts may update the public, but they’re primarily used to update investors. In the past few weeks, there has been a glut of them. And the particular way news releases are now coinciding with investment moves has some financial experts worried. In part, they’re concerned that executives may be engaging in trading practices that, thanks to current law, may be just on the right side of legal. But they’re also worried that such profiteering in the present moment could signal issues with the companies or their products—and could lead to public mistrust in the vaccines themselves. Read more at The New Republic.