Bristol Meyers Squibb reported earnings on Thursday.
Daniel Acker/Bloomberg
The drugmaker Bristol Myers Squibb reported earnings early Thursday that fell short of Wall Street expectations.
It’s the latest disappointment in an earnings season that is turning into a bloodbath for large-cap pharma firms.
Bristol Myers (ticker: BMY) reported non-GAAP earnings of $1.74 per share, short of the FactSet consensus estimate of $1.81 a share. Non-GAAP earnings per share were up 1% compared with the same quarter last year.
The company reported first-quarter revenue of $11.1 billion, up 3% compared with the same quarter last year, and in line with the FactSet consensus estimate. Bristol also said that revenue was actually up 8% from the year-ago quarter if you exclude “Covid-19 related buying patterns from the prior year period.”
The company reaffirmed its previously-issued guidance of non-GAAP earnings of between $7.35 and $7.55 per share for the 2021 fiscal year.
“We continue to deliver solid growth, execute against our strategic priorities and make meaningful progress across our pipeline,” said Bristol’s CEO, Giovanni Caforio, in a statement.
Bristol Myers shares fell 2.5% in premarket trading early Thursday.
The report was the latest in a string of disappointing earnings reports from drug companies this week, including an earnings miss from Merck (MRK) on Thursday, and misses from Amgen (AMGN) and Eli Lilly (LLY) earlier in the week.
Sales of Bristol’s blockbuster blood clot drug Eliquis rose 9% compared with the same quarter last year, while sales of its top seller, the cancer drug Revlimid, were up 1%. Sales of Opdivo, another top-selling cancer drug, slipped 3%.
Bristol’s U.S. revenue rose 4% compared with the same quarter last year, while international revenue fell 5%, adjusted for foreign exchange impact.
Bristol shares are up 6.4% so far this year, and up 8.6% over the past 12 months. The stock trades at 8.6 times earnings expected over the next 12 months, above its 5-year average of 7.1 times earnings.
Write to Josh Nathan-Kazis at [email protected]
