Shares of Abbott Laboratories ABT, +0.21% edged up 0.2% in premarket trading Thursday, after the medical devices, diagnostics and nutrition company reported second-quarter profit and sales that rose above expectations, with beats in all of its major business segments. Net income more than doubled, to $1.19 billion, or $1.17 a share, from $537 million, or 57 cents a share, in the year-ago period. Excluding nonrecurring items, adjusted earnings per share of $1.17 topped the FactSet consensus of $1.02. Sales grew 39.5% to $10.22 billion, above the FactSet consensus of $9.69 billion, with strongest growth in diagnostics sales (62.8%) and medical devices (51.3%). For 2021, the company expects adjusted EPS of $4.30 to $4.50, compared with the FactSet consensus of $4.36. “We’re achieving very strong growth across our portfolio,” said Chief Executive Robert Ford. “Perhaps most impressively, excluding COVID testing-related sales, our sales grew more than 11 percent on an organic basis compared to pre-pandemic levels in the second quarter of 2019, which demonstrates the fundamental strength of our performance.” The stock has gained 8.7% year to date through Wednesday, while the S&P 500 SPX, +0.82% has advanced 16.0%.
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