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Amgen Q3 - Beats expectations

Amgen is another core holding in Vestact US portfolios, and had results out after the bell last night. As you know, it is one of the world's leading biotechnology companies, with a focus on cardiovascular disease, oncology, bone health, neuroscience, nephrology and inflammation.

The quarterly results were pretty good. They reported revenue of $5.9 billion and earnings per share of $3.69 for the three months, which was well above consensus expectations. More importantly, guidance for full-year earnings was raised to $14.00 and $14.25 per share from a previous outlook of $13.30 to $14.00.

Operating expenses, including pharma research and new product launch costs, increased 7 percent to $3.58 billion. Amgen has around 20,000 employees, and lots of them are highly paid science wonks with advanced degrees.

In the current portfolio, Sensipar, a drug for people who are on long-term dialysis for kidney disease, sold well, as did blood cell stimulant Epogen. White blood cell booster Neulasta sales declined again but still generated nearly $900 million. It faces biosimilar competition.

The very important new-generation cholesterol drug Repatha posted quarterly sales of $120 million, which was a little disappointing. Amgen has lowered the price of the drug to try to get more medical aids to agree to pay for it. Let's see how that goes in the future.

Aimovig, the migraine drug launched in May, saw sales of $22 million in this quarter. Its early days, but that drug is really doing well in the field since it is an entirely new class of treatment.

The company's shares, which closed at $189.08 in regular trading yesterday, were up slightly at $189.45 after hours. That's well below the recent all time high of $210.19, mostly just due to a generally softer market in October. The current price presents investors with an excellent buying opportunity, in my view!

If you are interested in more detail, you can read the transcript of the interview with CEO Robert Bradway on Q3 2018 Results - Earnings Call Transcript.


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