Regeneron Pharmaceuticals handily beat Wall Street's third-quarter earnings estimate Thursday, but REGN stock dipped.
During the September quarter, the biotech giant earned $11.14 per share, minus some items. Earnings declined 28%, as expected. But that was better than the bigger drop to $9.74 per share projected by FactSet-polled analysts.
Sales are toppled 15% to $2.94 billion, but came in ahead of forecasts for $2.91 billion. The lion's share of the sales drop-off is due to a massive year-earlier gain from Covid antibody treatment, Regen-Cov. The drug is not effective against omicron, so it's no longer in use in the U.S. International sales were just $22.8 billion. Excluding that drug, Regeneron said its sales actually grew 11%.
On today's stock market, REGN stock sank 0.2% to 738.68.
REGN Stock: U.S. Eylea Comes In Soft
Regeneron's biggest moneymaker is eye-disease drug Eylea. In the U.S., Eylea sales climbed nearly 11% to $1.63 billion. That missed more bullish calls for $1.65 billion to $1.68 billion, according to multiple analysts' reports. Regeneron's Eylea partner Bayer records international sales of the drug.
The results suggest "competition from Roche's (eye-disease drug) Vabysmo may be slightly eroding sequential growth although is still not substantially reducing Eylea's share," RBC Capital Markets analyst Brian Abrahams said in a note to clients.
"We believe this quarter may highlight some modest challenges to Eylea's growth trajectory," he said.
However, he notes Regeneron is working on a high-dose formulation of Eylea with plans to file for approval in the U.S. by year's end.
In other products, U.S. sales of Praluent and Libtayo also lagged forecasts. Regeneron records the U.S. sales of those two drugs — treatments for cholesterol and cancer, respectively. Partner Sanofi records international sales of those two drugs.
Abrahams kept his sector perform rating and 702 price target on REGN stock.
Follow Allison Gatlin on Twitter at @IBD_AGatlin.
