New York [US], November 2: U.S. pharmaceutical and biotechnology corporation Pfizer Inc. on Tuesday reported expectation-beating results for the third quarter of 2022 driven by strong sales growth of oral antiviral treatment Paxlovid and COVID-19 vaccine booster Comirnaty in the United States.
Pfizer posted 10.17 billion U.S. dollars of adjusted income in the third quarter, which surged 40 percent year on year. Adjusted diluted earnings per share (EPS) stood at 1.78 dollars, higher than market expectation of 1.39 dollars per share.
Pfizer's third-quarter revenues dipped 6 percent year on year to 22.6 billion dollars, but higher than 21 billion dollars of average estimate compiled by market information supplier Refinitiv.
Notably, unfavorable impact of foreign exchange resulted in a drag of 957 million dollars on Pfizer's revenues in the quarter, which contributed four percentage points to year-on-year decline of revenues in the quarter.
"We saw strong operational performance this quarter from key brands such as Paxlovid and Eliquis, particularly in the United States, as well as the continued impressive launch of Prevnar 20 for adults in the United States," said David Denton, chief financial officer and executive vice president of Pfizer.
The sales revenues of Paxlovidtotaled 7.5 billion dollars in the third quarter driven by the U.S. launch under emergency use authorization at the end of 2021 and international launches in late 2021 or early 2022, said a release by Pfizer.
Though revenues of Comirnaty outside of the United States plunged 86 percent to 1.49 billion dollars due to amendment to supply agreement with the European Commission, the revenues of Comirnaty within the United States jumped 83 percent to 2.9 billion dollars driven by the deliveries of the Omicron BA.4/BA.5-adapted bivalent booster, according to the release.
Moreover, Pfizer raised the forecast of revenues and adjusted diluted EPS on an operational basis for 2022 by about 1.7 billion dollars and 0.19 dollars, respectively.
Source: Xinhua
