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J&J Has A Strong Finish For 2020 Despite Pandemic Disruption

A big jump in prescription drug sales boosted fourth-quarter sales at Johnson & Johnson, but profits dove 57% due to higher research spending and one-time charges totaling $2.4 billion.

It still beat Wall Street expectations and shares ticked more than 1% higher before the opening bell Tuesday.

The worlds biggest maker of health care products had a net income of $1.74 billion, or 65 cents per share. That was down from $4.01 billion, or $1.50 per share, a year earlier.

Adjusted net income came to $4.97 billion, or $1.86 per share. That easily topped the $1.81 Wall Street was looking for, according to a survey of industry analysts by Zacks Investment Research.

Total revenue for the quarter totaled $22.48 billion, up 8.3% from $20.75 billion. Analysts had expected $21.62 billion.

The New Brunswick, New Jersey, company said that the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic reduced sales for its prescription medicines and consumer health products, except for increased demand for oral care products.

Prescription drug sales jumped 16.3%, to $12.27 billion, led by immune disorder drugs to Stelara and cancer drugs Darzelex, Imbruvica and Erleada.

Sales of consumer health products such as Tylenol and Listerine edged up 1.4% to $3.62 billion. Meanwhile, sales for the medical devices and diagnostics unit dipped nearly 1%, to $6.59 billion.

J&J gave its first financial forecast for 2021, saying it expects sales of $90.5 billion to $91.7 billion and adjusted earnings per share of $9.40 to $9.60.

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A portion of this story was generated by Automated Insights (http://automatedinsights.com/ap) using data from Zacks Investment Research. Access a Zacks stock report on JNJ at https://www.zacks.com/ap/JNJ

Disclaimer: This post has been auto-published from an agency feed without any modifications to the text and has not been reviewed by an editor

Source: News18