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AbbVie's beat fueled by demand for Humira, Hep C drugs

FILE PHOTO: A screen displays the share price for pharmaceutical maker AbbVie on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange July 18, 2014. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: A screen displays the share price for pharmaceutical maker AbbVie on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange July 18, 2014. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo

Thomson Reuters

(Reuters) - AbbVie Inc reported a better-than-expected quarterly profit on Thursday, driven by higher sales of its rheumatoid arthritis treatment Humira and its Hepatitis C drugs, leading the company to raise its full-year earnings forecast.

The company's shares, which have been under pressure due to setbacks to its drug pipeline, gained about 3 percent to $94.44 before the bell.

Humira brings in nearly two-thirds of AbbVie's total revenue and the company has been aggressively protecting the pricey drug.

The company has negotiated with rivals Amgen Inc, Samsung Bioepis and Biogen Inc to fend off U.S. competition from their biosimilars until 2023.

Quarterly sales of the drug, the world's best-selling prescription medicine, rose to $4.71 billion, beating estimates of $4.64 billion, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

Sales from the company's Hepatitis C franchise soared to $919 million, easily beating consensus estimate of $572 million, according to brokerage Bernstein.

The revenue rise was fueled by sales of newly approved Mavyret, and comes when the market for Hepatitis C treatments in the United States is steadily shrinking as the impact of the disease lessens.

Cancer treatment Imbruvica raked in $762 million in sales, above expectations of $755.77 million.

The drugmaker raised 2018 adjusted earnings per share expectation to between $7.66 and $7.76, from between $7.33 and $7.43 previously forecast.

AbbVie said the forecast accounts for an effective tax rate approaching 9 percent this year, following the new U.S. tax law.

Net earnings rose to $2.78 billion, or $1.74 per share, in the three months ended March 31, from $1.71 billion, or $1.06 per share, a year earlier.

Excluding items, AbbVie earned $1.87 per share, ahead of analysts' estimate of $1.79.

AbbVie's net revenue rose 21.4 percent to $7.93 billion, ahead of average estimate of $7.59 billion.

The company also said it would roll out part of a previously announced share repurchase program by May 1, and buy back up to $7.5 billion worth of common stock.

(Reporting by Tamara Mathias and Mrinalini Krothapalli in Bengaluru; Editing by Shounak Dasgupta and Sriraj Kalluvila)

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