Merck & Co., Inc. (NYSE:MRK) stock took a hit on Friday following a poor sowing in its earnings report for the third quarter of 2017.
During the third quarter of the year, Merck & Co., Inc. reported revenue of $10.33 billion. This is 2% down from its revenue of $10.54 billion that was reported in the same period of the year prior. It also came in below Wall Street’s revenue estimate of $10.55 billion, which isn’t good news for MRK stock.
Merck & Co., Inc. says that there were a few factors that caused its revenue for the third quarter of 2017 to decline. Among these reasons is the borrowing of GARDASIL 9 supplies by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Pediatric Vaccine Stockpile. This hurt revenue by roughly $240 million in the quarter.
Another reason that Merck & Co., Inc. gives for the decline in revenue for the third quarter of 2017 is cyber attacks. The company notes that these cyber attacks resulted in temporary production shutdown. It lost about $135 million in sales due to this issue.
Merck & Co., Inc.’s pharmaceutical sales for the third quarter of 2017 were down 3% to $9.2 billion. The company says that this was due to it losing exclusivity for several of its products in certain markets. It also points out that the drugs JANUVIA and JANUMET saw lower sales in the third quarter of the year.
Despite the poor revenue for the third quarter of 2017, there was one bright spot in Merck & Co., Inc.’s third-quarter earnings report. Earnings per share for the quarter came in at $1.11, which is up 4 cents from the same time last year. It also beat out Wall Street’s earnings per share estimate of $1.03 for the quarter.
MRK stock was down 4% as of Friday morning.
As of this writing, William White did not hold a position in any of the aforementioned securities.
