With quarterly earnings underway, BioPharma Dive is providing a snapshot of some companies’ results and how they’re being received by investors. Today, we’re offering insight into the latest numbers from Gilead, Pfizer and Merck & Co.
Gilead’s ‘uncertain’ growth prospects
Gilead Sciences has spent tens of billions of dollars on deals hoping to show it can rely on more than its bread-and-butter HIV medicines to grow sales. But that business still accounts for the bulk of Gilead’s revenue, and is the focus of a debate among analysts tracking the company.
Gilead reported $7.6 billion in overall product sales in the second quarter, an 8% increase from the same period a year ago. Its two top HIV products, Biktarvy and Descovy, handily beat Wall Street projections to generate $5.7 billion combined. A third closely watched by investors, Yeztugo, hit $232 million, in-line with expectations and putting the drug on track to hit Gilead’s $1 billion projection this year. The company now believes overall HIV sales should grow anywhere from 9% to 10% in 2026, versus 8% previously.
To some analysts, those numbers calmed lingering fears about Gilead’s HIV franchise as well as the sales prospects of Yeztugo, a twice-yearly preventive shot that’s been hailed as a medical breakthrough. The market for HIV drugs has become increasingly fragmented and could be even more so in the future, with the arrival of newer options to “switch” from one treatment to another. But Gilead’s “strong operational performance” gives it a “higher base” with which to weather any coming erosion, wrote RBC Capital Markets’ Brian Abrahams.
