Leroy Leo and Christy Santosh
(Reuters) – AbbVie expects the decline in sales of its popular arthritis drug Humira to deepen following recent changes in benefit managers at U.S. pharmacies and as patients switch to other drugs.
Its shares fell nearly 5% in afternoon trading Friday after the company forecast U.S. sales of Humira would fall 32% in the second quarter.
AbbVie (NYSE:) investors closely watched the sales trajectory of Humira, the world’s best-selling drug, until it lost exclusivity last year and saw the release of nine close copies, or biosimilars, in the United States.
The company said in February that it expects U.S. sales to decline 36% this year.
“We’re seeing that not all Humira prescriptions are moving to biosimilars,” Chief Commercial Officer Jeffrey Stewart said during a conference call with investors.
He said data shows patients are also switching to other drugs, such as AbbVie’s newer immunology drugs Skyrizi and Rinvoq.
The company has managed to retain most of Humira’s market share so far, with sales of the drug falling nearly 36% during the quarter, largely due to price competition in the United States.
Health insurer Cigna (NYSE:) said Thursday it plans to make close copies of Humira available without any out-of-pocket costs to eligible U.S. patients using its specialty pharmacy business starting in June.
“There appears to be a lot of concern about the impact of Humira biosimilars. It appears that this call was where most of the questions were focused,” said BMO Capital Markets analyst Evan Zeigerman, adding that Cigna’s plans could hurt AbbVie. Humira volume this year.
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AbbVie earned $2.27 billion from Humira sales in the first quarter, roughly in line with estimates of $2.28 billion. The drugmaker and its investors have focused on sales of Skyrizi and Rinvoq to offset lower Humira sales.
Earlier Friday, the company raised its full-year adjusted earnings forecast to $11.13 to $11.33 per share, up from $10.97 to $11.17 previously estimated. The company also beat first-quarter profit estimates thanks to strong sales of Skyrizi and cancer drug Imbruvica. Skyrizi’s sales of $2.01 billion beat expectations of $1.94 billion, while Rinvoq’s sales of $1.09 billion were slightly above expectations of $1.06 billion.
AbbVie posted adjusted earnings of $2.31 per share, beating estimates of $2.23 per share.