(Reuters) -Abbott Laboratories on Wednesday forecast 2024 profit largely below Wall Street estimates despite meeting quarterly earnings expectations, sending the medical device maker’s shares down 2% in premarket trading.
Expectations around performance of medical device makers have increased over the last one month after insurers flagged higher medical costs earlier this month as people, especially older adults, go back for medical procedures they had delayed during the pandemic.
Med-tech peers Johnson & Johnson and Intuitive Surgical had reported strong earnings beat on Tuesday.
Overall, Abbott’s medical devices unit generated $4.44 billion in sales, higher than estimates of $4.33 billion.
The company is also benefiting from strength of its glucose monitoring device FreeStyle Libre, which brought in sales of $1.4 billion in the fourth quarter, up 25.5% year-on-year.
Abbott also forecast 2024 adjusted profit in the range of $4.50 to $4.70 per share, with the mid-point below analysts’ estimate of $4.64 per share, according to LSEG data.Excluding items, Abbott’s profit was in line with the average of analysts’ estimates of $1.19 per share.
(Reporting by Pratik Jain and Leroy Leo in Bengaluru; Editing by Maju Samuel)
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