Sun Amaya
(CNN Business) – AstraZeneca made its first profit from the sales of its Covid-19 vaccine.
The company sold the injection for US $ 2.2 billion in the first nine months of the year. In the quarter ending September 30, sales of the vaccine totaled $ 1.05 billion, contributing one penny to earnings per share.
In announcing its earnings on Friday, the UK’s largest pharmaceutical company said it expected to see modest earnings from the vaccine in the final quarter of this year as it provided guidance on the impact of sales of its covid-19 vaccine. for the first time.
“The company now hopes to progressively transition the vaccine to modest profitability as new orders are received,” he said.
Most of the vaccine sales between October and December this year were expected to come from existing supply agreements, the company said, adding that it also expected some new orders.
A company spokesperson confirmed that AstraZeneca would continue to fulfill existing orders to non-profit developing countries, as previously committed.
“We are still very honoring our existing agreement with the [Universidad] from Oxford and will continue to deliver [esos] orders at cost price, ”he told CNN Business.
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The company said that “the limited contribution to earnings from the vaccine” in the fourth quarter would offset costs related to a COVID-19 antibody combination drug it is testing.
Sales of its covid-19 vaccine contributed to an increase in AstraZeneca’s total revenue for the first nine months of the year, which rose by almost a third to $ 25.4 billion.
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He said the company and sublicense partners had released “more than 1.5 billion doses of vaccines as of September 30, 2021, for supply in more than 170 countries.”
AstraZeneca’s overall operating profit for the year to date decreased 63% from the same period in 2020 to $ 1.3 billion. Earnings before taxes plummeted to $ 371 million from $ 2.75 billion the previous year.
According to the company, supplying the covid-19 vaccine without profit to AstraZeneca had contributed to a drop in core profit margin of six percentage points to 74.1%, along with an increase in overhead and research costs. .
The-CNN-Wire
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