Earnings season is in full swing, with huge numbers of companies having already given their latest numbers to investors. The key to making smart investment decisions with stocks releasing their quarterly reports is to anticipate how they’ll do before they announce results, leaving you fully prepared to respond quickly to whatever inevitable surprises arise. That way, you’ll be less likely to make an uninformed kneejerk reaction to news that turns out to be exactly the wrong move.
Stats on Teva Pharmaceutical
| Analyst EPS Estimate | $1.33 |
| Change from Year-Ago EPS | (16%) |
| Revenue Estimate | $5.26 billion |
| Change from Year-Ago Revenue | (7.4%) |
| Earnings Beats in Past 4 Quarters | 3 |
Source: Yahoo! Finance.
Will Teva Pharmaceutical stay healthy?
Analysts have been pretty certain about their estimates for Teva Pharmaceutical in the just-concluded quarter, but over the past three months, they’ve pulled in their estimates for the first quarter and full-year 2013 sharply. The stock has been equally pessimistic, falling almost 8% since early November.
Teva is best known for its generic versions of off-patent drugs. Given how much less expensive generic versions are compared to their branded equivalents, health-care advocates argue that they’re essential to keeping drug costs down, even though they also discourage innovation. Teva hasn’t been content to stick with generics solely, though, also working on branded drugs. Its blockbuster drug is Copaxone, which is a treatment for multiple sclerosis.
For Copaxone, though, competition is on the horizon. Teva filed what’s known as a citizen’s petition with the FDA to try to delay approval of Biogen Idec Inc. (NASDAQ:BIIB)‘s BG-12 treatment for MS, which will go up directly against Copaxone if approved.
