(Reuters) -Drugmaker Eli Lilly and Co fell short of quarterly profit expectations on Tuesday, hurt by weaker sales of its COVID-19 therapies as vaccinations gained pace in the United States and regulatory actions.
It lowered the upper end of its annual sales forecast for the therapies to $1.1 billion, from its prior view of between $1 billion and $1.5 billion.
U.S. health officials in late June paused the distribution of the drugmaker’s antibody cocktail therapy after lab analyses showed it was not effective against variants first identified in Brazil and South Africa.
Sales of the COVID-19 drugs, bamlanivimab and etesevimab, have also been slowing due to weak uptake by hospitals, which had led Lilly to lower sales expectations for the therapies in April.
The move came after the U.S. health regulator denied the lone use of bamlanivimab to treat COVID-19 in response to variants that could be resistant to the treatment.
Sales of its antibody treatments came in at $148.9 million in the quarter compared to $810.1 million in the previous quarter.
Sales of its diabetes drug Trulicity rose 25% to $1.54 billion, roughly in line with estimates of $1.53 billion.
Net income fell to $1.39 billion, or $1.53 per share in the quarter ended June 30, from $1.41 billion, or $1.55 per share, a year ago.
Excluding items, Lily earned $1.87 per share, missing estimates of $1.89 per share, according to IBES data from Refinitiv.
Shares of the company fell 1.3% in light premarket trading.
(Reporting by Manas Mishra and Amruta Khandekar in Bengaluru; Editing by Arun Koyyur)
