Eli Lily sees a downfall in 1st Qtr profits

Eli Lily, announced its quarterly profit and loss statement on Monday, 16th April, 2007. An Indianapolis based pharmaceutical company, Lily Eli, reported a downfall in the first quarter profits on Monday. The reason behind this fall in the profits has been a result of charges due to restructuring and a major acquisition by the company.

Apart from the comparative lower profits earned, the company still managed to reach up to its targets and boosted an overall profit of 84 cents per share, unlike the expectations and forecasts at the Wall Street, which was assumed to be around 79 cents per share.

Eli Lily, whose most popular prescription medicines include Zyprexa, Cymbalta and Cialis, estimated a net income of the first three months of the year 2007 which totaled to a $508.7 million, which in comparison to the last year’s profits of $834.8 million for the same period last year i.e. 2006 were lower and showed a downfall, but in contrast to the lesser profits than last year, the company still achieved its targets and remained profitable.

The company incurred an expense of 8 cents per share due to restructuring, and 29 cents per share because of a $2.3 billion acquisition of ICOS Corp., made by the company earlier this year which closed in January.

Sales of the company rose to 14% out of the total sales revenue earned, which amounts up to $4.23 billion from $3.71 billion since last year. This growth in the sales revenue was reportedly due to the increase in sales volume of the drugs Zyprexa, a schizophrenic drug, which hiked up to 10% and Cymbalta, which cures depression, rose to a tremendous increase of 89%.

“Results benefited from average 5 percent uplift in prices and boosted another 2 percent due to foreign exchange factors” said a Lily spokesman.