Teva and its long-term investors have been through much disappointment over the last decade, but 2024 is bringing optimism for the Israeli drugmaker.
During the second quarter of the year, Teva grew sales 11% in local currency terms to $4.2 billion. The performance comes after the company reported a 5% revenue increase during the first quarter.
The figures are a cause for celebration at Teva, which endured years of sliding sales before its recent turnaround. The company’s sales peaked in 2017 at $22.4 billion and dropped to $14.9 billion by 2022. But under the leadership of Richard Francis, who joined the company in early 2023, Teva grew sales to $15.8 billion last year.
Now, after releasing second-quarter results for 2024, Teva has raised its annual revenue guidance to a new range of $16 billion to $16.4 billion. The forecast adds $300 million to the low end of the company’s prior guidance of $15.7 billion to $16.3 billion.
Teva also added $100 million to its sales forecast for Huntington’s disease and tardive dyskinesia medicine Austedo this year; the company now sees the drug pulling down $1.6 billion worldwide.
On the profit side, Teva boosted the low end of its earnings per share forecast by 10 cents to $2.30. The company expects total EPS for the year to land between $2.30 and $2.50.
After Teva’s share price peaked at around $70 in the summer of 2015, the firm lost momentum and watched its share price decline by a total of 90% in subsequent years. Since Francis was named the company’s CEO in November of 2022, though, Teva shares are up nearly 90%.
As for the company’s second-quarter performance, Teva said that its long-troubled generics business grew “across all regions.” The unit grew sales in local currency terms by 16% in the U.S., 8% in Europe and 22% in international markets compared with the same period in 2023.
Austedo, meanwhile, continued on its strong path, growing sales 32% to $407 million during the quarter. Sales of migraine prevention therapy Ajovy increased 12% to $115 million.
In Teva's earnings release, Francis touted “positive momentum across each of the four pillars of our Pivot to Growth strategy.” The strategy places an emphasis on Teva’s growth engines—including Austedo and Ajovy—plus its pipeline, “strategic” capital allocation and maintaining a strong presence in the generics business. Francis unveiled the strategy a little more than a year ago.
After Teva released its second-quarter results, the company’s share price increased about 4% before U.S. markets opened on Wednesday.