J&J reports quarterly loss on $13.6 billion tax charge

Johnson & Johnson reported a quarterly loss due to a $13.6 billion (9.75 billion pounds) charge related to the new U.S. tax law, but beat adjusted quarterly profit estimate on strong demand for new cancer drugs and gains from its Actelion acquisition.

A number of U.S. companies with sizable international operations are booking huge charges related to the new tax law, which encourages companies to repatriate their offshore earnings.

International operations accounted for nearly a half of J&J's total fourth-quarter sales of $20.20 billion, which was up 11.5 percent from a year earlier.

Higher sales of cancer drugs Darzalex and Imbruvica, and psoriasis drug Tremfya helped drive a 17.6 percent rise in pharmaceuticals sales to $9.68 billion, the company said.

High-margin treatments from Actelion, which was acquired by J&J for $30 billion in 2016, accounted for about a quarter of the pharmaceutical unit's sales growth.

Sales at J&J's consumer products unit, which makes Band-Aids, Neutrogena beauty products and Tylenol, rose 3.1 percent to $3.5 billion.

The net loss was $10.71 billion, or $3.99 per share, for the latest quarter, compared with a profit of $3.81 billion, or $1.38 per share, a year earlier.

Excluding items, J&J earned $1.74 per share, slightly above the analysts' average estimate of $1.72 per share, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

J&J forecast an adjusted profit of $8 to $8.20 per share on revenue of $80.6 billion to $81.4 billion for 2018.
Analysts on average were expecting a profit of $7.87 per share and revenue of $80.7 billion.

Shares of the company were up marginally in premarket trading.