Big Wins for Big Pharma: Novartis Bounces Back

In the fourth quarter of 2024, a big Swiss drug maker, Novartis, beat expectations but missed its own yearly goals. It announced a huge 16% jump in net sales. That's $13. 2 billion, way more than the estimated $12. 795 billion. The company's adjusted core operating income also surpassed expectations, hitting $4. 86 billion. This was a nice surprise for investors and for analysts. As a result, at the start of the trading day, Novartis shares were up by 3. 16% in London. The company said that the boost in sales was due to two popular drugs. Entresto, a medication for heart failure, and Cosentyx, a drug for arthritis. Now, looking at the entire year, Novartis saw a 12% growth in net sales. That's $50. 32 billion in total. However, this number was just slightly lower than what was forecasted which is $50. 47 billion. The full-year core operating income rose by 22%, which is $19. 5 billion. It's interesting to note that the company had previously raised its 2024 earnings guidance for the third time in October. A strategic overhaul took place in 2023 and Chief Executive Vas Narasimhan spoke about this. He said that the company was now focused on being an "innovative medicines company". He also mentioned that the company's "momentum" would continue into 2025. Understand that pharmaceutical companies have a lot of ups and downs. They can make a lot of money one day then the next day a big drug can fail. This is because they do a lot of research into new drugs and usually these tests are very expensive. The best they can do is to keep innovating and trying to come up with new drugs to treat the human race.