Abbott Laboratories’ sales jump 9.6% in the fiscal third quarter

Abbott Laboratories (NYSE: ABT) published its earnings report for the fiscal third quarter on Wednesday. The company said that its earnings in Q3 came in stronger than what analysts had expected, and expressed confidence that its performance was likely to remain strong in the rest of the year.

Shares of the company slid less than 0.5% in premarket trading on Wednesday and tanked another 1.5% on market open. Abbott Laboratories is now trading at £81.51 per share that represents a close to 55% recovery since March, when the stock had touched a year to date low of £48 per share.

Abbott’s Q3 financial results versus analysts’ estimates

Abbott said that its net income in the third quarter came in at £940 million that translated to 52.87 pence per share. In the same quarter last year, its net income was capped at a lower £735.60 million or 40.61 pence per share.

On an adjusted basis, the medical devices company earned 75.09 pence per share in the recent quarter versus 69.73 pence per share expected, as per FactSet. In separate news from the U.S., Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. also published its quarterly earnings report on Wednesday.

In terms of sales, the healthcare company registered a 9.6% year over year growth to £6.78 billion. According to FactSet, experts had forecast a lower £6.54 billion of revenue for Abbott in the fiscal third quarter.

The U.S. Food and Drug Authority approved Abbott’s rapid COVID-19 test for emergency use in August. The test takes only 15 minutes to deliver results. The novel Coronavirus has so far infected more than 41 million people worldwide and caused over 1.1 million deaths.

Abbott Laboratories’ guidance for the full year

For the full fiscal year, the American multinational now forecasts at least £2.72 of adjusted per-share earnings. In comparison, experts forecast a lower £2.56 per share of adjusted earnings for Abbott Laboratories this year.

CEO Robert B. Ford commented on the earnings report on Wednesday and said:

“Our strong results and increased guidance are a direct reflection of our ability to innovate and deliver despite challenging conditions, during the pandemic.”

Abbott performed fairly upbeat in the stock market last year with an annual gain of more than 20%. At the time of writing, the American multinational health care company is valued at £146 billion and has a price to earnings ratio of 61.89.