Novartis raises sales guidance until 2028

Novartis NOVN on Thursday raised its medium-term sales guidance to 6% annual growth through 2028, driven by strong momentum of launched drugs and the prospect of upcoming launches.

The Swiss drugmaker was previously targeting mid-term currency-adjusted sales growth of at least 5% from 2023 to 2028.

However, the company said it was still expecting 5% sales growth per year during the 2024-2029 period, given its strong performance in 2024.

CEO Vas Narasimhan has cut jobs and spun off Novartis' generic drugs business Sandoz to narrow its focus on new drug development in certain disease areas.

The company, which will hold an investor event on Thursday, reaffirmed that it was targeting a core margin of at least 40% by 2027.

The group also raised the peak annual sales estimate for five drugs with multi-billion dollar sales potential - Cosentyx, Kisqali, Kesimpta, Pluvicto and Leqvio.

Last month, it raised its 2024 earnings guidance for the third time, buoyed by wider use of its drugs, but its shares have since declined almost 9% as sales of radiopharmaceutical Pluvicto disappointed investors, as did a write-down on German biotech company MorphoSys, which it is acquiring.

The $800 million impairment at the time was due to delays in the approval of MorphoSys' lead compound pelabresib.

Presentation slides on Thursday showed that the drug - designed to treat a rare type of slowly progressing blood cancer - had "multi-billion" annual peak sales potential and would start contributing to revenue before 2029.