Allergan abandons women’s health sale plan as profit slumps

Shares in Allergan fell after the company said it had swung to a loss in the last quarter of 2018 and forecast 2019 revenues below analyst expectations. The Ireland-headquartered specialty drugmaker, best known for its Botox wrinkle treatment, reported a loss of $4.3 billion that reversed a profit of over $3 billion a year ago, even though sales were a little better than expected at $4.08 billion. The loss resulted from big write-offs to the tune of a whopping $5.4 billion, in part resulting from lower-than-expected sales of double chin treatment Kybella/Belkyra – the main asset in the company’s $2.1 billion acquisition of Kythera – which brought in just $8 million in the quarter. It also revealed that it had dropped plans to sell off its female health division, which was put on the block last year along with its anti-infectives business. CEO Brent Saunders said on a conference call that it made more sense at the moment to continue “managing and optimizing” the women’s health business, but that he still expected anti-infectives to be sold as planned. It’s possible that the volte-face on women’s health is related to the failure by Allergan to get FDA approval for uterine fibroids therapy Esmya (ulipristal acetate) last year, which had been tipped as a potential blockbuster. Approval would have made the division much more valuable.