TLDR
- Merck (MRK) stock rose 3.2% to $145.40 in premarket trading after a third-quarter beat.
- Adjusted earnings were $2.49 a share on $18.1 billion in sales, topping forecasts of $2.09 and $17.3 billion.
- Full-year earnings guidance moved up to $2.77 to $2.82 a share, and the revenue range narrowed to $66.8 billion to $67.3 billion.
- Keytruda sales reached $8.6 billion, and Winrevair sales nearly doubled to $694 million.
- Keytruda loses patent protection in 2028, and clinical updates in late 2026 and early 2027 are the next catalysts.
Merck (MRK) stock rose 3.2% to $145.40 in premarket trading Thursday after the drugmaker beat third-quarter estimates. S&P 500 futures were down 0.4% at the time.
Adjusted earnings came in at $2.49 a share, well above the $2.09 analysts expected. Revenue grew 4% on a constant-currency basis to $18.1 billion.
Wall Street had called for about $17.3 billion in sales. Pharmaceuticals brought in $16.2 billion, while animal health added $1.7 billion.
Keytruda, Merckās top seller, generated $8.6 billion across its intravenous and subcutaneous forms. That was a 6% increase.
Keytruda QLex, the subcutaneous version, contributed $830 million. It has tracked ahead of analyst forecasts since its September 2025 approval.
What Drove the Quarter
Winrevair, the heart-disease drug cleared in 2024, nearly doubled its sales to $694 million. Demand grew in the U.S., Europe and Japan.
Gardasil sales rose 14% excluding currency effects to about $2 billion. Januvia went the other way, falling 39% after losing patent protection in May.
Merck raised its full-year revenue forecast for the third time this year. The new range is $66.8 billion to $67.3 billion, up from a low end of $66.3 billion.
The $67.05 billion midpoint is about in line with the $67.04 billion consensus. So the revenue change was small.
Adjusted earnings guidance now sits at $2.77 to $2.82 a share. The prior range was $2.66 to $2.76, and the consensus was $2.65.
The outlook still falls well below Merckās initial projections from the start of the year. It also includes a one-time charge of 12 cents a share.
The charge ties to a global license deal with Shanghaiās SciBrunch. The partners are co-developing a drug for hard-to-treat cancers.
Eyes on the Pipeline
Keytruda loses exclusivity in 2028, which opens the door to generic and biosimilar rivals. Goldman Sachs analyst Asad Haider expected āa relatively in-line set of resultsā and said focus was on next year.
Haider pointed to Lipfendra, a new cholesterol drug, as part of āa sizable new product cycle.ā Sales of the drug were not broken out in the release.
Merck is also testing a personalized cancer vaccine, intismeran autogene, with Moderna (MRNA). A data leak last week triggered a selloff.
CEO Robert Davis called the vaccine part of a āsubstantial long-term opportunityā in the late-stage pipeline. Data presented at last weekendās ESMO meeting also covered the antibody-drug conjugate sac-TMT.
Haider said clinical updates in late 2026 and early 2027 are the next catalysts for the stock. Moderna stock was up about 3% Thursday.
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