Eli Lilly’s Earnings Jump 23%

Eli Lilly (LLY) is one of our new additions to this year’s Buy List. The company just reported decent earnings this morning. AP reports:

Eli Lilly & Co. said Monday flat costs and strong sales of several top-selling drugs boosted first-quarter profit 23 percent, surpassing Wall Street expectations.
Higher sales volume and increased prices helped boost revenue from many of Lilly’s drugs. Those factors helped offset a reduction in revenue caused by the stronger dollar, the company said.
Sales of the antidepressant Cymbalta, Lilly’s second-best seller, grew 17 percent to $709 million, and the insulin Humalog saw revenue rise 11 percent to $450.6 million.
Lilly earned $1.31 billion, or $1.20 per share, compared with profit of $1.06 billion, or 97 cents per share, during the same period a year earlier. Revenue rose 5 percent to $5.05 billion.
Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected profit of 99 cents per share on revenue of $5.05 billion.

That’s a huge earnings beat. The company also reiterated its full-year EPS forecast of $4 to $4.25 which means the stock is far from fully valued. The stock also pays a dividend close to 6%. Eli Lilly is a great buy.

Posted by Eddy Elfenbein on April 20th, 2009 at 9:26 am

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