QLT Has 2nd-Quarter Profit as Sales of Visudyne Drug Double
By Theresa Ebden
Vancouver, July 25 (Bloomberg) -- QLT Inc. said it had a second-quarter profit as the company doubled sales of its drug Visudyne, which treats the leading cause of blindness in the elderly.
Net income was C$6.6 million ($4.3 million), or 10 Canadian cents a share, the company said in a statement distributed by Canada NewsWire. A year earlier, QLT reported a loss from operations of C$559,000, or 1 cent a share. Revenue tripled to C$31.5 million from C$10.4 million.
QLT has been under pressure from investors to increase sales of Visudyne, which dries up eye lesions caused by age-related macular degeneration. To do that, Chief Executive Julia Levy has been trying to find new uses for Visudyne, which accounts for almost all QLT's sales. The Vancouver-based company is testing the drug as a treatment for skin cancer.
QLT was expected to earn 8 cents a share, the average estimate of three analysts polled by First Call/Thomson Financial.
In the year-earlier period, a gain of C$14.8 million, or 22 cents a share, made net income C$14.2 million, or 21 cents a share. The gain was for the sale of rights to a light-activated cancer-therapy drug to Axcan Pharma Inc.
Shares of QLT rose C$2.38, or 7 percent, to C$35.98 Toronto. They have fallen 14 percent this year. |
