Forest Laboratories – Fiscal 2012 Guidance

Forest Laboratories, Inc. (NYSE: FRX), an international pharmaceutical manufacturer and marketer, today announced that reported earnings per share were $1.04 in the third quarter of fiscal 2012. Reported earnings per share in the third quarter of fiscal 2011 were $1.11 after a charge for a new product licensing fee of $66.1 million, or $0.23 per share net of tax, related to a licensing agreement with Grünenthal GmbH (Grünenthal) for GRT 6005 and its follow-on compound GRT 6006, for the treatment of moderate to severe chronic pain.

Fiscal 2012 Guidance

The Company now expects that diluted earnings per share for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2012 will be in the range of $3.65 to $3.75.

Howard Solomon, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Forest, said: “We are pleased with the financial performance of the Company reported this quarter and with the continued positive progress of our new product launches. In the quarter, excluding the small increase for Lexapro, we had a sales increase of $91 million which included a $20.6 million increase for Namenda whose patent expires in 2015. The remaining $70.4 million of growth is principally attributable to Bystolic, Savella, Teflaro, Viibryd and Daliresp, all five new products with patents expiring in the next decade. The fact that Bystolic, which we launched in 2008, achieved $90.6 million in quarterly sales representing 33% growth over the prior year is truly an outstanding performance, particularly since Bystolic is the only branded beta-blocker in an otherwise generic category of multiple anti-hypertensive agents. And we fully expect continued annual sales level increases until they ultimately subside. Our other products may also have significant year-to-year growth prospects.

Our late stage new product development pipeline continues to progress very well. We currently have two new drug applications (NDAs) under review at the FDA. In June we and our partner Almirall filed an NDA for aclidinium, a novel long-acting inhaled anticholinergic bronchodilator for the treatment of COPD. In August we and our partner Ironwood Pharmaceuticals, Inc. filed an NDA for linaclotide, a guanylate cyclase type-C (GC-C) receptor, for the treatment of irritable bowel syndrome with constipation (IBS-C) and chronic constipation (CC). We look forward to hearing from the FDA as the Agency completes its review for both NDAs in the coming months. If FDA approvals are granted our plans are to launch both products later this calendar year.

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Post Written By: Ed Liston Ed Liston is a senior contributing editor at TheStockMarketWatch.com. An active market watcher and investor, Ed guides an independent team of experienced analysts and writes for multiple stock trader publications. He is widely quoted in various financial publications on the Internet. When Ed is not writing about stocks, investing in stocks, talking about stocks, or otherwise doing something stock related, he likes to go sailing and fishing in his yacht.