Beta Finch - Pharma & Biotech - EN

About Beta Finch - Pharma & Biotech - EN

Leading pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies. AI-powered earnings call analysis for Pharma & Biotech (PHARMA). Two AI hosts break down quarterly results, key metrics, and market implications in digestible podcast episodes.

Publisher

Beta Finch

Category

business

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

21 Mar 2026

Latest episode

29 Oct 2026

Latest episodes

33 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   29 Oct 2026

   Merck Q3 2026 Earnings Analysis

   More earnings analysis: https://betafinch.com (https://betafinch.com) Groups: PHARMA (https://betafinch.com/groups/PHARMA) (https://betafinch.com/groups/PHARMA)) ────────── **ALEX:** Welcome to Beta Finch, your AI-powered earnings breakdown. I'm Alex. **JORDAN:** And I'm Jordan. Today we're diving into Merck's third quarter 2026 results, reported this past Thursday. **ALEX:** Before we get into it — quick disclaimer. This podcast is AI-generated content for educational and entertainment purposes only. Nothing we discuss should be considered investment advice. Always do your own research and consult a qualified financial advisor before making any investment decisions. **JORDAN:** Good to have that squared away. So Alex, Merck's a company everyone's watching right now because of the Keytruda patent cliff looming. What'd the quarter actually look like? **ALEX:** Solid, honestly. Revenue came in at $18.1 billion, up 5% year-over-year, or 4% excluding currency effects. And they actually narrowed and raised the midpoint of their full-year guidance — now expecting $66.8 to $67.3 billion in revenue and EPS of $2.77 to $2.82. **JORDAN:** That's a good sign. Companies don't usually raise guidance if they're nervous about the quarter. Let's talk Keytruda specifically, since that's the elephant in the room. **ALEX:** Right, the Keytruda franchise — including the newer subcutaneous version, Keytruda Qlex — grew 6% to $8.6 billion. Still their biggest product by a mile. But management was candid: they're now approaching peak revenues in certain indications, and growth is moderating as they've basically saturated the eligible patient population. **JORDAN:** And that subcutaneous version, Qlex, is actually really interesting as its own story. $830 million in sales this quarter, and there's litigation drama in Europe — a Dutch court issued an injunction over hyaluronidase IP that's blocking sales in several smaller European markets. **ALEX:** Yeah, but CEO Robert Davis was pretty firm that this doesn't change their confidence. The U.S. business is humming — they're targeting 30-40% subcutaneous adoption by end of 2027, and the affected European markets are described as lower-volume anyway. **JORDAN:** Okay, so that's the "today" story. But the real headline for me is what they said about 2027 — because that's when the real Keytruda cliff pressure, plus generic competition for Bridion and Januvia, starts biting. **ALEX:** CFO Caroline Litchfield called it directly: more than $2 billion in headwinds next year from generics hitting Bridion, the Januvia family, and Adempas. Plus continued Keytruda moderation and some German pricing policy pressure. **JORDAN:** But — and this is the part I think investors should really sit with — she described 2027 as "a year of investment," not decline. They're framing the whole Keytruda loss-of-exclusivity period as more of a "hill" in revenue rather than a cliff, with earnings expected to largely mirror that shallow dip and then resume growth. **ALEX:** That's the bet they're making. And it's backed by what might be the most exciting part of this whole call — the pipeline news out of the ESMO oncology conference last weekend. **JORDAN:** Walk us through it, because there were a lot of acronyms flying around. **ALEX:** The biggest one: sac-TMT, their antibody-drug conjugate, showed nearly a 7-month improvement in median overall survival for endometrial cancer patients compared to chemo alone. That's a disease with rising incidence and a really poor prognosis, so that's meaningful. **JORDAN:** And then there's entismodigene — the individualized mRNA cancer vaccine they're developing with Moderna. This one actually got some strong outside validation. **ALEX:** Right,...

2. 

   29 Oct 2026

   Eli Lilly Q3 2026 Earnings Analysis

   More earnings analysis: https://betafinch.com (https://betafinch.com) Groups: PHARMA (https://betafinch.com/groups/PHARMA) (https://betafinch.com/groups/PHARMA)) ────────── **ALEX:** Welcome to Beta Finch, your AI-powered earnings breakdown! I'm Alex, joined as always by Jordan, and today we're digging into Eli Lilly's Q3 2026 results — and folks, this is a big one. **JORDAN:** Huge one. Stock popped over 6.5% on the news. **ALEX:** It really did. But before we get into it — quick disclaimer. This podcast is AI-generated content for educational and entertainment purposes only. Nothing we discuss should be considered investment advice. Always do your own research and consult a qualified financial advisor before making any investment decisions. **JORDAN:** Important stuff. Okay, Alex, let's talk numbers because they're staggering. **ALEX:** Revenue grew 39% year-over-year — that's nearly $7 billion in additional revenue in a single quarter. Non-GAAP EPS came in at $7.48, and gross margin actually expanded to 84.4%. **JORDAN:** And the guidance raise is what really got everyone's attention. Full-year revenue guidance moved up to $91-92 billion, and EPS guidance jumped to $35-36 — that's roughly a $4 per share increase at the midpoint from where they were tracking before. **ALEX:** Which is wild because this isn't the first raise this year. CFO Lucas Montarce basically said they've now raised full-year revenue guidance by about $10 billion since the start of 2026. **JORDAN:** And when analysts pushed on that — like, "are you guys just being too conservative?" — CEO David Ricks had a great answer. He basically said, look, we're in the middle of the largest category expansion in pharma history. There's real uncertainty here, and he'd rather beat estimates than miss them. Two big unknowns this year were the Medicare bridge program uptake and how deep international out-of-pocket demand would go — and both surprised to the upside. **ALEX:** Let's talk about that Medicare bridge program because it's honestly the story of the quarter. This opened up obesity medicine access to about 20 million seniors starting July 1st, and in just one quarter, over half a million people already filled a prescription. **JORDAN:** And Lilly is absolutely dominating that channel — 7 out of 10 new bridge patients are starting on a Lilly medicine. There was even a USC Schaeffer Center study cited saying this program could save Medicare over $20 billion cumulatively over ten years. That's a pretty powerful argument for why this program might get extended or made permanent. **ALEX:** Right, and that was actually a direct question in the Q&A — will this bridge program survive past 2026? Ricks sounded genuinely optimistic, citing strong uptake, appropriate use based on BMI and comorbidities, and that cost-effectiveness data. He thinks it could get folded into the permanent Part D benefit going forward. **JORDAN:** Let's not overlook the core business though — Mounjaro and Zepbound combined for over $16 billion in the quarter alone, contributing $6 billion of year-over-year growth. China was a standout too — Mounjaro became the first medicine there ever to cross $1 billion in its first full year, with 62% constant currency growth. **ALEX:** And it's not just incretins anymore. Management specifically called out that oncology, immunology, and neuroscience revenue combined actually doubled year-over-year. Jaypirca up 59%, Ebglyss up 59%, and Kisunla — their Alzheimer's drug — up a staggering 175%. **JORDAN:** That diversification story matters. David Ricks made a point of saying three-fourths of their clinical pipeline is actually outside of obesity. They don't want to be a one-trick pony, even though the trick is working extremely well right now.<br...

3. 

   29 Oct 2026

   Bristol-Myers Squibb Q3 2026 Earnings Analysis

   More earnings analysis: https://betafinch.com (https://betafinch.com) Groups: PHARMA (https://betafinch.com/groups/PHARMA) (https://betafinch.com/groups/PHARMA)) ────────── **ALEX:** Welcome to Beta Finch, your AI-powered earnings breakdown where we turn dense earnings calls into conversations you'd actually want to listen to. I'm Alex. **JORDAN:** And I'm Jordan. Today we're digging into Bristol Myers Squibb's third quarter 2026 results, reported this past Thursday. **ALEX:** Before we get into it, our standard disclaimer: this podcast is AI-generated content for educational and entertainment purposes only. Nothing we discuss should be considered investment advice. Always do your own research and consult a qualified financial advisor before making any investment decisions. **JORDAN:** Right, let's get into the numbers because honestly, Alex, this was a pretty strong quarter for BMS. **ALEX:** It was. Total revenue came in at $13.1 billion, up 7% year-over-year. But the number that really matters is the growth portfolio — that's their newer, patent-protected medicines — which jumped 12% to $7.7 billion. **JORDAN:** And that's the story investors want to hear with Bristol, right? They've got this massive legacy portfolio dealing with patent cliffs, but the growth portfolio is now carrying real weight. Eight products are annualizing over a billion dollars each. That's a surprisingly diversified base. **ALEX:** Diversified is the key word. Reblozyl grew 22% to $750 million, Breyanzi — their CAR-T therapy — grew 48% to $526 million. Camzyos jumped 42%. These aren't just incremental wins. **JORDAN:** The one that caught my eye is Qvantig, the subcutaneous version of Opdivo. Sequential growth of 28%, now annualizing over $1.3 billion. They've converted about 17% of their IV Opdivo business to this subcutaneous form, and management said they're tracking toward the higher end of their 30-40% conversion target. **ALEX:** Which matters because Opdivo itself actually declined 6% as patients shift over — but that's by design. It's essentially the same revenue moving to a better-margin, more convenient format. A three-minute in-office injection instead of an infusion. **JORDAN:** Meanwhile, Eliquis — still their biggest legacy product — grew 26% to $4.7 billion. Management flagged that Q4 will see some impact from loss of exclusivity in Europe, and there's a bigger $1.5 to $2 billion step-down expected in 2027. So enjoy this number while it lasts. **ALEX:** On the bottom line, diluted EPS was $1.35, though that includes a $0.58 hit from acquired IP R&D charges and licensing income. Strip that out, and the underlying EPS story actually improved by about 15 cents versus their prior guide. **JORDAN:** And they raised full-year guidance — new EPS range of $6.35 to $6.55. Gross margin held around 68.4%, and they're sitting on $13 billion in cash with $4.2 billion in operating cash flow this quarter alone. That's a company with real flexibility. **ALEX:** Let's talk pipeline, because this quarter was genuinely eventful. Bristol got FDA approval for Symvexis, their first CELMoD — that's a targeted protein degradation drug — for multiple myeloma. Early launch feedback has been positive. **JORDAN:** And it wasn't just one win. In the span of about two months, they had four positive registrational readouts. Admilparant hit its primary endpoint in a Phase 3 pulmonary fibrosis trial. Their radiopharmaceutical RYZ101 showed meaningful progression-free survival improvement in a rare tumor type called GEP-NETs. And Arlocel, their CAR-T for multiple myeloma, delivered positive Phase 2 results. **ALEX:** CEO Christopher Boerner was clearly feeling good about this streak, calling it a "next wave of launches coming into sharper focus."...

Contact Beta Finch - Pharma & Biotech - EN

Guest appearances

Does not typically book guests

Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.