AbbVie lifts profit forecast, downplays tariff threat

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By Christy Santhosh and Puyaan Singh

(Reuters) -AbbVie raised its full-year profit forecast on Friday while downplaying the potential hit some analysts expect it to take from sector-specific import duties that could be imposed by the Trump administration.

Drugmaker shares, including AbbVie’s, have fallen over the past month due to investor concerns around a probe into pharmaceutical imports that sets the stage for U.S. levies on the sector.

The company said its updated 2025 forecast of between $12.09 and $12.29 per share, up 10 cents from its previous estimate, did not reflect any trade policy shifts, including potential sector tariffs. The increase was driven by strong sales of its newer immunology drugs, it said.

Merck on Wednesday estimated that it would incur $200 million in tariff-related costs, while Johnson & Johnson earlier this month accounted for a $400 million hit from those costs in its full-year forecast, mostly related to its medical devices business.

Bernstein analysts said AbbVie is in their “highest risk category” for potential tariffs, along with Merck, adding they expect a hit “in the range of low hundreds of millions of dollars” for the company.

AbbVie CEO Robert Michael said during an investor call that the company could look at alternate sources for the ingredients in its drugs and implement cost efficiencies as ways to mitigate the impact from tariffs.

He added that it would be challenging to try and pass the tariff impacts on to customers, however, given the penalties that might incur from the U.S. government and the terms of its existing commercial contracts.

The Illinois-based drugmaker already had a robust U.S. manufacturing network, the CEO said, with more than 6,000 American workers across 11 sites making raw drug ingredients, biologics, and small molecule drugs, among other things.

The company also said it plans to build four new manufacturing plants in the U.S., following pledges from several drugmakers to pump billions of dollars into U.S. manufacturing in an effort to curry favor with the administration of President Donald Trump. Swiss drugmaker Roche earlier this week said it would invest $50 billion in the U.S. over the next five years.

AbbVie said it expected to invest $10 billion in capital over the next decade, including in manufacturing for obesity drugs, following its March deal with Danish biotech Gubra to develop a weight-loss treatment.

AbbVie shares were up 3% at $185.82 in midday trading.

Global sales of AbbVie’s flagship arthritis drug Humira, which faces competition from 10 cheaper biosimilars in the U.S., stood at $1.12 billion for the first quarter, dropping 50.6% from a year ago, and missing analysts’ estimates of $1.32 billion, according to LSEG data.

AbbVie is now pushing its immunology drugs Skyrizi and Rinvoq, which beat estimates for quarterly sales, to counter the drop in Humira revenue. The company said it expects the two drugs that treat several autoimmune disorders to collectively bring in more than $31 billion in 2027.

Skyrizi had quarterly sales of $3.43 billion, while Rinvoq brought in $1.72 billion.

On an adjusted basis, AbbVie earned $2.46 per share in the first quarter, topping analysts’ expectations by 8 cents.

(Reporting by Puyaan Singh and Christy Santhosh in Bengaluru; Editing by Patrick Wingrove and Bill Berkrot)