Gedeon Richter Falls Second Day on Sales Drop: Budapest Mover

Gedeon Richter Nyrt., Hungary’s biggest drugmaker, dropped for a second day as fourth-quarter sales and operating results came in below analysts’ estimates.

The shares declined as much as 1.2 percent and traded 0.7 percent lower at 37,090 forint by the close in Budapest, extending the slide in the past two days to 1.1 percent. The benchmark BUX stock index slid 0.7 percent.

While Richter’s net income jumped 53 percent from a year earlier to 13.7 billion forint ($60 million), sales fell 6.7 percent to 83.6 billion forint in the last three months of the year, according to its statement to the Budapest Stock Exchange today. Profit from operations fell 8.8 percent to 11 billion forint.

“Richter’s results were below consensus on the key lines, even as net profit beat estimates because of one-time impacts,” Akos Horvath, a Budapest-based analyst at broker Equilor Befektetesi Zrt., wrote in a research report.

Richter expects sales to rise 3 percent in euro terms this year, Chief Executive Officer Erik Bogsch told reporters in Budapest today.

“The company is still performing well on export markets,” Peter Fazekas, a Budapest-based analyst at Buda-Cash Brokerhaz Zrt., wrote in an e-mailed report today, adding that he rated Richter a “cautious buy.”

To contact the reporter on this story: Andras Gergely in Budapest at agergely@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Gavin Serkin at gserkin@bloomberg.net; Wojciech Moskwa at wmoskwa@bloomberg.net