Thumbs up from investors for CSL’s latest full-year results and confident outlook for the 2020-21 financial year.
Australia’s global pharma giant said yesterday it is looking for an 8% rise in earnings for 2020-21 after reporting record sales and a record dividend for 2019-20, despite all the uncertainties caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
CSL yesterday revealed a record $US2.1 billion ($A2.8 billion) profit for the year to June.
Revenue for the year rose 9% to $US8.54 billion or $US9.25 billion at constant currencies.
Shareholders will benefit from the final dividend up to $US1.07 a share making a total for the year to $US2.02, up from $US1.85 in 2018-19.
That makes a total for the year to June of $US2.02 a share.
That saw the shares jump more than 6% to $312.05.
Looking to the current year CSL said “net profit after tax for FY21 is anticipated to be in the range of approximately $US2,100 million to $US2,265 million at constant currency, representing growth over FY20 of up to 8%’, or about the same pace of expansion as in 2019-20.
Sales in the company’s core blood plasma products business CSL Behring were up 9% to $US7.8 billion, while CSL’s vaccine producer Seqirus saw an 11% rise in revenue to $US1.3 billion as the demand for influenza vaccines globally grew in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.
In the earnings release, CSL chairman Brian McNamee and CEO Paul Perreault said the COVID-19 pandemic had resulted in “sobering and far-reaching” impacts on the global community and added complexities to CSL’s business.
Global shutdowns had presented challenges for collecting plasma which CSL collects predominantly in the United States and uses to make treatments for diseases like hemophilia.
The company’s plasma collections for the 2020 financial year were down 5% compared with 2019 and “additional collection costs” had been incurred as city-wide shutdowns presented a barrier to donors attending collection centres.
“To mitigate this, we have a number of measures in place to sustain plasma collections. It is our view that at some point, the pandemic will recede” the company said in briefing notes to investors,” CSL said yesterday.
The company warned there would be a need for multiple treatment tools in the long-term fight against coronavirus.
“No single vaccine or therapeutic approach is going to solve this health crisis; multiple approaches are essential.”
CSL has a conservative approach to liquidity and leverage, but to further bolster the balance sheet an additional $US750 million was raised earlier in the year via private placement. Available liquidity now stands at $US3.1 billion
