Yesterday was a particularly bad day for the company, with downgrades coming from four analysts after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration released draft guidelines for generic competitors to the Allergan’s dry-eye drug Restasis. The proposed guidelines would make it much easier to get approval for a generic version to compete with the drug that pulled in $1 billion in sales for Allergan last year.
In early May Allergan lowered its guidance and announced a delay in further trials of a drug to treat age-related macular degeneration. Shares dropped $15 in one day, bounced back about $5, but then collapsed again by more than $15 last week on a first round of recent downgrades.
A couple of analysts are out today saying that Allergan is still okay. RBC Capital kept its Outperform rating but did lower its target price. BMO Capital Markets also maintained its Outperform rating and its $118 price target.
The maker of Botox and breast implants posted record sales of $5.2 billion in 2012, and Botox has been approved for treatment of a wide variety of ailments, not just smoothing out wrinkles.
The stock’s rocket-like trajectory began in January with a number of Buy recommendations based on the company’s low debt, high gross margins and operating cash flow. Allergan’s forward price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio has come back to earth, from highs of around 27 to around 15. It could be that Allergan looked a lot better when there was a lot more interest in equities in general.
Shares were up about 2.5% in the late morning today, at $84.07 in a 52-week range of $81.28 to $116.45. The company named a new president yesterday.
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