Wyeth profit hurt by generic, but beats forecast

By Ransdell Pierson

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Wyeth posted slightly lower first-quarter earnings on Tuesday, hurt by the recent launch of generic forms of its Protonix ulcer drug, but surprisingly strong sales of other medicines enabled the company to beat Wall Street profit forecasts.

Wyeth earned $1.2 billion, or 89 cents per share, compared with $1.25 billion, or 92 cents per share, a year earlier.

Excluding special items, the drugmaker earned 94 cents per share. Analysts' average forecast was 90 cents, according to Reuters Estimates.

"The earnings number was solid and came in above expectations; it's a good beginning for the year," said David Katz, chief investment officer of asset manager Matrix Asset Advisors in New York.

Global revenue rose 6 percent to $5.71 billion, above the average Wall Street forecast of $5.49 billion. Excluding the favorable impact of the weak dollar, revenue rose just 1 percent.

Wyeth reaffirmed it expects earnings to fall as much as 5 percent this year due to generic competition for Protonix and possible generic competition for its $3.5 billion-a-year Effexor anti-depressant.

"Wyeth historically has been conservative, not raising its yearly estimates even when beating quarterly forecasts, and that seems to be the case now," Katz said.

The Madison, New Jersey-based drugmaker said it expects Effexor sales, which grew 15 percent in the first quarter to $1 billion, to be comparable for the full year to those seen in 2007.