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Sucampo Pharmaceuticals ( SCMP ) popped to a two-month high Tuesday after its Q4 earnings beat estimates. Sucampo said it made 43 cents a share in the quarter, excluding one-time items, up 108% from the year-earlier quarter. That beat analysts’ consensus of 19 cents, according to Thomson Reuters. On a GAAP basis, Sucampo made 23 cents a share. Sales climbed 47% to $55.4 million, about $13 million above consensus. For the full year, Sucampo made 95 cents a share, up 136% from 2014, while revenue rose 33% to $153.2 million. For the current year, the company affirmed its previous guidance of 97 cents to $1.07 in EPS on sales of $195 million to $205 million. Sucampo stock jumped almost 15% in early trading to 16, its highest point since Jan. 5, but closed up just 4.3% at 14.54. The company’s lead drug Amitiza provided most of the revenue, with prescriptions growing 10% over Q4 2014 to 390,228. Sucampo’s income derives from royalties paid by its partners, Takeda in the U.S. and Mylan ( MYL ) in Japan; Sucampo also took a $5 million milestone payment from Mylan in the quarter as part of their partnership. The Q4 results included the acquisition of R-Tech Ueno in December, which gave Sucampo a greater share in Amitiza’s global economics as well as some pipeline products. “The key revenue driver, Amitiza, is doing better than we expected outside the U.S., and even in the U.S. sales remained strong as the end-market sales reported by Takeda for royalty calculation were $102.3 million vs. our estimate of $98.2 million,” wrote UBS analyst Ami Fadia in a research note. “4Q 2015 was the first reported quarter that included the R-Tech deal and we are starting to see the improvement in earnings we were expecting from this deal.” Guggenheim analyst Louise Chen lowered her 2016 earnings estimate slightly due to the guidance, but said several factors could provide upside this year: M&A, data readouts on some pipeline products this year, and new formulations and indications for Amitiza, which is currently used for constipation. She estimated that Sucampo has the financial capacity to make a buyout in the $400 million to $500 million range. Scalper1 News
Scalper1 News