With quarterly earnings underway, BioPharma Dive is providing a snapshot of some companies’ results and how they’re being received by investors. Today, we’re offering insight into the latest numbers from Amgen, Pfizer and Merck & Co.

A blemish on Amgen’s ‘high quality’ quarter

Over the course of last year, Amgen recorded $35.1 billion in annual product sales, reflecting a 10% increase that delighted some analysts. The company touted how 14 of its medicines surpassed $1 billion in sales. Eighteen had their best commercial year yet.

Looking just at fourth quarter, Amgen reported product sales of almost $9.4 billion. The performance during that three-month period was “very high quality” and handily beat expectations on Wall Street, according to Raymond James analyst Christopher Raymond. The company’s financial guidance for 2026 — which includes total revenue in the range of $37 billion to $38.4 billion and earnings per share between $15.45 and almost $17 — also “leaves plenty of room for upside.”

“As we have said for some time, there is no better commercial execution team in this business and that execution was on full display with this print,” Raymond wrote in a note to clients.

However, Amgen’s report wasn’t fully glowing. The company disclosed that, on Jan. 16, the Food and Drug Administration requested a medicine used to treat a group of rare, blood-vessel-swelling diseases be pulled from market. Amgen got ahold of that medicine, Tavneos, through its nearly $4 billion acquisition of ChemoCentryx back in 2022.

Amgen said the FDA has raised concerns about Tavneos’ potential risks to liver health, as well as the way ChemoCentryx handled results from the main clinical trial that led to the drug’s approval.

Even so, Amgen said that after reviewing years of data and real-world evidence, it remains confident in Tavneos. The company last week informed the agency it does not intend to withdraw the drug, and instead will be “evaluating next steps with the FDA to determine a path forward, while keeping patient safety, needs and support at the forefront.”

Umer Raffat, of Evercore ISI, called this update “surprising” and highlighted that European regulators appear to be conducting a similar re-evaluation.

Yet, these issues might not have much of an impact on Amgen’s bottom line. Tavneos brought in $459 million last year, barely 1% of overall revenue. Salim Syed, at Mizuho Securities, wrote that he expects a limited stock impact from the update. — Jacob Bell

Pfizer defends obesity drug results

Pfizer executives put on a brave face Tuesday, calling the Phase 2 results for their lead obesity drug “compelling” despite skepticism that pressured company shares.

The GLP-1 shot, previously called MET097i and now PF’3944, joined Pfizer’s pipeline with the $10 billion buyout of Metsera last year. Since then, investors have been keen to see signs it might be able to compete with Eli Lilly’s Zepbound and Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy and justify Pfizer’s acquisition price.

The results unveiled alongside Pfizer’s fourth-quarter earnings report raised questions from some Wall Street analysts. Leerink Partners’ David Risinger wrote that the data suggested Pfizer’s drug was “slightly inferior” to Zepbound, while Evercore ISI’s Raffat noted how Pfizer might need a “much higher dose” to accomplish its goals. Pfizer shares tumbled about 3% following the news and, at one point, were down as much as nearly 5% on the day.

Still, Pfizer executives indicated the best results lay ahead. The drug, which Pfizer hopes to position as a once-monthly injection,“has the potential to deliver efficacy that's competitive with the standard of care and potentially best in class,” said Aamir Malik, Pfizer’s U.S. commercial chief, in a call with analysts.

Pfizer intends to get there by perfecting its dosing strategy going forward. According to Chris Boshoff, the company’s chief scientific officer, Pfizer intends to double the maximum dose in further testing, allow for a slower step-up to that dose and allow patients to dial doses down. The hope is doing so will reduce side effects,improve weight loss totals and limit trial discontinuations, he said.

According to Pfizer, internal modeling that accurately predicted weight loss from the doses that have been tested so far forecast that the monthly dose to be tested in Phase 3 — 9.6 milligrams — will spur weight loss amounting to 15 percentage points better than a placebo after 28 weeks. “We think ‘3944 is going to be a compelling therapy, full stop,” Malik said. — Jonathan Gardner

Merck’s $70B-in-sales plan

Merck & Co. is preparing to lose its biggest moneymaker in Keytruda, the cancer immunotherapy that accounted for nearly half of the company’s $65 billion in sales last year. The big drugmaker has been adamant that it can not only overcome the loss of Keytruda’s market exclusivity in 2028, but grow sales to $70 billion annually next decade. It laid out plans to reach that target in fourth-quarter earnings on Tuesday, pointing to “the broadest and widest pipeline” the company has had in years.

According to CEO Rob Davis, Merck has already done much of the work needed to get there. The company only needs a few more key readouts and approvals to go its way.

“Of the $70 billion, we’re going to de-risk substantially all of that by the time we get to the end of 2027,” Davis told analysts.

On Tuesday, for instance, the company reported sales growth in 2025 for several young products. The pneumococcal shot Capvaxive generated $279 million in fourth-quarter sales, surpassing consensus estimates by 33%, according to Leerink Partners analyst Daina Graybosch. Kidney cancer drug Welireg also beat sales estimates in generating $220 million between October and December. That medicine could receive an important label expansion and become a “significant growth driver” for Merck this decade, Graybosch added.

Merck’s lung drug Winrevair pulled in more than $1.4 billion in 2025, and uptake could climb higher following a key data readout last year.

Potentially joining those products on the market soon could be a cholesterol-lowering pill and an antibody-drug conjugate Merck is co-developing with Kelun-Biotech.

Still, Merck has some hurdles ahead. Declining sales in China for its HPV vaccine Gardasil have pressured shares. The company also has a series of study readouts coming that are important to its projections, a few of which involve assets it recently acquired through buyouts. Those prospects include an eye drug from EyeBio, an inflammatory bowel disease therapy inherited from Prometheus Biosciences, and a preventative flu medicine from Cidara Therapeutics. Merck believes Cidara’s drug “has greater than $5 billion in revenue potential,” said Davis.

Merck expects Phase 3 results from all of those therapies, as well as two of its ADCs and an HIV regimen, by sometime next year. Davis expressed optimism that they’ll turn up positive.

“I’m proud of the progress we’ve been making,” Davis added. “That’s why my confidence is so high.” — Delilah Alvarado