Business Insider Edition
CVS Health was down more than 7% to $64.88 a share early Wednesday after delivering disappointing full-year earnings guidance.
The drug-store giant reported adjusted earnings of $2.14 a share in the fourth quarter, beating the Bloomberg consensus by $0.06. It netted $54.42 billion in revenue, topping the $53.36 billion that was expected. CVS said its comparable sales grew 5.7% in the quarter, beating on the 4.6% increase that was expected.
"We had strong financial performance and delivered on our operating expectations," said CEO Larry Merlo in a press release. "2018 was a milestone year for CVS Health as we successfully completed our transformational merger with Aetna, began effective implementation of our integration strategy, and took important steps toward building the integrated healthcare model that will bring substantial value to our various stakeholders."
However, CVS said its integration with Aetna will cause some headwinds in 2019. As a result, it provided worse-than-expected guidance for full-year profits.
CVS said it expects its 2019 earnings to be in the range of $6.68 to $6.88 a share, missing the $7.36 that was expected. But its outlook for consolidated revenue of $249.9 billion to $254.3 billion beat the $246.9 billion that was anticipated.
CVS was down 7% this year through Monday.
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