AstraZeneca reports strong first quarter

(Sharecast News) - AstraZeneca delivered a strong performance in the first quarter of 2025, it announced on Tuesday, with total revenue rising 10% at constant exchange rates to $13.59bn, supported by double-digit growth in oncology and biopharmaceuticals across all major regions. The FTSE 100 drugmaker said product sales rose 9% to $12.88bn, while reported earnings per share climbed 34% to $1.89 and core EPS increased 21% to $2.49.

Core operating profit grew 12%, and the company maintained its full-year guidance for high single-digit revenue growth and low double-digit core EPS growth at constant exchange rates.

"Our strong growth momentum has continued into 2025 and we have now entered an unprecedented catalyst-rich period for our company," said chief executive officer Pascal Soriot.

He added that AstraZeneca was making "excellent progress toward our ambition of eighty billion dollars in total revenue by 2030," underpinned by a broad-based global manufacturing and R&D footprint, including planned expansion in the United States.

Alongside the results, AstraZeneca announced it would discontinue the CAPItello-280 phase three trial of Truqap in metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer after an independent committee concluded the combination therapy was unlikely to meet its primary endpoints.

The company said the safety profile remained consistent with previous studies and that findings would inform future research.

Separately, AstraZeneca also said it had received a positive recommendation from the European Medicines Agency's Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use for fixed-duration Calquence-based regimens in first-line chronic lymphocytic leukaemia.

Data from the AMPLIFY ohase three trial showed that Calquence combinations significantly reduced the risk of disease progression or death compared to standard chemoimmunotherapy, positioning Calquence to potentially become the only all-oral second-generation BTK inhibitor regimen approved in Europe for untreated CLL patients.

Reporting by Josh White for Sharecast.com.