NEW YORK (Reuters) - Schering-Plough Corp's third-quarter earnings fell sharply, hurt by special charges and falling demand for its two cholesterol fighters, but results beat expectations.
The U.S. drugmaker earned $551 million, or 34 cents per share, compared with $713 million, or 45 cents per share, in the year-earlier period.
Excluding special items, Schering-Plough earned 39 cents per share. Analysts on average expected 31 cents per share, according to Reuters Estimates.
Quarterly sales jumped 63 percent to $4.58 billion, slightly better than the Reuters Estimates forecast of $4.48 billion. They were bolstered by sales of products acquired in Schering's acquisition late last year of Organon BioSciences, and from favorable foreign exchange factors.
Total sales of cholesterol treatments Vytorin and Zetia fell 15 percent to $1.1 billion, with plunging U.S. sales somewhat offset by higher overseas revenue.
Schering-Plough last month said it planned to cut 20 percent of its U.S. sales force as part of a previously announced restructuring plan meant to eliminate costs related to the $16 billion Organon purchase. The program is meant to create cumulative savings of $1.5 billion by late 2012.
Other drugmakers, including Pfizer Inc and Merck, have already cut thousands of jobs in order to create savings needed to bolster earnings and finance their costly research programs.
(Reporting by Ransdell Pierson; Editing by Derek Caney)
