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Saturday 29 July 2017 BUSINESS
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A strong second quarter for Merck, outlook mixed

By LINDA A. JOHNSON new cancer drug partner- for top franchises Keytruda, $1.01 per share, trouncing discounts demanded by in-
AP Medical Writer ship with AstraZeneca and Januvia and Zepatier for the 87 cents analysts ex- surers and other payers.
Sustained cost cuts helped a cyberattack last month. hepatitis C. pected. Keytruda sales jumped 180
push Merck’s second-quar- Merck said the attack, Company executives said The company, based in percent to $881 million,
ter profit up 61 percent, which struck numerous Friday that the recovery ef- Kennilworth, New Jersey, and Zepatier sales soared
easily topping Wall Street companies and govern- fort and security improve- posted revenue of $9.93 bil- to $517 million from $112
expectations, as growing ment networks, significantly ments meant to withstand lion, above analyst projec- million a year ago, just after
sales of new cancer and affected its global manu- future threats might not be tions for $9.79 billion. Zepatier’s launch.
hepatitis C medicines offset facturing, research and completed until early next Veterinary medicine sales Keytruda , one of the top
growing generic competi- sales operations. Merck year. jumped 6 percent to $955 new cancer medicines that
tion to older drugs. is still calculating the dis- Merck & Co. reported sec- million, while prescription stimulate the immune sys-
Still, the maker of blockbust- ruption’s magnitude and ond-quarter net income drug sales edged up 1 per- tem to attack cancer cells,
er Januvia for type 2 diabe- continues to restore manu- of $1.95 billion, or 71 cents cent to $9.93 billion. won U.S. approvals during
tes and advanced cancer facturing operations while per share, up from $1.21 bil- Januvia sales fell 8 percent, the quarter to treat four
drug Keytruda trimmed its filling product orders. It an- lion, or 43 cents per share, a to $1.51 billion, amid rising additional cancer types or
2017 profit expectations, ticipates some temporary year earlier. competition and lower net patient groups, including
citing the cost of a major shipping delays, but none Adjusted earnings came to prices deu to ever-bigger- bladder cancer. q

Exxon 2Q profit doubles from a year ago but misses forecasts

low profit of a year ago. Exxon said higher prices it
Profit rose for both produc- got for oil and gas helped
tion of oil and gas and offset a 1 percent decline
Exxon’s refining business. in production of oil and
The results, however, still fell gas.
short of Wall Street expec- Exxon’s exploration and
tations. production side earned
Crude prices are currently $1.2 billion, an increase of
trading around $49 a bar- $890 million from a year
rel, up about 18 percent ago, despite a narrow loss
from a year ago, helping to in U.S. production. That
boost the finances of Exxon profit matched the amount
and other oil and gas com- that Exxon slashed from
panies. capital and exploration, a
The Irving, Texas-based 24 percent reduction from
oil giant said Friday that it a year earlier.
earned 78 cents per share, The company posted a
which was not adjusted $1.4 billion profit from refin-
for one-time items such as ing and selling petroleum
asset sales. Nine analysts products, up $560 million
surveyed by Zacks Invest- from a year earlier on high-
ment Research expected er margins.
83 cents per share on aver- Chairman and CEO Darren
age. Woods said in a statement
A motorist drives by an Exxon sign displaying gas prices in Opa-locka, Fla. Exxon Mobil Corp. Revenue rose 9 percent to that the results were driven
reported earnings, Friday, July 28, 2017. $62.88 billion, beating the by higher commodity pric-
(AP Photo/Alan Diaz) $61.16 billion forecast of es and “a continued focus
IRVING, Texas (AP) — Exxon on oil exploration, helping billion in the second quar- four analysts in the Zacks on operations and business
Mobil Corp. cut spending boost its earnings to $3.35 ter, doubling its historically survey. fundamentals.”q

Wells Fargo faces new scandal in auto insurance business

By KEN SWEET surance on their vehicles iar, it is. Nearly a year ago, ling industry reputation was Wells would purchase it for
AP Business Writer when the customers al- Wells Fargo admitted that in tatters. The bank’s new the customer and charge
NEW YORK (AP) — Scandal- ready had appropriate its employees opened up management has been them for it.
plagued Wells Fargo is back insurance. It will pay $80 to 2 million accounts for trying to amends with cus- Wells acknowledged its
in hot water for signing cus- million in refunds and ac- customers without getting tomers, politicians and the systems signed up custom-
tomers up for products that count adjustments to those their permission in order public ever since. ers who already had insur-
they didn’t need or want. people. to meet overly aggres- In this case, Wells Fargo ance.
This time it’s auto insurance, “We take full responsibility sive sales goals. The bank reviewed auto policies Worse, roughly 20,000 cus-
and the bank says it may for our failure ... and are ex- paid $180 million in fines placed between 2012 and tomers were unable to af-
have cost 20,000 people tremely sorry for any harm and penalties and recently 2017. ford the car payment plus
their cars. this caused our customers, reached a settlement to Like most auto loan com- the insurance that some
The San Francisco-based who expect and deserve pay an additional $142 mil- panies, the bank required did not realize had been
bank acknowledged late better from us,” said Frank- lion to customers through a borrowers to have compre- added to what they owed,
Thursday that it enrolled lin Codel, the head of Wells class-action lawsuit. hensive and collision insur- and that “may have con-
roughly 570,000 auto loan Fargo Consumer Lending, That scandal cost then- ance. tributed to a default that
borrowers for what’s known in a statement. CEO John Stumpf his job, If they didn’t have com- led to their vehicle’s repos-
as collateral production in- If the situation seems famil- and the bank’s once-ster- prehensive coverage, session,” the bank said. q