Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ) kicked off this earnings season with a grim outlook for its pharmaceutical business, and it looks like the trouble has spread to its big pharma peers. More recently, AbbVie (NYSE: ABBV) and Pfizer (NYSE: PFE) told investors not to expect a great deal of sales growth in 2019.
本财报季伊始，强生公司就发布了一个黯淡的制药业务前景，看来问题已蔓延至大型制药企业。而最近，艾伯维和辉瑞也都在告诉投资者，不要期望2019年销售额能够有很大的增长。
Are these isolated incidents or is the entire pharmaceutical industry in for a year of disappointment? To answer that we need to understand why they're predicting slower sales growth in the first place. Here's what you need to know about the soft-guidance bug that's spreading throughout the biopharmaceutical industry.
这些只是孤立的事件，还是说它们预示整个制药行业将会迎来令人失望的一年？为了回答这个问题，我们首先需要理解为什么这些大公司们预测销售增长放缓。下面是您需要了解的正在蔓延到整个生物制药行业的软引导漏洞。
1. 强生:收入下降
The world's largest healthcare conglomerate kicked off earnings season by telling investors its U.S. pharmaceutical segment is trying to walk up an escalator that's going down. Johnson & Johnson made regular price hikes for successful drugs in 2018, but the net price it actually received after insurers applied discounts and rebates fell between 6% and 8% last year.
这家全球最大的医疗保健集团向投资者表示，其美国制药部门正试图搭上一辆正在下行的自动扶梯，并以此拉开财务季度的序幕。强生在2018年定期上调热销药品的价格，但扣除了保险公司申请的折扣和回扣后，实际的净价反而下降了6%至8%。
Overall, 2018 was a pretty good year for Johnson & Johnson's U.S. pharma division. Despite lower net pricing, higher volume drove U.S. pharmaceutical sales 8.4% higher.
总体而言，2018年对强生美国药企部门来说是相当不错的一年。尽管净价较低，但销量的上升推动美国医药销售增长了8.4%。
In 2019, though, Johnson & Johnson expects total annual sales to fall 1% to $80.8 billion at the midpoint of its guided range. Net prices sliding across the pharmaceutical segment isn't the only headwind Johnson & Johnson faces right now. A rising dollar is expected to knock about $1.2 billion from reported sales this year.
然而，在2019年，强生预计年度总销售额将下降1%，至808亿美元，处于公司指导范围的中值区域。制药板块的净价格下滑并非强生目前面临的唯一逆风。美元升值预计将使今年公布的销售额减少12亿美元左右。
Sales of the company's top-selling product, Remicade, slid 15.7% to $5.3 billion last year, due to biosimilar competition that probably won't subside soon. Zytiga sales reached $1.8 billion last year in the U.S., but generic versions of the prostate cancer tablet launched late last year. Unlike biosimilars, sales of small-molecule drugs often fall by more than half during their first year of generic competition.
该公司最畅销产品 Remicade 的销售额去年下滑了15.7%，至53亿美元，原因是来自生物仿制药产品的竞争，而且该竞争可能不会很快消退。去年前列腺癌药品Zytiga在美国的销售额达到18亿美元，但是该药物的仿制药已经于去年年底上市。与生物仿制药不同，小分子药物的销售额在面临仿制药竞争的第一年往往会下降一半以上。
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