NEW YORK (Reuters) - Bristol-Myers Squibb Co on Thursday said third-quarter earnings tripled from the sale of its ConvaTec wound-healing unit and higher drug sales, but the company took another big charge for soured investments.
The New York-based drugmaker said it earned $2.58 billion, or $1.29 per share, compared with $858 million, or 43 cents per share in the year-ago quarter.
The results reflect a $2 billion after-tax gain from the sale of the ConvaTec unit in August.
Bristol-Myers said its net earnings from continuing operations fell 21 percent to $588 million, or 30 cents per share, primarily due to a charge of $224 million in the quarter related to losses on auction rate securities.
The company previously had identified $811 million of such investments whose value had been deemed questionable because subprime mortgages were a component of the securities. It wrote down $275 million of the securities in the first quarter and said the carrying value of remaining invested principal, following the latest charge, has been reduced to $213 million.
Excluding special charges, Bristol-Myers said its third-quarter earnings from continuing operations was 46 cents per share.
Analysts on average expected 42 cents per share, according to Reuters Estimates.
(Reporting by Ransdell Pierson, editing by Maureen Bavdek)
