Analysts Have Made A Financial Statement On Ionis Pharmaceuticals, Inc.'s (NASDAQ:IONS) First-Quarter Report

Shareholders might have noticed that Ionis Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ:IONS) filed its quarterly result this time last week. The early response was not positive, with shares down 6.8% to US$40.16 in the past week. It wasn't the greatest result, with ongoing losses and revenues of US$119m falling short of analyst predictions. The losses were a relative bright spot though, with a per-share statutory loss of US$0.98 being moderately smaller than the analysts forecast. Earnings are an important time for investors, as they can track a company's performance, look at what the analysts are forecasting for next year, and see if there's been a change in sentiment towards the company. Readers will be glad to know we've aggregated the latest statutory forecasts to see whether the analysts have changed their mind on Ionis Pharmaceuticals after the latest results.

See our latest analysis for Ionis Pharmaceuticals

Taking into account the latest results, the current consensus, from the 20 analysts covering Ionis Pharmaceuticals, is for revenues of US$599.4m in 2024. This implies a concerning 23% reduction in Ionis Pharmaceuticals' revenue over the past 12 months. Per-share losses are expected to explode, reaching US$3.94 per share. Before this earnings announcement, the analysts had been modelling revenues of US$619.7m and losses of US$3.94 per share in 2024.

The consensus price target was broadly unchanged at US$58.17, implying that the business is performing roughly in line with expectations, despite a downwards adjustment to forecast revenue next year. The consensus price target is just an average of individual analyst targets, so - it could be handy to see how wide the range of underlying estimates is. The most optimistic Ionis Pharmaceuticals analyst has a price target of US$85.00 per share, while the most pessimistic values it at US$33.00. This is a fairly broad spread of estimates, suggesting that analysts are forecasting a wide range of possible outcomes for the business.

One way to get more context on these forecasts is to look at how they compare to both past performance, and how other companies in the same industry are performing. One more thing stood out to us about these estimates, and it's the idea that Ionis Pharmaceuticals' decline is expected to accelerate, with revenues forecast to fall at an annualised rate of 29% to the end of 2024. This tops off a historical decline of 5.6% a year over the past five years. By contrast, our data suggests that other companies (with analyst coverage) in a similar industry are forecast to see their revenue grow 18% per year. So it's pretty clear that, while it does have declining revenues, the analysts also expect Ionis Pharmaceuticals to suffer worse than the wider industry.

The Bottom Line

The most important thing to take away is that the analysts reconfirmed their loss per share estimates for next year. Unfortunately, they also downgraded their revenue estimates, and our data indicates underperformance compared to the wider industry. Even so, earnings per share are more important to the intrinsic value of the business. There was no real change to the consensus price target, suggesting that the intrinsic value of the business has not undergone any major changes with the latest estimates.

Following on from that line of thought, we think that the long-term prospects of the business are much more relevant than next year's earnings. We have forecasts for Ionis Pharmaceuticals going out to 2026, and you can see them free on our platform here.

Even so, be aware that Ionis Pharmaceuticals is showing 1 warning sign in our investment analysis , you should know about...

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This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.