Roche Sales Gain Clouded by Lack of Guidance Boost
(Bloomberg) — Roche Holding AG beat sales expectations in the third quarter but left its outlook for the year unchanged, disappointing investors who had hoped for an upgrade.
Revenue rose 8% to 16.1 billion Swiss francs ($19.7 billion) in the quarter, Roche said Thursday, above the average analyst prediction of 15.8 billion francs. The gain was helped by the older asthma and allergy drug Xolair, which faces cheaper competitors. The shares fell 1.2% in early Zurich trading.
Roche is betting big on multiple sclerosis and oncology, including a new breast-cancer pill it says could one day surpass its former blockbuster Herceptin. The Swiss drugmaker needs new medicines and recovering diagnostics to keep growing as sales of older treatments fade.
The company reiterated its forecast for the year, with earnings growing in the high single-digit range and revenue by a mid single-digit percentage.
The decision not to increase the guidance “should raise some questions about the growth trajectory into 2027,” Michael Leuchten, an analyst at Jefferies, wrote in a note.
Xolair, a medicine first approved more than 20 years ago, is making a comeback to reduce the risk of dangerous reactions like anaphylaxis in people with food allergies. The drug will likely keep growing next year despite cheaper copies becoming available, the company said. Newer blockbusters like the eye drug Vabysmo, Ocrevus for multiple sclerosis and Hemlibra for hemophilia also gained.
Roche is also shopping for new drugs to replenish its pipeline, especially in China, striking six deals there since August alone.
The drugmaker “taps into innovation wherever it happens” and that’s largely in Asia and the US at the moment, according to Chief Executive Officer Thomas Schinecker.
The 51-year-old executive on Thursday made some of his harshest comments to date about Europe’s lack of pharma innovation, saying Germany and others are “not really investing in growth.”
“The US and Asia really play to win, and I feel Europe is more and more playing not to lose,” he said in an interview on Bloomberg television. Roche will “only invest in countries in the future that are also going to reward innovation.”
Investors have warmed to the drugmaker’s efforts to deliver new medicines, with shares rising about 19% in the year to Wednesday, more than other large European pharma companies. Local rival Novartis AG, which faces a patent cliff and has experienced research setbacks recently, has gained 16% in the period.
–With assistance from Guy Johnson and Anna Edwards.
(Updates with shares in second paragraph)
©2026 Bloomberg L.P.
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