NVO Novo Nordisk

By Dominic Chopping

Denmark's Novo Nordisk A/S (NVO) Friday trimmed its 2016 guidance due to currency exchange rates, but posted better-than-expected first-quarter net profit on the back of strong sales of its Victoza and Tresiba diabetes drugs.

"Given the current level of exchange rates versus the Danish krone, [sales] growth reported in DKK is now expected to be around 3 percentage points lower than the local currency level," the company said.

Growth in earnings before interest and tax in 2016 is now expected to be around 4 percentage points below growth in local currencies, it said.

The company had previously expected both metrics to grow around 1 percentage point below the local currency level.

Net profit for the three months ended Mar. 31 fell to 9.46 billion Danish kroner ($1.45 billion) from DKK9.88 billion the same period in 2015, after last year's figure was boosted by income from the initial public offering of a subsidiary. Analysts polled by FactSet expected a net profit of DKK9.16 billion.

Sales in the first-quarter were DKK27.21 billion compared with DKK25.20 billion in the year-ago period. Operating profit fell to DKK12.31 billion from DKK13.86 billion.

The company said that all regions helped boost sales in the quarter, but the U.S. was the main contributor.

For 2016, sales and operating profit are both still expected to grow by 5% to 9% measured in local currencies.

Write to Dominic Chopping at dominic.chopping@wsj.com; Twitter: @domchopping @WSJNordics

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

April 29, 2016 03:50 ET (07:50 GMT)

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