Boston, MA 06/04/2014 (wallstreetpr) – Express Scripts Holding Company (NASDAQ:ESRX), the largest pharmacy benefit firm in the U.S., moved up the Fortune 500 rank in the latest listing. The company moved to No. 20, up from No. 24 where it ranked in 2013. The company was among the nine companies in St. Louis that made it to the Fortune 500’s latest list. The number is the same as last year.
Although ESRX can take comfort in its top 20 ranking in Fortune 500, the company has little to celebrate about, what with expensive drugs that are eating into its profits. And now the company has picked up a war against drug companies that it believes have unfair pricing program.
Problem manifests in earnings
Looking at Express Scripts (NASDAQ:ESRX)’s most recent financial results is enough to reveal the challenge the company is going through in its business. The company earned $0.99 per share in the most recent quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $1.01 per share for the quarter. As if that was not enough, the company reported revenue of $23.69 billion, yet analysts expected revenue of $23.81 billion for the quarter.
The miss in earnings in the latest quarter was because of the higher costs that Express Scripts Holding Company (NASDAQ:ESRX) encountered for treatments related to hepatitis C.
Fighting the price
Following the high costs of hepatitis C treatments using Sovaldi from Gilead Sciences, Inc. (NASDAQ:GILD), Express Scripts Holding Company (NASDAQ:ESRX) has taken matters into its own hands to fight what it terms exorbitantly high costs for the drug. The drug costs $1,000 per pill, meaning about $84,000 for a 12-week treatment.
Express Scripts (NASDAQ:ESRX) is, therefore, urging Gilead (NASDAQ:GILD) to consider lowering the cost of the drug because the high prices are a threat to its profits. Express Scripts claims to have 3 million hepatitis C patients in the U.S. and with the treatment cost per patient being $100,000, Express Scripts could end up spending $300 billion in hep-C treatments alone.
