Haleon Shares Dive After Advil Maker Cuts Guidance — 2nd Update

By Aimee Look

Advil maker Haleon's shares dove after the company cut its outlook for the year and weak sales for cough medications weighed on results.

The company, which spun out of pharmaceutical group GSK in 2022, said it now expects full-year organic revenue growth around 2.5%. Haleon at its half-year results in July said it expected organic revenue growth of 3% to 5%.

Shares dropped 13.5% in early morning trading in Europe.

The British consumer-healthcare company's performance was held back by weaker sales in cough, cold and flu products, particularly with lower orders in North America, it said. Its respiratory-health category had a 2% fall in organic revenue.

Other consumer-goods companies across various categories, like British Lysol-maker Reckitt and French yogurt producer Danone, were also held back by a lack of progress in North America.

However, before earnings, J.P. Morgan's Celine Pannuti had said that a strong flu season could uplift sales for Haleon, with rising incidences in Europe and the U.S. "An uptick in scanner data in the U.S. and [Western] Europe has spearheaded hopes that Haleon should benefit from growth momentum in upcoming quarters," the analyst wrote.

While its respiratory-health category's revenue dropped, Haleon's oral-health category grew 8.8% organically for the quarter. In the company's international geography segment, organic revenue grew 6.9% for the quarter.

Haleon's third quarter was disappointing, mainly due to the weaker cold and flu results, said Barclays analyst Warren Ackerman. The company's results fell short in North America, and Europe remained challenged, he said. Oral health was a bright spot, he added.

Haleon reported an overall 2.6% rise in organic revenue, booking 2.87 billion pounds, equivalent to $3.82 billion.

Also on Thursday, Haleon said it is planning to purchase up to 500 million pounds of shares through a buyback, which it expects to complete by the full-year results in February 2027.

Write to Aimee Look at aimee.look@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

October 29, 2026 04:51 ET (08:51 GMT)