Restructuring Reduces Allergan Profit

Allergan Inc. said first-quarter profit fell because of costs for restructuring and the spinoff of the drug maker’s business that makes contact lens products and eye surgery devices.

Net income fell to $43.8 million, or 33 cents a share, from $52.1 million, or 39 cents, a year earlier. Sales increased 9.1% to $432.2 million from $396.1 million on greater demand for glaucoma, muscle-spasm and dermatology drugs.

Irvine-based Allergan last week won U.S. approval to market Botox--a medicine for treating muscle spasms--for use in smoothing forehead wrinkles, a use that analysts said may increase demand. Botox sales rose 31% to $88.6 million in the first quarter. The company is spinning off its contact lens products and eye surgery devices business to focus on its faster-growing pharmaceutical business.

“The pharmaceutical sales are really good,” said Morgan Stanley analyst Marc Goodman, who rates Allergan “overweight” and doesn’t hold its shares.

Sales in the firm’s specialty pharmaceutical unit rose 15.6% to $318.2 million, led by Botox and the glaucoma medicines Alphagan and Lumigan. Botox already was approved to treat a disorder of the eye muscles and the pain of a head-and-neck disorder called cervical dystonia. Doctors had been administering the drug, a refined form of the deadly botulinum toxin, for cosmetic purposes in so-called off-label use.

Sales in the optical device unit Allergan is spinning off fell 5.6% to $114 million.

Shares of Allergan fell $1.87 to $67 Monday on the New York Stock Exchange.