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Can BMY's Growth Portfolio Counter Legacy Drugs Decline in Q1?

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Key Takeaways

  • BMY's growth portfolio drove 55% of revenues in 2025, with sales rising 17% year over year.
  • Opdivo, Reblozyl and Breyanzi lead growth, supported by label expansions and strong demand.
  • Legacy drugs face 12-16% decline in 2026 due to exclusivity losses, pressuring total revenues.

Bristol Myers Squibb (BMY - Free Report) is undergoing a strategic revenue transition, with its growth portfolio increasingly driving the company’s investment narrative and helping offset headwinds from legacy products.

The growth portfolio — including Opdivo, Opdivo Qvantig, Orencia, Yervoy, Reblozyl, Camzyos, Breyanzi, Opdualag, Zeposia, Abecma, Sotyku, Krazati and Cobenfy — is becoming central to top-line resilience. Sales from this segment rose 17% in 2025, lifting its contribution to 55% of total revenues from 47% in 2024. This shift signals improving revenue durability and supports a more favorable long-term growth outlook.

Within this mix, the company’s immuno-oncology (IO) portfolio, along with drugs like Camzyos, Breyanzi and Reblozyl, maintains momentum for the company.

Blockbuster IO drug Opdivo has maintained sales momentum, driven by label expansions in newer indications and continued share growth within the first-line non-small cell lung cancer setting.

The approval of Opdivo Qvantig, a subcutaneous formulation, has added incremental growth, with initial uptake proving robust across all approved tumor types in the United States.

Other key drugs are contributing to revenue growth, though at varying stages of maturity.

Opdualag sales remain robust, particularly in the United States, where it continues to serve as a standard of care in first-line melanoma.

Reblozyl has reached an annualized sales run rate above $2 billion, driven by demand in first- and second-line MDS-associated anemia patients.

Breyanzi has surpassed $1 billion in annualized sales, reflecting adoption in large B-cell lymphoma and recent label expansions. Camzyos continues to see increasing demand in the cardiovascular segment.

Newer therapies like Cobenfy also add optionality to the long-term story, with early launch traction and potential label expansions positioning it as a future growth lever.

The transition is not without challenges. The legacy portfolio — including Eliquis, Revlimid, Pomalyst, Sprycel and Abraxane — still represents 45% of revenues and continues to face significant erosion due to loss of exclusivity for four drugs (Revlimid, Pomalyst, Sprycel and Abraxane).

Management expects this segment to decline 12-16% in 2026, which is reflected in its revenue guidance of $46.0-$47.5 billion, down from $48.2 billion in 2025.

BMY’s Competition in Oncology Space

Oncology is a key therapeutic area of focus for Bristol Myers, which is developing and delivering transformational medicines in this space.  

The company competes with big pharma giants Merck (MRK - Free Report) and Pfizer (PFE - Free Report) in this space.

The IO space is dominated by pharma giant MRK’s blockbuster drug Keytruda (pembrolizumab).    

Keytruda is approved for several types of cancer and alone accounts for around 50% of MRK’s pharmaceutical sales. Merck is currently working on different strategies to drive long-term growth of Keytruda.

Developing bispecific antibodies that target two proteins, namely PD-1 and VEGF, has lately been one of the lucrative areas in cancer treatment.

In 2024, pharma giant Merck received an exclusive global license to develop, manufacture and commercialize LM-299, a novel investigational PD-1/VEGF bispecific antibody from LaNova.  Merck’s oncology portfolio boasts a blockbuster PD-L1 inhibitor, Keytruda, and the company is looking to build a diversified oncology pipeline spanning differentiated mechanisms and multiple modalities.

Pfizer (PFE - Free Report) is one of the largest and most successful drugmakers in the field of oncology. It has an innovative oncology product portfolio of antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs), small molecules, bispecifics and other immunotherapies that treat a wide range of cancers, including certain types of breast cancer, genitourinary cancer and hematologic malignancies, as well as certain types of melanoma, gastrointestinal, gynecological and lung cancer.  Pfizer also has oncology biosimilars in its portfolio.

The company inked a licensing agreement with 3SBio for the development, manufacturing and commercialization of SSGJ-707, a bispecific antibody targeting PD-1 and VEGF, outside China.

Pfizer is also advancing a robust pipeline of oncology candidates, with several entering late-stage development.

BMY’s Price Performance, Valuation & Estimates

Shares of Bristol Myers have gained 11.5% year to date compared with the industry’s growth of 3.6%.

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From a valuation standpoint, BMY is trading at a discount to the large-cap pharma industry. Going by the price/earnings ratio, shares currently trade at 9.67x forward earnings, higher than its mean of 8.53x but lower than the large-cap pharma industry’s 17.03x.

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The Zacks Consensus Estimate for 2026 EPS has moved north to $6.28 from $6.15 in the past 60 days, while that for 2027 has inched up to $6.08 from $5.94 in the same time frame.

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BMY currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.


 

 

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