We are becoming a better-balanced business, both regionally and through our medicines." Shore Capital analysts Adam Barker and Tara Raveendran said the results fell short of expectations on a number of points. Core earnings were 2% below consensus because of higher investment spending and sales of major drugs such as cancer treatments Tagrisso and Lynparza were lower than expected. "Given the broad-based miss of key on-market assets and Core earnings per share today's results are likely to be viewed negatively. We also believe management guidance will disappoint albeit we would flag that AstraZeneca has attempted to quantify the impact of COVID-19 [coronavirus] in its guidance with other large pharma excluding this impact." AstraZeneca returned to growth in 2018 for the first time since 2014 when it fought off a hostile takeover bid from Pfizer. The Anglo-Swedish company increased its sales guidance twice last year as new medicines for cancer, heart disease and diabetes took off.