J&J beats on earnings but falls 5.8%: Tremfya's gain barely covers Stelara's loss as MedTech misses

Johnson & Johnson reported third-quarter revenue of $25.4 billion and adjusted earnings of $2.59 a share on Tuesday, ahead of Wall Street estimates of $25.28 billion and about $2.54, according to CNBC's carriage of Reuters reporting. The company raised its full-year sales forecast to about $101.2 billion at the midpoint and its adjusted earnings midpoint to $11.10 a share, from $11.04. By 11:50 AM ET, Nasdaq data showed the stock at $248.55, down $15.19 or 5.76% from Monday's $263.73 close.

A beat that costs a company nearly 6% in a morning is a story about the parts that were not the headline.

The number behind the number: one drug replacing another

Two lines tell most of the quarter. Tremfya, the immune disease drug, rose 68% to $2.4 billion. Stelara, which now faces generic competition, fell 54% to $716 million. Working backward from those stated percentages (our arithmetic, rounded), Tremfya added roughly $970 million over the year-ago quarter while Stelara lost roughly $840 million. The net is about $130 million of growth from the pair.

That is the point. J&J's best-growing new drug is mostly refilling the hole left by its old one. Guggenheim analyst Vamil Divan noted that Stelara and Simponi, older products, were strong, and that Tremfya and the myeloma drug Tecvayli were the only newer strategic products that clearly beat expectations. Darzalex, the blood cancer treatment, rose about 16% to $4.24 billion but missed the roughly $4.4 billion analysts expected, a shortfall of about $160 million.

Line	Q3 2026	Versus expectations
Total revenue	$25.4B	Above $25.28B
Pharmaceuticals	$16.76B, +7.7%	Not stated in our sources
Medical technology	$8.6B, +2.5%	Below $8.71B (about $110M short)
Tremfya	$2.4B, +68%	Above about $2.2B
Stelara	$716M, -54%	Above $591M
Darzalex	$4.24B, +16%	Below about $4.4B

MedTech missed, and it is the unit being separated

Medical technology sales of $8.6 billion missed by about 1.3%. Sales outside the United States were essentially flat. J.P. Morgan analyst Chris Schott attributed the miss largely to cardiovascular and surgery, and Reuters reported that the Abiomed heart pump business stayed slow after a UK study earlier this year raised questions about Impella pumps in certain high-risk coronary procedures. Guggenheim's Divan called the MedTech results "somewhat disappointing."

The segment matters more than a 1% miss suggests because it includes the orthopedics business J&J intends to separate. CFO Joe Wolk told analysts the company remains on track for a mid-2027 separation of DePuy Synthes, and that "we are leaning towards a spin as being the best option." Bloomberg reported in September that Apollo Global Management was in talks to acquire the unit in a deal that could value it near $20 billion; Wolk's comment points to a spinoff rather than a sale, though we have not seen the company rule out other routes. The Wall Street Journal ran the same headline this morning.

Defense budgets are now a hospital-sales line

The least obvious detail came from Wolk's interview with Reuters. The Middle East conflict has driven up fuel costs but has not yet raised J&J's own costs. It has hurt sales in the region, he said, because wealthy Gulf states that normally spend on premium healthcare are shifting budgets toward defense, naming Kuwait, the UAE and Saudi Arabia. He added that austerity in Europe and pricing in China continued to weigh on international results, "in a little bit more pronounced way."

For anyone tracking medical-device suppliers or hospital capital budgets, that is a transmission channel from war spending to elective equipment orders, and it is worth watching in other companies' reports this month.

Where the stock stands

At the 11:50 AM price, Nasdaq put J&J's market value at about $599 billion. The stock's 52-week range is $184.66 to $281.07, so it trades roughly 12% below its high after this morning's drop. Quotes move all day; treat these figures as a snapshot from that minute.

What we are watching: whether the DePuy Synthes spin comes with a filing that breaks out the unit's revenue and margin, and how the fourth-quarter Tremfya and Stelara lines net out as generic erosion continues.

Sources: CNBC / Reuters; WSJ; Johnson & Johnson investor relations; SEC EDGAR filings; Nasdaq market data at 11:50 AM ET, Oct. 13, 2026. Year-ago figures are derived from stated percentage changes and are approximate. This is market information, not investment advice.