THOUSAND OAKS, Calif. (AP) _ Amgen Inc. (AMGN) on Tuesday reported fourth-quarter earnings of $1.62 billion.

On a per-share basis, the Thousand Oaks, California-based company said it had profit of $3. Earnings, adjusted for non-recurring costs, came to $4.09 per share.

The results surpassed Wall Street expectations. The average estimate of nine analysts surveyed by Zacks Investment Research was for earnings of $4.04 per share.

The world's largest biotech drugmaker posted revenue of $6.84 billion in the period, which also beat Street forecasts. Nine analysts surveyed by Zacks expected $6.74 billion.

Amgen expects full-year earnings in the range of $17.40 to $18.60 per share, with revenue in the range of $26 billion to $27.2 billion.

Amgen shares have fallen almost 4% since the beginning of the year, while the S&P's 500 index has increased 6%. In the final minutes of trading on Tuesday, shares hit $252.45, a rise of 11% in the last 12 months.

This story was generated by Automated Insights (http://automatedinsights.com/ap) using data from Zacks Investment Research. Access a Zacks stock report on AMGN at https://www.zacks.com/ap/AMGN

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