Merck & Co., Inc. (NYSE:MRK) Q4 2023 Earnings Conference Call February 1, 2024 9:00 AM ET

Company Participants

Peter Dannenbaum - Vice President, Investor Relations

Rob Davis - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Caroline Litchfield - Chief Financial Officer

Dean Li - President, Merck Research Labs

Conference Call Participants

Umer Raffat - Evercore ISI

Trung Huynh - UBS

Daina Graybosch - Leerink Partners

Carter Gould - Barclays

Evan Seigerman - BMO Capital Markets

Terence Flynn - Morgan Stanley

Adam Jolly - Wolfe Research

Mohit Bansal - Wells Fargo

Chris Schott - JPMorgan

Andrew Baum - Citi

Seamus Fernandez - Guggenheim Securities

Geoff Meacham - Bank of America

Steve Scala - TD Cowen

Chris Shibutani - Goldman Sachs

Louise Chen - Cantor Fitzgerald

Operator

Thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Merck & Co. Q4 Sales and Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] This call is being recorded. If you have any objections, you may disconnect at this time. I would now like to turn the call over to Mr. Peter Dannenbaum, Vice President, Investor Relations. Sir, you may begin.

Peter Dannenbaum

Thank you, Ivy and good morning everyone. Welcome to Merck’s fourth quarter 2023 conference call. Speaking on today’s call will be Rob Davis, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; Caroline Litchfield, Chief Financial Officer; and Dr. Dean Li, President of Merck Research Labs.

Before we get started, I’d like to point out a few items. You will see that we have items in our GAAP results, such as acquisition-related charges, restructuring costs and certain other items. You should note that we have excluded these from our non-GAAP results and provide a reconciliation in our press release. I would like to remind you that some of the statements that we make today maybe considered forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Safe Harbor provision of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such statements are made based on the current beliefs of Merck’s management and are subject to significant risks and uncertainties. If our underlying assumptions prove inaccurate or uncertainties materialize, actual results may differ materially from those set forth in the forward-looking statements. Our SEC filings, including Item 1A and the 2022 10-K identify certain risk factors and cautionary statements that could cause the company’s actual results to differ materially from those projected in any of our forward-looking statements made this morning. Merck undertakes no obligation to publicly update any forward-looking statements.