Shares in liver cancer treatment developer Sirtex Medical have plunged after it ended a challenging year with a $26.3 million loss.
Sirtex said a previously announced $90.5 million writedown in the value of its clinical and research and development assets led to the loss, along with restructuring costs.
Excluding those one-off items, slowing sales growth contributed to a 21 per cent drop in underlying profit to $42.4 million in the 12 months to June 30 - the first fall since 2010/11.
Sirtex said it had a 5.4 per cent lift in global sales of doses of its core technology, a radiation therapy for liver cancer.
However sales growth in its largest market of America slowed to 4.6 per cent.
The company says referrals for the technology declined as competition for patients increased, including from drug-based therapies.
Sirtex also spent $4.1 million on restructuring the business in 2016/17, mostly on redundancies.
The company said it is committed to improving its market share and has cut costs to improve its financial performance, but some challenges may continue.
"We do anticipate the market conditions that manifested in FY17 may persist through FY18," Sirtex said in a statement.
"Though the resetting of the business means we are now better positioned and more focussed on growing our core SIR-Spheres microspheres business."
Sirtex shares dropped $1.70, or 10.5 per cent, to $14.56.
IMPAIRMENTS HIT SIRTEX AS SALES GROWTH SLOWS:
* Full-year loss of $26.3 million vs $53.6m profit
* Revenue up 0.9pct at $236.9m
* Final unfranked dividend 30 cents, unchanged
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