GSK has seen its full-year sales increase by 7% year-on-year to £31.4bn, which is ahead of consensus expectations of £31.1bn.

The pharmaceutical giant also saw its core operating profit jump by 11% to £9.1bn, beating expectations by £100m.

The firm’s general medicines sales increased by 6% in this period.

In the year to the end of 2024, its core earnings per share increased by 10% to 159.3 pence per share.

Meanwhile, GSK declared a Q4 dividend of 16 pence per share, taking the total for the full financial year to 61 pence. This is expected to increase to 64 pence per share for 2025.

Chief executive officer at GSK, Emma Walmsley, said: "GSK delivered another year of excellent performance in 2024, with strong sales and core profit growth driven by accelerating momentum of our specialty medicines portfolio.

"We are increasing and prioritising R&D investment to promising new long-acting and specialty medicines in respiratory, immunology & inflammation, oncology and HIV. Our outperformance and stronger balance sheet support these investments and others planned in R&D."

Looking ahead, the firm has announced a £2bn share buyback scheme that will be implemented over the next 18 months.

GSK now expects turnover growth of between 3% and 5% in 2025, with core operating profit and core earnings per share growth of between 6% and 8% respectively in the same period.

Looking further ahead, it expects 2031 sales to reach more than £40bn, having previously set the target at more than £38bn. GSK said that this reflected late-stage pipeline progress guidance.

Head of equity research at Hargreaves Lansdown, Derren Nathan, said that the latest results are a "healthy dose of good news" for the firm.

He concluded: "The pipeline’s in good shape, with five major new product approvals expected this year, underpinning an increase in the 2031 sales outlook to over £40bn of revenue.

"Despite the demands of ongoing research on cash resources GSK took a sizeable bite out of its net debt pile last year and is increasing returns to shareholders with a £2bn buyback. Growth guidance for the current year looks a little pedestrian but at just over 8x forward earnings, the valuation doesn’t reflect the strong progress being made on the ground."

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