Bristol-Myers Shares Fall on Schedule of Drug Trial Bristol-Myers Squibb on Friday reported stronger-than-expected quarterly results, but its shares fell because of concerns about the pace at which the company was developing a promising new combination of cancer drugs. The stock dropped as much as 6.7 percent after company officials said in a conference call with investors that they were not yet planning a late-stage trial that would combine two of its drugs as a treatment for lung cancer. Instead, Bristol-Myers said it would continue a midstage study of the drugs - an experimental medicine called nivolumab and an approved melanoma treatment called Yervoy - before moving them into a larger Phase III lung cancer trial. Both drugs enhance the immune system's ability to fight cancer. "Many investors expected Bristol-Myers to rapidly advance the Nivo-Yervoy combo to Phase III, with the plans for such a move perhaps being announced as early as today," said Alex Arfaei, an analyst at BMO, in a research note. The company's slower timetable might be interpreted as a sign of caution or suggest a lack of "synergy" between the two drugs when treating lung cancer, he said. Shares of Bristol closed down 5.6 percent at $50.94. The company reported quarterly earnings of $726 million, or 44 cents a share. That compares with $925 million, or 56 cents a share, in the period a year earlier, when it took a big write-off for a failed hepatitis C drug. Excluding special items, the profit was 51 cents a share, above the analysts" average estimate of 43 cents, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S. Revenue rose 6 percent to $4.44 billion, exceeding Wall Street expectations of $4.3 billion. "Bristol-Myers's execution on cost structure continues to impress, with lower-than-expected spending" that helped the company handily beat earnings estimates, said Seamus Fernandez, a Leerink Swann analyst.