Pfizer cuts full-year forecast on stronger dollar

(Reuters) - U.S. drugmaker Pfizer Inc cut its full-year revenue and profit forecast, blaming a stronger dollar. However, the drugmaker reported a better-than-expected first-quarter profit, helped by demand for its vaccines and cancer drugs. Pfizer's shares were roughly unchanged at $34.62 in premarket trade on Tuesday morning. The company, which got 60 percent of its 2014 revenue from outside the United States, cut its 2015 revenue forecast to $44-$46 billion from $44.5-$46.5 billion. Pfizer also cut its profit forecast, joining Johnson & Johnson , which also lowered its forecast earlier this month. The dollar <.DXY> had gained nearly 9 percent against a basket of major currencies from January to March, after rising 13 percent in 2014. Pfizer's net profit rose to $2.38 billion, or 38 cents per share, in the latest quarter, from $2.33 billion, or 36 cents per share, a year earlier. Excluding items, Pfizer earned 51 cents per share, beating the average analyst estimate of 49 cents, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S. Revenue fell 4 percent to $10.86 billion, but beat analysts' estimate of $10.76 billion. Pfizer's global vaccines sales rose 44 percent to $1.33 billion. The stock had risen about 12 percent in the three months to March 31, while the broader Dow Jones industrial Average Index <.DJI> had fallen 1.45 percent. (Reporting by Ankur Banerjee in Bengaluru; Editing by Saumyadeb Chakrabarty and Savio D'Souza)