Cardinal Health Inc. Raises Its Annual Profit Forecast

Cardinal Health Inc. on Tuesday raised its annual profit forecast for its first full year following the spinoff of its most profitable business.

Photo: Cardinal Health Inc. Raises Its Annual Profit Forecast

The health care products and services company expects to finish the spinoff of its clinical and medical products business on Aug. 31. That division will become a publicly traded company called CareFusion Corp. That business brings in only 4 percent to 5 percent of Cardinal Health's revenue, but has been responsible for a quarter to a third of its profits, BusinessWeek reports.

Cardinal has lost more than a third of its value in the past 12 months in New York trading amid slower hospital spending, job cuts spurred by the recession and recalls of faulty infusion pumps. While Cardinal may benefit from proposals to expand health coverage if more people use drugs, investors want to see how the company will fare after the Aug. 31 spinoff , said Charles Rhyee , an analyst at Oppenheimer & Co. in New York , Bloomberg reports.

The company said it lifted its fiscal-year forecast for its stand-alone Cardinal business , Reuters reports.