AbbVie Offers Cash Flow While CRISPR Bets on Gene Editing

AbbVie’s second-quarter results put a hard number on the pharmaceutical giant’s post-Humira transition: $16.99 billion in revenue, up 10.2% from a year earlier. The growth is no longer theoretical. Skyrizi and Rinvoq generated a combined $8.03 billion during the quarter, with sales of each drug rising roughly 24%.

That matters because AbbVie is being judged on whether it can replace Humira, once the world’s best-selling drug, rather than simply harvest its legacy portfolio. Humira revenue fell 35.9% year over year to $756 million in the second quarter, but the decline was more than offset by newer immunology medicines and gains in neuroscience. AbbVie also reiterated a 2026 adjusted earnings outlook of $13.87 to $14.07 per share after factoring in its planned acquisition of Apogee Therapeutics.

CRISPR Therapeutics offers a very different proposition. Its investment case rests on Casgevy, the first approved CRISPR-based medicine, which it developed with Vertex Pharmaceuticals. Casgevy revenue reached $76 million in the second quarter, up 78% from the prior quarter and 151% from a year earlier, according to CRISPR’s earnings release. The FDA’s July 1 approval for patients as young as 2 expanded the eligible population by approximately 5,500 people, although treatment remains complex, individualized and expensive.

The commercial signal is encouraging, but CRISPR is still funding a research company around one emerging product. It reported a second-quarter net loss of $91.2 million, even as the loss narrowed sharply from $208.5 million a year earlier. Its pipeline adds upside, including early-stage programs aimed at hypertension and alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency, but those assets remain clinical bets rather than established revenue streams.

For most investors, AbbVie is the stronger buy for 2026. Its expanding drug franchise produces substantial cash, supports a dividend and gives management room to acquire new growth. CRISPR is the more explosive possibility, particularly if Casgevy adoption accelerates and in vivo gene editing works as hoped. It is also the stock more exposed to clinical setbacks, manufacturing friction and reimbursement delays. AbbVie is a compounding pharmaceutical business. CRISPR is a wager on medicine’s next platform.