Health Stocks in Motion

Updated from 2:35 p.m. EDT

Shares of NBTY (NTY) were among the best-performing health and pharmaceutical stocks Monday, rising 11.9% after the company released preliminary fourth-quarter sales results.

The maker of nutritional supplements posted preliminary sales of $426 million, up significantly from the year-ago period, when it turned in sales of $365 million. Analysts polled by Thomson First Call were expecting fourth-quarter sales of $394.1 million. Shares of NBTY traded up $2.71 to $25.40.

Euro Tech Holdings(CLWT) rose 10.2% after the company signed two contracts to supply flow injection analyzers and sample preparation equipment for water quality analysis. The contracts, worth about $1.9 million, were awarded by the State Environmental Protection Agency of the People's Republic of China. The equipment will be supplied and installed in monitoring stations around various parts of China by the end of the year. Shares traded up 27 cents to $2.92.

Shares of Cytyc(CYTC) rose 5.4% after the company announced a multi-year deal with LabOne(LABS). The deal calls for Cytyc's ThinPrep Imaging Systems to be placed within a LabOne lab in the Kansas City area. The location is the highest volume, single-site testing lab in the country, Cytyc said. The ThinPrep system is used to improve cancer screening efficiency and performance. Shares traded up $1.30 to $25.23.

Johnson & Johnson(JNJ) traded actively after the company announced that its Ortho Biotech Products unit received a subpoena from the Office of the Inspector General for the Department of Health and Human Services. The subpoena for documents is related to the sales and marketing of Procrit, a treatment that's used for anemia. Johnson & Johnson said that it is cooperating with regulators. Shares traded up 25 cents to $57.25.

Other health care volume movers included Merck(MRK), up 92 cents to $34.23; Schering-Plough (SGP), down 45 cents to $18.50; Amgen(AMGN), down 13 cents to $57.63; Pfizer(PFE), up 33 cents to $31.30; and Genentech(DNA), up 83 cents to $53.99.

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