TRENTON, New Jersey: Merck Co. reported Monday it nearly doubled its first-quarter profit, with the drugmaker citing a $1.4 billion (\0.88 billion) payment from a partner drug company and sales up slightly from last year.

The maker of allergy and asthma pill Singulair and cervical cancer vaccine Gardasil posted net income of $3.3 billion (\2.08 billion), or $1.52 (\.96) per share, for the January-March period, up from $1.7 billion (\1.07 billion), or 78 cents a share, a year ago.

The $1.4 billion (\0.88 billion) gain from AstraZeneca PLC, $2.22 billion (\1.4 billion) before taxes, was a scheduled payment from a decades-long deal under which the London-based company promotes chronic heartburn drug Nexium and several other products in which Merck owns an interest. Excluding that and other one-time items, Whitehouse Station, New Jersey-based Merck earned 89 cents per share in the latest quarter.

That was 3 cents more than the forecast of analysts surveyed by Thomson Financial, who were expecting 86 cents per share, excluding one-time items.

Revenues totaled $5.82 billion (\3.66 billion), up 1 percent from $5.77 billion (\3.63 billion) in the first three months of 2007 but below analysts expectations of $6.11 billion (\3.84 billion).

Merck shares slipped 5 cents to $39.71 (\24.98) in late morning trading. They have traded in a 52-week range of $36.82 (\23.16) to $61.62 (\38.76).

Merck, which is in the process of settling massive litigation over its withdrawn painkiller Vioxx with a $4.85 billion (\3.05 billion) agreement, got hit with some new problems during the quarter.

Its osteoporosis treatment Fosamax, which had been the leading drug in the category and one of Mercks top sellers, got new generic competition, cutting sales by 37 percent to $470 million (\295.63 million). The company also reserved $40 million (\25.16 million) for legal defense costs amid about 940 lawsuits alleging the drug damaged jaw bone in some patients.

In addition, Merck and New Jersey neighbor Schering-Plough Corp., which have a profitable partnership selling cholesterol drugs, got a black eye when congressional investigators and some doctors alleged that to protect sales of their blockbuster drug Vytorin, the companies delayed releasing negative study results expected to significantly hurt revenues.

When the full results were finally released last month, nearly two years after the study ended, they showed Vytorin was no better than generic Zocor at reducing plaque buildup to neck arteries. Vytorin combines Mercks Zocor and Schering-Ploughs Zetia. Since mid-January, Merck has been served with about 115 potential class-action lawsuits alleging fraud in the companies promotion of the drugs.

“We anticipate that the confusion in the marketplace (over the study results) will cause sales of Vytorin and Zetia to be significantly lower than expected for the entire year,” Mercks chairman and chief executive officer, Richard T. Clark, told analysts Monday.

Because of that, he said Merck has lowered its expected 2008 income from that joint venture by $700 million (\440.31 million).

However, the company said it expected its blood pressure drugs Cozaar and Hyzaar, as well as other products, to pick up the slack. It reaffirmed its earnings forecast for the year of $3.28 (\2.06) to $3.38 (\2.13) per share, excluding about 60 cents worth of one-time items.

Meanwhile, Merck said that as of March 31, more than 45,000 former Vioxx users who suffered a heart attack or ischemic stroke and are eligible for its global settlement have at least started the enrollment process, keeping the settlement process on track. Eligibility of another 5,500 enrollees is not yet determined.

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By day, John Layfield is an investment banker and professional pontificator for Fox Business Network. By night, he peddles a love potion.

Mamajuana Energy, a berry-flavored liquid that Layfield developed, sells for $4.99 or less in the United States. He bills the 2-ounce, or 57-gram, shots as an all-natural “sexual endurance drink” for men. A ministers son, Layfield says he first sampled the concoction in a dive bar in the Dominican Republic while on vacation and was hooked.

“Its more of a sex potion,” said Layfield, who enjoyed a successful run as a professional wrestler before reinventing himself as a financial whiz and beverage impresario. “Think of it as liquid Viagra.”

Mamajuana - typically made from soaking tree bark and herbs in rum - has long been part of Dominican culture. But it was new to Layfield, who saw a business opportunity. How about introducing a beverage into the booming energy drink market that was also an ostensible aphrodisiac?

Teaming with Baywood International in Arizona, a purveyor of herbal products, Layfield developed a nonalcoholic, caffeinated version of the island elixir, which he named Mamajuana Energy. (He pronounces it mama-JA-wana.) The marketing slogan is “Come to Mama.”

One of his investors is Meredith Whitney, the Wall Street analyst (now at Oppenheimer) best known for downgrading Citigroup in November and helping to prompt a $15 billion drop in the stock. She is also his wife.

Is Layfield a 21st century snake-oil salesman? If traditional mamajuana is indeed a sexual stimulant, say experts in male sexual health, it has less to do with the herbal ingredients than with psychology - and the rum.

“Marketing hocus pocus” is how Dr. Andrew McCullough, director of sexual health and male infertility at New York University, describes the product. McCullough, who also served as a clinical investigator for Viagra, said herbal remedies were unlikely to have a significant impact on the libido and they certainly would have no impact on erectile dysfunction. “Its a bogus promise,” he said.

Still, a lot of people are curious.

“I keep hitting him up for a bottle,” said Neil Cavuto, the Fox Business Network anchor, laughing. Cavuto, who is also managing editor for business news at the Fox News Channel, added that Layfield “has an excellent sense of the marketplace, so my bet is that hes on to something.”

The Vitamin Shoppe agrees. The health supplement retailer recently decided to stock Mamajuana Energy in its 340 stores.

“A lot of products come across my desk, but I saw a huge opportunity here,” said Michael Carrubba, the category manager of Vitamin Shoppe who took Layfields initial call. “It gives us a chance to play in a market that we dont play in very much, which is immediate sexual stimulation.”

Carrubba, who recently took a job at another company, described Mamajuana Energy as “a great grab-and-go item.” He sidestepped questions about the products effectiveness, instead focusing on the flavor. “Its a little medicinal,” he said, “but thats OK.”

Because some of the roots and herbs found in traditional mamajuana are banned in the United States, according to Layfield, he spent a year tinkering with substitute ingredients. Making it nonalcoholic was also crucial, he said, for marketing reasons.

“Show me an 18-year-old guy who doesnt want to be a sexual tyrannosaurus,” he said.

Layfield, a 6-foot-6-inch, or 1.98-meter, Texan, actively cultivates an outlandish persona. His wrestling character is based on the television character J.R. Ewing, the ruthless oilman on “Dallas.” For a photo to accompany this article, his publicist, Pamela Johnston, suggested the following: “Layfield in a beach chair, wearing a suit and tie on the top and swim trunks on the bottom. NYC skyscape in background. Cabana girl serving him Mamajuana Energy on a silver tray.”

Layfields wrestling career began, he says, on a dare to wrangle an 800-pound, or 363-kilogram, bear at a cowboy bar in Texas. The bear won. While the animals teeth and claws had been removed, Layfield says the skirmish left him badly injured.

Still, the thrill of being the center of attention was intoxicating. He recently returned to the ring part time, where he demonstrated his signature move, the “clothesline from Wall Street.” In the maneuver, Layfield catapults himself off the ropes of the ring, runs toward his opponent with his arm extended parallel to the ground and rams into his neck or chest.

Hawking the beverage by himself involves traveling the country and pushing samples at bars and late-night parties, many of them wrestling-related. He also has been coaxing regional convenience store chains to stock the product, and is working on landing more national accounts.

WASHINGTON: Six months ago, the Bush administration quietly eased some restrictions on the export of politically delicate technologies to China. The new approach was intended to help U.S. companies increase sales of high-tech equipment to China despite tight curbs on sharing technology that might have military applications.

But today the administration is facing questions from weapons experts about whether some equipment - newly authorized for export to Chinese companies deemed trustworthy by Washington - could instead end up helping China modernize its military.

Equally worrisome, the weapons experts say, is the possibility that China could share the technology with Iran or Syria.

The technologies include advanced aircraft engine parts, navigation systems, telecommunications equipment and sophisticated composite materials.

The questions raised about the new policy are in a report to be released this week by the Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control, an independent research foundation that opposes the spread of arms technologies.

The administrations new approach is part of an overall drive to require licenses for the export of an expanded list of technologies in aircraft engines, lasers, telecommunications, aircraft materials and other fields of interest to Chinas military.

But while imposing license requirements for the transfer of these technologies, the administration is also validating certain Chinese companies that may import these technologies without licenses.

Five such companies were designated in October, but as many as a dozen others are in the pipeline for possible future designation.

Mario Mancuso, under secretary of commerce for industry and security, said the new system of broadening the list of technologies that require licenses, but exempting some trustworthy companies from the license requirement, results in more effective protections.

“We believe that the system we have set up ensures that we are protecting our national security consistent with our goal of promoting legitimate exports for civilian use,” he said in an interview. “We have adopted a consistent, broad-based approach to hedging against helping Chinas military modernization.”

But the Wisconsin Project report, made available to The New York Times, asserts that two nonmilitary Chinese companies designated as trustworthy are in fact high-risk because of links to the Chinese government, the Peoples Liberation Army and other Chinese entities accused in the past of ties to Syria and Iran.

One of the Chinese companies, BHA Aero Composites, is partly owned by two American companies - 40 percent by the American aircraft manufacturer Boeing and 40 percent by the aerospace materials maker Hexcel. The remaining 20 percent is owned by a Chinese government-owned company, AVIC I, or China Aviation Industry Corp. I.

“In principle, you could find companies that would be above suspicion, but in this case they havent done it,” said Gary Milhollin, Washington director of the Wisconsin Project. “If you just look at the relations these companies have, rather than be above suspicion, they are highly suspicious.”

The Wisconsin Project report also charges that both Boeing and Hexcel have been cited for past lapses in obtaining proper licenses for exports.

Spokesmen for both Boeing and Hexcel said in interviews that they are fully confident that BHA has no ties to the Chinese military and that its use of aircraft parts and materials were strictly for commercial and civilian ends.

“Boeing is not involved in any defense activities in China,” said Douglas Kennett, a company spokesman. “All our activities in China are in compliance with U.S. export laws and regulations.”

Both companies also say that the past failure to get proper licenses has led to tighter controls and, in any case, was the result of improper paperwork affecting products that continue to be exported as licensed.

Milhollin said that research by his staff had uncovered several links with the Chinese military establishment involving both BHA and another of the five companies, Shanghai Hua Hong NEC Electronics.

AVIC I, the Chinese government entity that owns a minority share of BHA, also produces fighters, nuclear-capable bombers and aviation weapons systems for the Peoples Liberation Army, the report says. The State Department has cited another AVIC subsidiary, China National Aero-Technology Import Export, for links to arms sales to Iran and Syria.

The report also says that Shanghai Hua Hong NEC Electronics is majority owned “through a corporate chain” by China Electronics, which the report says is a government conglomerate that produces military equipment along with consumer electronics. It has a subsidiary, the report says, that procures arms for the military.

Milhollin said that the new Bush administration policy granting companies the right to import some technologies without prior licenses was adopted quietly as “a stealth attack on export controls.”