Cramer on BloggingStocks: Pfizer's Wyeth bid is obvious in retrospect

Posted Jan 23rd 2009 10:15AM by Jim Cramer
Filed under: Deals, Pfizer (PFE), Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMY), Cramer on BloggingStocks

From TheStreet.com Network

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says it's a quick way to ensure growth in the face of generics competition.

Pfizer's (NYSE: PFE) (Cramer's Take) moves suddenly make sense. You lay off your scientists, you buy the better group at Wyeth (NYSE: WYE) (Cramer's Take) , you get Wyeth's franchise and you slash the sales budget, and voila, you have growth.

That's the greatness of the pharma industry. You need mergers, especially when Obama has made it clear that he's not going to be in the camp of stifling generic competition, of which Pfizer faces the brunt of.

It is why I recommended Forest Labs (NYSE: FRX) (Cramer's Take) last night -- believe me, that's the cheapest. I own Bristol-Myers (NYSE: BMY) (Cramer's Take) because BMY looks like Wyeth with a bigger dividend and a great cancer franchise.

Celgene (NASDAQ: CELG) (Cramer's Take) too -- Celgene was approached not that long ago when it was much higher. CELG's another way to replenish.

Schering-Plough's (NYSE: SGP) (Cramer's Take) been abnormally strong with amazing option activity. That, too, could have no business being independent. And it has great patent protection until 2014.

Funny, I have been looking at Wyeth ever since the group bottomed. Kept trying to find a reason to own it, kept being dissatisfied with the drugs up for approval.

I got that wrong -- just one of many things that I and others have been doing wrong for months now.

Unless I owned Wyeth.

At the time of publication, Cramer was long Celgene and Bristol-Myers. Jim Cramer is co-founder and chairman of TheStreet.com. He contributes daily market commentary for TheStreet.com's sites and serves as an adviser to the company's CEO.

Tags: bristol-myers squibb, Bristol-myersSquibb, Celgene, cramer, featured, Jim cramer, JimCramer, pfizer, pharma, wyeth

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

1-23-2009 @ 10:49AM

Eric Brandler said...

"...in the camp of stifling generic competition, of which Pfizer faces the brunt of."

That's not very elegant Mr. Cramer

1-23-2009 @ 10:59AM

paul s said...

Gotta' love that "great cancer franchise". God forbid they cure cancer, eh, Cramer? No dividend in that.

1-23-2009 @ 3:40PM

M Meyer said...

Wyeth has a lot of cash.......so the purchase is obvious. Rumors have it that Wyeth has been trying to sell for a long time and gossip says the previous head of Wyeth tried very hard to sell so that the higher ups would make lots of money and his children would inherit it since he was so ill. This is a sad day for women's health issues.

1-27-2009 @ 4:56AM

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