That cash is going somewhere. It ain't going to buy back shares.
Boston's overall sales growth is going to slip to 5 percent in the second half of this year and go flat in 2006. The new-product portfolio Boston is piecing together can restore double-digit earnings and sales growth, but it will probably take until 2009.
Boston Scientific has a couple of more weeks if needed to complete due diligence.
They are destroying the value of their company for a damaged asset. What is their board thinking?
It seems like (Johnson & Johnson and Boston Scientific) are going to dominate the market at least through '06.
The odds of them stopping this are not high. They are fully committed to walking.
Even with the new components of the Boston offer, we don't think Guidant's board will get comfortable enough with the aforementioned antitrust issues and the extra $1.
They walked away, and they got $700 million for their trouble. I don't really see a problem here.