The Zacks Analyst Blog Highlights: Amazon, Medtronic, Vertex Pharmaceuticals, Intuit and Bayer

For Immediate Release

Chicago, IL – April 6, 2020 – Zacks.com announces the list of stocks featured in the Analyst Blog. Every day the Zacks Equity Research analysts discuss the latest news and events impacting stocks and the financial markets. Stocks recently featured in the blog include: Amazon AMZN, Medtronic MDT, Vertex Pharmaceuticals VRTX, Intuit INTU and Bayer BAYRY.

Here are highlights from Friday’s Analyst Blog:

Top Research Reports for Amazon, Medtronic and Vertex

The Zacks Research Daily presents the best research output of our analyst team. Today's Research Daily features new research reports on 16 major stocks, including Amazon, Medtronic and Vertex Pharmaceuticals. These research reports have been hand-picked from the roughly 70 reports published by our analyst team today.

You can see all of today’s research reports here >>>

Amazon’s shares have outperformed the S&P 500 over the past six months (+10.3% vs. -14.2%). The Zacks analyst believes that Amazon is benefiting from its aggressive retail strategies, distribution strength and robust Prime program.

Rapid adoption of Prime driven by customer benefits and strengthening grocery services is aiding its top line. Also, expanding content portfolio is encouraging Prime membership. Further, strengthening AWS services and its growing adoption rate are aiding Amazon’s dominance in the cloud space. Furthermore, improving Alexa skills and features remain major positives.

Also, rising number of Alexa compatible devices is a tailwind. However, rising transportation cost related to its free one-day shipping service remains an overhang and is likely to increase further. Further, foreign exchange headwinds are concerns. Additionally, rising cloud competition poses risk.

Shares of Medtronic have lost -4% over the past year against the Zacks Medical Products industry’s fall of -15.8%. The Zacks analyst believes that within RTG, strong sales at Specialty and Brain Therapies more than offset slower growth in Pain Therapies.

Within CVG, despite the ongoing challenges, the company registered 1.8% growth at CER. The MITG arm recorded sturdy growth on strength across all businesses. The 2020 EPS guidance also looks promising.

However, its revenues lagging estimates, and escalating costs and expenses have been persistently pressurizing the margins. Unfavorable currency movement also deterred growth. The difficult macroeconomic conditions due to coronavirus outbreak is concerning as well.

Vertex’s shares have gained 8.1% over the past three months against the Zacks Biomedical and Genetics industry’s fall of -7.1%. The Zacks analyst expects Vertex’ sales in 2020 to be primarily driven by the uptake of Trikafta as well as higher international revenues due to additional ex-U.S. reimbursement arrangements in key countries like England and France.

Trikafta’s early approval and launch was a key milestone for Vertex. Trikafta is crucial for Vertex’s long-term growth as it has the potential to treat up to 90% of CF patients. Meanwhile, Vertex’s non-CF pipeline is progressing rapidly with data in multiple diseases expected in 2020. However, competitive pressure is rising in the CF market.

Also, Vertex’s dependence on just the CF franchise for growth is a concern. Estimates have declined ahead of Q1 earnings due to the coronavirus impact. Vertex has a positive record of earnings surprises in the recent quarters.

Other noteworthy reports we are featuring today include Intuit and Bayer.

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Past performance is no guarantee of future results. Inherent in any investment is the potential for loss. This material is being provided for informational purposes only and nothing herein constitutes investment, legal, accounting or tax advice, or a recommendation to buy, sell or hold a security. No recommendation or advice is being given as to whether any investment is suitable for a particular investor. It should not be assumed that any investments in securities, companies, sectors or markets identified and described were or will be profitable. All information is current as of the date of herein and is subject to change without notice. Any views or opinions expressed may not reflect those of the firm as a whole. Zacks Investment Research does not engage in investment banking, market making or asset management activities of any securities. These returns are from hypothetical portfolios consisting of stocks with Zacks Rank = 1 that were rebalanced monthly with zero transaction costs. These are not the returns of actual portfolios of stocks. The S&P 500 is an unmanaged index. Visit https://www.zacks.com/performance for information about the performance numbers displayed in this press release.

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Medtronic PLC (MDT) : Free Stock Analysis Report
 
Amazon.com, Inc. (AMZN) : Free Stock Analysis Report
 
Intuit Inc. (INTU) : Free Stock Analysis Report
 
Vertex Pharmaceuticals Incorporated (VRTX) : Free Stock Analysis Report
 
Bayer Aktiengesellschaft (BAYRY) : Free Stock Analysis Report
 
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