Small Recall Overshadows Big Profit Gain

Article Excerpt

BAXTER INTERNATIONAL INC. $54 (New York symbol BAX; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 651.5 million; Market cap: $35.2 billion; WSSF Rating: Average) fell 5% after it recalled some models of its Colleague medication-delivery pumps. The recall affects just 4,500 of the roughly 280,000 pumps currently in use, so any charge to earnings will probably be small. In the second quarter of 2007, Baxter earned $0.72 a share before unusual items, up 53.2% from $0.47 a year earlier. Revenue grew 7.7%, to $2.8 billion from $2.6 billion, thanks mainly to strong sales of vaccines and its Advate hemophilia drug. The company spends 6% of its revenue of $16.40 a share on research, which it writes off as an ordinary expense. Baxter should earn $2.70 or so a share in 2007, excluding special items, and it trades at 20.0 times that stripped-down figure. Baxter is a buy. buy…