Johnson & Johnson

Phase A — Understand the business

Lens 1 · Company Overview

Johnson & Johnson is the world's largest broad-based healthcare company, run as two reportable segments:

• Innovative Medicine (pharma) — FY2025 sales $60,401M, 64% of the total, segment income before tax $22,266M (36.9% IBT margin). Six therapeutic areas: Oncology ($25.4B), Immunology ($15.7B), Neuroscience ($7.8B), Pulmonary Hypertension ($4.4B), Infectious Diseases ($3.2B), Cardiovascular/Metabolism/Other ($3.8B).
• MedTech (devices) — FY2025 sales $33,792M, 36% of the total, segment IBT $4,113M (12.2% IBT margin). Four franchises: Cardiovascular ($8.9B), Surgery ($10.1B), Orthopaedics ($9.3B), Vision ($5.5B).

Total FY2025: sales $94,193M (+6.0%), gross profit $63,937M (67.9% GM), net earnings $26,804M, diluted EPS $11.03. This is post-Kenvue: J&J spun out its consumer-health business (Band-Aid, Tylenol, Listerine) via the 2023 IPO and completed the exit — it is now a pure pharma+device company. CEO Joaquin Duato (also Chairman); CFO Joseph J. Wolk. Incorporated New Jersey; HQ New Brunswick, NJ; auditor PwC "since at least 1920".

Contract / payment structure. The business is a portfolio of patent-protected drug franchises (high gross margin, exposed to patent cliffs and now to IRA price negotiation) plus a recurring device/consumables base (surgical instruments, contact lenses, electrophysiology catheters). Revenue recognition is at point of sale through wholesalers; profit-share collaboration payments are <2.0% of total revenue. Customer concentration is real and rising: three wholesalers accounted for ~21.8%, 15.5% and 11.1% of total gross revenues in FY2025 (~48% combined), up from ~18.2%/15.1%/14.2% in 2023 — see Lens 13.

Lens 2 · Supply Chain

J&J is more vertically integrated than most: it "generally seek[s] to own, rather than lease, [its] manufacturing facilities," with PP&E net of $23,169M. The chain:

Upstream inputs → APIs, biologics substrate (CHO cell lines for monoclonal antibodies like DARZALEX, TREMFYA, STELARA), small-molecule precursors, talc/excipients, device components (titanium/cobalt-chrome for orthopaedic implants, semiconductors and pumps for Abiomed's Impella, catheters for electrophysiology), and contract manufacturers (CDMOs) for surplus capacity → J&J internal manufacturing network (largely US-owned, expanding under the $55B US capital program) → three dominant pharma wholesalers (the McKesson / Cencora / Cardinal Health oligopsony — the ~22%/15.5%/11% buyers named above) and direct hospital/ASC channels for devices → end customers: patients via providers, reimbursed by Medicare/Medicaid (now under IRA price negotiation), commercial payers, and ex-US single-payer systems.

Chokepoints / single-source dependencies:

• CAR-T (CARVYKTI) manufacturing capacity — the +95.9% FY2025 growth was explicitly "driven by continued share gains and capacity expansion"; cell-therapy slot constraints are the binding throttle, not demand.
• Wholesaler oligopsony — three buyers control ~48% of gross revenue; a contracting shift is a structural risk (Lens 13).
• Tariff/logistics exposure — FY2025 cost of products sold rose partly on "tariffs, unfavorable transactional currency and macroeconomic factors in the MedTech business". This is being actively de-risked: the $55B US-based manufacturing/R&D program through early 2029 secured tariff exemptions under the Trump-administration agreement.

(Topic commercial-layer files are robotics-bucket generic — kb/robotics/wiki/supply-chain.md etc. — and not J&J-specific; named chain above is from the filing.)

Lens 3 · Competitive Advantages (moats)

J&J's moat is portfolio breadth + scale-funded R&D + switching costs, not any single franchise:

• Scale / diversification. $94B across 10+ therapeutic areas and franchises means no single LOE (loss of exclusivity) sinks the company — the STELARA collapse (-41% / -$4.3B) was fully absorbed in FY2025 while total sales still grew +6.0%. That is the moat operating in real time.
• R&D engine. $14,665M R&D in FY2025 (15.6% of sales; Innovative Medicine alone spends 19.6% of segment sales). Funds a deep pipeline (DARZALEX subcutaneous, RYBREVANT/LAZCLUZE in lung cancer, TREMFYA's IBD expansion, nipocalimab/IMAAVY, icotrokinra/ICOTYDE oral IL-23).
• Switching costs / installed base (MedTech). Surgeons standardize on platforms — VELYS robotic-assisted knees "pull through" ATTUNE implant sales; Abiomed Impella and electrophysiology catheters embed in hospital workflows. Robotics (Ottava/Monarch/Velys) is the next switching-cost land-grab.
• IP estate + brand. Patent-protected biologics; AAA-rated balance sheet (one of two AAA US corporates historically) lowers cost of capital.

Bargaining power is asymmetric by channel. Over the wholesaler oligopsony J&J has moderate power (branded, hard-to-substitute drugs) but the three-buyer concentration cuts the other way. Over payers/governments power is eroding — IRA price negotiation (Lens 9/13) and 340B discounting are structural take-rate compression. Versus device competitors the moat is narrower than pharma: Medtronic, Stryker, Abbott, Boston Scientific, Intuitive (robotics) all contest MedTech directly.

---

Phase B — Measure performance

Lens 4 · Segments

By segment (FY2025 vs FY2024):

Innovative Medicine — the growth-through-the-cliff story:

• Oncology $25,380M (+22.1%) — DARZALEX $14,351M (+23.0%), CARVYKTI $1,887M (+95.9%), ERLEADA $3,574M (+19.2%), RYBREVANT/LAZCLUZE $734M (>100%). Accelerating.
• Immunology $15,728M (-11.8%) — STELARA collapsed to $6,078M (-41.3%, was $10,361M) on biosimilars; TREMFYA surged to $5,155M (+40.5%). The cliff, partly self-offset by TREMFYA.
• Neuroscience $7,837M (+10.1%) — SPRAVATO $1,696M (+57.4%), CAPLYTA $700M (new, Intra-Cellular). Accelerating.
• The decline drivers are STELARA biosimilars (-10.4% drag on segment) and Medicare Part D redesign; offset by oncology share gains + the CAPLYTA acquisition (+1.2%).

MedTech — Cardiovascular carries it:

• Cardiovascular $8,928M (+15.8%) — Abiomed $1,751M (+17.1%), Shockwave $1,146M (>100%, acquired May 2024), Electrophysiology $5,634M (+7.0%). Accelerating, M&A-fueled.
• Orthopaedics $9,258M (+1.1%) — dragged by restructuring disruption + China volume-based procurement; slated for separation (Lens 8). Decelerating → being shed.
• Surgery $10,137M (+3.0%), Vision $5,468M (+6.3%).

By geography (FY2025): US $53,752M (57%), Europe $21,535M (23%), Asia-Pacific/Africa $14,031M (15%), Western Hemisphere ex-US $4,875M (5%). US sales grew fastest; China VBP is the recurring international drag in MedTech.

Lens 5 · Earnings Result — Q1 2026 (latest print)

The latest print is Q1 FY2026 (ended 2026-03-29):

• Sales $24,062M, +9.9% reported vs $21,893M (operational +6.4% ). Innovative Medicine $15,426M (+11.2%), MedTech $8,636M (+7.7%).
• GAAP net earnings $5,235M (diluted EPS $2.14) vs $10,999M ($4.54) prior-year quarter — a -52% GAAP "drop" that is entirely an accounting artifact: Q1 2025 carried a -$7,321M Other income (the talc-reserve reversal), Q1 2026 carried +$294M expense. Strip the talc swing and the underlying business GREW.
• Adjusted EPS $2.70, adjusted earnings -1.4% to ~$6.6B. The adjusted figure is the one that reflects operations; the GAAP figure is talc-noise.
• Gross margin steady at 66.3% (vs 66.4%); SM&A rose to 25.1% of sales (Intra-Cellular/CAPLYTA launch investment).
• Oncology +22.8% to $6,973M; STELARA decline continued; TREMFYA momentum continued. Orthopaedics rebounded to +6.3% (vs +1.1% FY2025) ahead of separation, with VELYS robotics pulling Knees.
• Guidance RAISED: FY2026 reported sales midpoint ~$100.8B (+7.0%) — first-ever $100B target; operational sales growth 5.9–6.9%; adjusted operational EPS $11.30–$11.50; adjusted reported EPS ~$11.55. Tone: confident, "$100 billion" framing.
• Balance-sheet flags: inventories rose to $14,191M and receivables to $17,178M at year-end (both outrunning revenue growth modestly — acquisition-driven, watch); intangibles jumped $37.6B→$50.4B on Intra-Cellular.
• Market reaction: stock ~$238 in June 2026, near the top of its 52-week range; the raise was received as a confirmation, not a surprise.

Verdict on the print: clean operational beat-and-raise; the headline GAAP collapse is a reserve mirage. This is the single most important framing in the whole dossier.

Lens 6 · Earnings Calls (sentiment trend)

No transcripts/ on the shelf; reconstructed from web. Management's consistent through-line across recent calls: "growth through the LOE period," the $100B revenue milestone, and pipeline/MedTech as the back-half-of-decade story.

• What they keep saying: confidence in absorbing STELARA, oncology share gains, MedTech "shrink to grow faster" (the Orthopaedics separation framing), US manufacturing investment ($55B).
• Tone shift: more assertive on the regulatory/political front — Duato now publicly argues "the most effective answer is not tariffs, but tax policy" and the company struck a deal with the administration. The defensive crouch around talc has eased somewhat post-bankruptcy-collapse (they've stopped pretending a global settlement is imminent and reframed to "we'll litigate and win").
• What they stopped saying: the "Texas Two-Step will resolve talc for ~$8-9B" narrative is gone — the third attempt (Red River) was rejected and withdrawn (Lens 10).

Lens 7 · Comps

Large-cap pharma/diversified-healthcare peers. Multiples are `` with date or n/a. Forward P/E is the honest multiple for JNJ — its trailing GAAP P/E (~26.7x) is inflated by talc-distorted GAAP earnings.

JNJ EV/EBITDA proxy: EV ≈ $575B mktcap + $27.8B net debt = ~$603B; EBITDA proxy ≈ operating income $25.5B + D&A $7.5B = ~$33.0B → ~18.3x. Read as a range, not a point — the operating-income proxy excludes the $7.0B talc reversal that sits in Other income.

Read: JNJ trades at a discount to LLY/MRK and roughly in line with ABT/PFE on forward earnings — a defensible "quality diversified compounder at a fair, not cheap, multiple." It does not get the LLY growth multiple (no GLP-1 blockbuster) and shouldn't.

Lens 8 · Stock-Price Catalysts

What moves JNJ >5% historically and what's live now:

• Talc litigation headlines — the dominant idiosyncratic driver for 5+ years. Bankruptcy filings, plan rejections, and large jury verdicts (e.g., the Missouri verdicts) all move the stock. The Q1 2025 $7B reserve reversal and the 2025 Red River collapse are the biggest recent swing factors.
• Quarterly beat/raise — Q1 2026's raise to a $100B target.
• STELARA biosimilar cadence — each erosion data point.
• MedTech catalysts — Ottava De Novo FDA submission (Jan 2026) and its bariatric pivotal-study readout (ASMBS 2026); Orthopaedics separation news (Oct 2025 announcement; Feb 2026 Bloomberg report of a possible >$20B sale).
• Macro/regulatory — IRA selected-drug announcements; the Trump-administration pricing/tariff deal.

Pattern: the market reacts to legal tail-risk resolution and MedTech portfolio reshaping more than to routine pharma beats — the pharma engine is "priced as a steady compounder," so the optionality (talc off the table, Ortho monetized, Ottava cleared) is where the re-rate lives.

---

Phase C — Judge people & books

Lens 9 · Management

• CEO Joaquin Duato (Chairman + CEO since Jan 2022). Track record: oversaw the Kenvue consumer separation (clean execution, ~$20B+ value crystallized), the post-spin repositioning to pure pharma+device, and a disciplined M&A run — Shockwave ($13B, 2024), Abiomed ($16.6B, 2022), Intra-Cellular ($14.5B, 2025), Halda ($3.05B, 2025) — all bolt-on, all in-franchise (cardiovascular, neuro/CNS, oncology). CFO Joseph Wolk (long-tenured, credible).
• Skin in the game: professional managers, not founders — typical large-cap insider ownership (low % but large absolute). No insider-transactions.csv on shelf; Q1 2026 buybacks were comp-program only (16.8M shares @ $239.26 avg), no open-market authorization shown.
• Capital allocation — strong and shareholder-friendly: FY2025 returned $18.3B ($12.4B dividends + $6.0B buybacks); the dividend rose to $5.14/share, the 63rd→64th consecutive annual increase (April 2026: +3.1%, indicated $5.36). FCF $19.7B covers the dividend at a comfortable ~63% payout. GAAP ROE 32.9% (talc-flattered); the underlying reinvest-acquire-return mix is textbook AAA-balance-sheet capital allocation.
• Red flags: the $55B US capital program is partly political (tariff-exemption-linked) — efficient if it would have happened anyway, value-dilutive if it's politically forced overcapacity. The aggressive "Texas Two-Step" bankruptcy strategy on talc (three attempts, all failed, DOJ called it "bad faith") is a genuine governance/reputation mark against management judgment (Lens 10/13).
• Archetype: disciplined professional-manager stewards of a compounding portfolio. Right archetype for this stage (harvest + reshape, not visionary bets).

Lens 10 · Forensic Red Flags

Forensic lens. Every figure labeled.

The single biggest quality-of-earnings issue is talc-reserve accounting in Other (income) expense, net. FY2025 GAAP net earnings of $26,804M are flattered by a ~$7.0B reversal of the previously accrued talc reserve; FY2024's $14,066M was depressed by a ~$5.1B talc charge; FY2023 carried a ~$7.0B charge. YoY GAAP earnings comparisons are therefore meaningless without adjustment — the +90% "growth" in net earnings is ~half accounting reversal. Use adjusted/operational EPS (Lens 5/11). The $7.0B reversal is also why Other (income) expense swung +$11.9B YoY.

• Talc reserve adequacy (the live question): the reserve was written down to a present value of ~$3.4B as of 2025-12-28 — but that figure covers "previously executed settlement agreements, litigation defense, and other costs," explicitly NOT a resolution of the ~68,000 pending MDL claims (Lens 13). Management states it is "unable to estimate the possible loss or range of loss beyond the amounts accrued." PwC flagged talc as a Critical Audit Matter — the auditor's own signal that this is the highest-judgment, most subjective estimate in the financials. A future re-accrual is a real risk if bellwether losses mount.
• R&D optics: R&D fell 14.9% ($17,232M→$14,665M) — but FY2024 was inflated by IPR&D charges (NM26/Yellow Jersey $1.25B + V-Wave $0.5B). Underlying R&D is not collapsing; the decline is "leverage from investment prioritization" + the absence of prior-year one-time IPR&D. Defensible, but worth flagging that the headline flatters operating margin.
• Intangibles/goodwill: $99.2B combined (intangibles $50.4B + goodwill $48.8B) = ~50% of total assets — acquisition-heavy balance sheet; impairment risk if pipeline assets (CARVYKTI, RYBREVANT, the Halda RIPTAC IPR&D at 17% discount / 47-68% PoS) disappoint. FY2025 IPR&D impairment was only $81M — clean so far.
• Receivables/inventory vs revenue: AR +$1,781M and inventory +$1,450M in FY2025 cash-flow — modestly outpacing the +6% revenue growth, consistent with acquisitions and CAR-T capacity build, not an obvious channel-stuffing flag.
• SBC: $1,354M, modest relative to scale; not a major non-GAAP flatter.
• Internal controls: management + PwC concluded ICFR effective as of 2025-12-28 (Intra-Cellular excluded per first-year rule).

Regulatory findings:

• SEC: No Litigation Releases or AAERs naming J&J in the 2021-06-24→2026-06-24 window (EDGAR EFTS LR + AAER).
• Non-SEC (web search, required):
• Talc product-liability MDL — ~68,000 pending claims, MDL-2738 before Judge Shipp (D.N.J.); the third Texas Two-Step (Red River Talc) bankruptcy was rejected in 2025, J&J withdrew its ~$7B settlement offer and is now litigating; the DOJ U.S. Trustee called the tactics "a textbook example of bad faith"; J&J has lost the first two post-pause ovarian-cancer bellwethers. This is the defining overhang (Lens 13).
• IRA / Medicare drug-price litigation — Janssen is litigating the constitutionality of the IRA price-negotiation program and sought Supreme Court review in Dec 2025 (Third Circuit affirmed for the government).
• 10-K Item 3 (Legal Proceedings): incorporated by reference to Note 19; the company is "involved in numerous product liability claims and lawsuits involving multiple products" with talc the material item.

Net: the accounting is clean and PwC-audited (no SEC enforcement, ICFR effective); the risk is not fraud but the gap between a $3.4B balance-sheet reserve and a ~68,000-claim, now-litigated tort liability of genuinely indeterminate size.

---

Phase D — Project & stress-test

Lens 11 · Forward Projection (EPS, three fiscal years)

Built bottom-up off FY2026 adjusted-operational EPS guidance midpoint ~$11.40 (reported adj ~$11.55). Inputs: ~6% operational sales growth (guidance), modest operating leverage offset by IRA/STELARA/SIMPONI/OPSUMIT LOE drag, continued buybacks (~flat-to-down share count), no talc re-accrual modeled (key assumption).

At ~$238, the base path implies the stock is held to a ~17–20x forward multiple as EPS compounds — a fair-value, dividend-plus-mid-single-digit-EPS-growth total return (~2.3% yield + ~6% growth ≈ 8–9%), not a multiple-expansion story unless an optionality lever (talc/Ottava/Ortho) breaks bullish.

Forecast log skipped (watchlist/breadth mode — no forecast.ts create per skill rules). If promoted to a thesis, the loggable base call is: "JNJ FY2026 adjusted operational EPS ≥ $11.30," p≈0.80, resolves 2026-12-31.

Lens 12 · Bull vs Bear

Bull case. J&J is the rarest thing in large-cap pharma: a company that grew +6% THROUGH a $4.3B STELARA loss and is guiding to its first-ever $100B revenue year — proof the diversification moat works. The oncology engine (DARZALEX, CARVYKTI, RYBREVANT, TECVAYLI/TALVEY bispecifics) is in secular acceleration; TREMFYA's IBD expansion is a multi-billion second act for immunology; CAPLYTA (Intra-Cellular) just got MDD approval, widening a neuro blockbuster. MedTech's Cardiovascular franchise (+15.8%, Abiomed + Shockwave) is a genuine growth pillar, and three discrete optionality levers could each re-rate the stock: (1) talc finally capped/settled at a sized number; (2) Orthopaedics separated (spin or >$20B sale) to "shrink to grow faster," leaving a higher-growth MedTech; (3) Ottava cleared by FDA into the soft-tissue surgical-robotics market. AAA balance sheet, 64-year dividend-growth streak, FCF $19.7B. At ~20.6x forward earnings it is cheap relative to its quality.

Bear case (permanent-impairment risks).

1. Talc tail. ~68,000 claims, now in the tort system after three failed bankruptcies, with the DOJ branding the strategy "bad faith" and J&J losing early bellwethers. The $3.4B reserve could prove a multiple too low; a forced multi-tens-of-billions resolution is the scenario that genuinely dents the equity — and unlike a product cliff, it's unhedgeable and open-ended.
2. Government as price-setter. IRA negotiation already hit Xarelto + Stelara (effective Jan 2026), Erleada is selected for 2028, and more flagships will follow — a structural, permanent take-rate compression on the highest-margin segment, compounding the natural LOE cadence (SIMPONI biosimilars H1-H2 2026, OPSUMIT generic H2 2026).
3. Pipeline-replacement treadmill. ~50% of assets are intangibles/goodwill; the model requires perpetually out-acquiring and out-innovating the next cliff. One or two pipeline failures (CARVYKTI capacity/safety, RYBREVANT, the Halda IPR&D) and growth stalls into the LOEs.

Pre-mortem (18 months out, thesis broke): a string of large adverse talc verdicts forces a re-accrual of $5–15B, the Ortho separation slips or fetches a disappointing price, Ottava's De Novo gets a CRL or competitive Medtronic Hugo adoption boxes it out, and 2027 IRA prices come in worse than modeled — the stock de-rates to a low-teens multiple on a stalled ~3% grower.

Are multiples too high? No — ~20.6x forward / ~18x EV/EBITDA is reasonable-to-cheap for a quality compounder; the trailing 26.7x P/E that screens show is a talc-distortion artifact and should be ignored.

Contrarian view (what the market refuses to see): the consensus treats talc as a bottomless pit, but the collapse of the bankruptcy route may paradoxically be de-risking — it forces a claim-by-claim litigation grind where J&J's deep pockets and the genuine scientific dispute (the Daubert fights cut both ways) can cap the realized liability below the feared catastrophe, even as headlines stay ugly. The market is pricing the headline risk, not the litigated-outcome distribution.

Lens 13 · Devil's Advocate (short-seller)

Skeptical short dismantling the bull case.

• Where revenue is concentrated / what breaks it: three wholesalers = ~48% of gross revenue and rising — a contracting renegotiation or channel shift (Amazon Pharmacy, direct-to-patient, the administration's "TrumpRx" direct model) compresses net price. On the demand side, a handful of mega-franchises (DARZALEX $14.4B, STELARA-in-decline, TREMFYA $5.2B) carry the pharma growth — DARZALEX alone is ~15% of segment sales and faces its own eventual biosimilar/LOE clock.
• Why the moat is weaker than bulls think: in MedTech the moat is thin — Medtronic (Hugo just cleared in urology), Stryker, Intuitive, Abbott, and Boston Scientific contest every franchise; Ottava is a late entrant to robotics (Intuitive owns it, Medtronic is ahead in soft-tissue clearance). Orthopaedics is being shed precisely because it can't grow (+1.1% FY2025).
• Most dangerous underestimated competitor: in robotics, Intuitive Surgical's installed-base lock-in plus Medtronic Hugo's head start — Ottava may clear and still struggle to convert accounts.
• Worst capital-allocation / governance moves: the three failed Texas Two-Step bankruptcies — a multi-year, reputation-damaging strategy the DOJ called "bad faith" that ultimately left J&J litigating ~68,000 claims anyway; and a $55B US capex program partly driven by political tariff-avoidance rather than pure ROIC.
• Assumptions that must hold for today's price: (1) talc resolves near the $3.4B reserve, not 3–5x it; (2) the oncology engine keeps offsetting STELARA/SIMPONI/OPSUMIT/Xarelto LOEs and IRA cuts; (3) MedTech stays mid-single-digit despite China VBP and robotics competition.
• What happens if growth disappoints 20–30%: if operational growth halves from ~6% to ~3% (bear path) AND a talc re-accrual lands, GAAP earnings power and the multiple both compress — a plausible path to a low-teens multiple on ~$12 EPS = a stock in the $150s–$170s (which is exactly the bottom of the analyst range, $155 ).
• Single scenario that permanently impairs the business: an adverse-science turning point in talc (a definitive causation ruling that survives appeal) that converts ~68,000 claims into a recurring, scaling liability stream measured in the tens of billions — the only realistic permanent-impairment vector, since the operating business is otherwise durable.

Lens 14 · Management Questions (ordered by information value)

1. With three failed bankruptcies and ~68,000 claims now in the tort system, what is your actual estimate of the realized talc liability range, and at what cumulative bellwether-loss threshold do you re-accrue beyond the current $3.4B reserve?
2. What is the base-rate of LOE/IRA erosion you have modeled into the FY2027–2029 plan (STELARA, SIMPONI, OPSUMIT, Xarelto, Erleada), and what growth do the launch franchises need to deliver to stay above mid-single-digits?
3. On the Orthopaedics separation — spin vs. the reported >$20B sale: what is the decision gate, the tax structure, and what RemainCo MedTech growth rate does shedding Ortho actually unlock?
4. Is the $55B US capital program ROIC-accretive on its own merits, or is it the price of the tariff exemption — and what is the IRR you underwrite on it?
5. Ottava entered a market Intuitive dominates and Medtronic Hugo just cleared ahead of you. What is the realistic account-conversion and placement ramp, and what share do you target by 2029?
6. How much of FY2025's GAAP operating-margin improvement is durable vs. the absence of prior-year IPR&D charges and the talc reversal — what is the clean underlying margin trajectory?
7. CARVYKTI grew +96% on "capacity expansion" — what is the manufacturing-slot ceiling, and is CAR-T demand or supply constrained through 2027?
8. What is your capital-allocation priority order now — bolt-on M&A vs. buybacks vs. the dividend — given ~$28B net debt post-Intra-Cellular and a AAA rating to defend?
9. How exposed is the pharma gross margin to the wholesaler oligopsony (now ~48% of gross revenue) and to the administration's direct-to-patient "TrumpRx" pricing model?
10. Which pipeline asset (RYBREVANT/LAZCLUZE, nipocalimab/IMAAVY, icotrokinra, TARIS/INLEXZO, the Halda RIPTAC programs) is the most material to the 2028+ growth bridge, and what is its risk-adjusted peak-sales view?
11. China volume-based procurement has dragged MedTech for several years — is that a permanent structural haircut to the international device margin, and how do you offset it?
12. TREMFYA is offsetting STELARA — what is its true peak-sales ceiling across psoriasis/PsA/IBD before its own biosimilar clock starts?
13. What is the integration scorecard on Abiomed and Shockwave vs. the deal models — are they hitting the synergy/growth assumptions?
14. How should investors think about the durability of the 64-year dividend-growth streak under a bear scenario of simultaneous talc re-accrual + accelerated IRA cuts?
15. What is the one assumption in your own internal plan that, if wrong, would most damage the 2029 earnings target — and how are you hedging it?

---