Eli Lilly taps into its GLP-1 windfall, while Honeywell sheds a lower-margin unit
Every weekday, the CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer releases the Homestretch — an actionable afternoon update, just in time for the last hour of trading on Wall Street. Stocks edged lower from record highs after oil jumped 5% into the high $80s, driven by uncertainty over commercial ship traffic in the Strait of Hormuz. While the action in the oil market was notable, the market’s decline was not as bad as feared because Treasury yields were little changed. Honeywell announced another step in its ongoing portfolio transformation . The company is selling its Productivity Solutions and Services (PSS) business to Brady Corporation for $1.4 billion in cash. PSS is a leading provider of mobile computers, barcode scanners, and printing solutions serving the warehouse and logistics market. Honeywell put PSS and its Warehouse and Workflow Solutions (WWS) business up for strategic review last July, and this sale is a result of that process. The company is still looking for a buyer for WWS. We are fans of Honeywell reshaping its portfolio, getting rid of cyclical, slower-growing, lower-margin businesses like PSS. But we’re neutral on this development because the $1.4 billion sale price was less than what many anticipated. Still, shedding this unwanted business should make a cleaner story when Automation becomes a standalone business later this year, following the Aerospace separation. Honeywell reports first-quarter earnings on Thursday before the opening bell, and while the war in Iran likely weighed on quarterly results, we expect management to keep its full-year outlook intact. Eli Lilly is tapping into its obesity windfall again to fortify its pipeline. On Monday, the drug giant announced a deal to buy Kelonia Therapeutics, a clinical-stage biotech company focused on cancer treatments. Clinical stage means it doesn’t have any approved drugs on the market; all its assets are still experimental. Lilly is paying $3.25 billion in cash upfront to buy Kelonia. The deal could be worth up to $7 billion if certain clinical, regulatory, and commercial milestones are met. Our CNBC colleague Angelica Peebles had a chance to catch up with the head of Lilly’s cancer business, Jacob Van Naarden. He shared a little bit about how Kelonia’s technology works. “It’s an intravenously delivered therapy, one time,” he told Peebles. “It targets your body’s T-cells, transforms them into attacking the cancer in the body, and requires no preconditioning at all.” The move continues Lilly’s aggressive dealmaking spree, building on the success of its blockbuster GLP-1s: Zepbound for obesity and Mounjaro for type-2 diabetes. Lilly ended last year with $7.3 billion in cash and cash equivalents, up from $3.3 billion at the end of 2024. It generated about $9 billion in free cash flow in 2025, an increase from $3.8 billion in the prior year. Lilly executives know they’re in a position of strength thanks to their GLP-1 leadership, and they’re intent on bolstering their drug pipeline with candidates across therapeutic areas. Lilly invests heavily in internal R & D. In pharma, companies can never rest on their laurels because patents don’t last forever. They must always be putting shots on goal to ensure they have future blockbusters. Less than a month ago, Lilly disclosed an agreement to acquire Centessa Pharmaceuticals for up to $7.8 billion. Centessa, which is also a clinical-stage firm, is working on sleep disorders such as narcolepsy. In early March, Lilly closed its $1.2 billion acquisition of Ventyx Biosciences, which is developing oral medications for inflammatory conditions. That deal was announced in January. Also, in February, Lilly announced a deal worth up to $2.4 billion to buy cancer-focused Orna Therapeutics. Good news for Wells Fargo and Goldman Sachs : Despite uncertainty over the war in Iran, companies aren’t shying away from going public. On Monday, Jersey Mike’s confidentially filed for an initial public offering. The sandwich chain was previously valued at roughly $8 billion after Blackstone bought a majority stake over a year ago. The news follows a week of high-profile IPO headlines. On Friday, AI chipmaker Cerebras filed to go public on the Nasdaq. Wells, which has made growing its investment bank a major focus, was tapped for the deal, but Goldman wasn’t. Madison Air Solutions had a successful IPO last Wednesday. Both Goldman and Wells worked on that debut. Companies reporting after the closing bell include Zions Bancorp and Alaska Air . Tuesday marks the start of a big earnings wave, with UnitedHealth Group , GE Aerospace , 3M , Danaher , RTX , Halliburton , and D.R. Horton scheduled to report. On the data side, we’ll see March retail sales and pending home sales. 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