To be clear from the outset, the only thing that’s “wrong” with Stryker (SYK) is that the company’s past performance, and the sell-side’s endless need to find ways to goose price targets ever higher, set a pace that few companies could maintain. Then COVID-19 came along and made life considerably more challenging for a company with exposure across the spectrum of procedure counts (weighted toward elective) and capital budgets (under strain).
With more mixed performance trends, and concerns that rivals like Zimmer Biomet (ZBH) have some momentum behind them, Stryker shares