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Jim Cramer
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Jason Hollister (CEO of Cardinal Health)
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Jim Cramer
Hey, I'm Kramer. Welcome to a special west coast edition of Bad Money. Welcome to Cramerica from One market in San Francisco. My friends, I'm just trying to make a little money. My job is not just entertain, but put it all in context. So call me at 1-800-743-CBC. With me, it's Jim Cramer. The market gets so angry over nothing. It's just plain irritable. Very hard to please, like a three year old child. But when you make it happy, the inner child giggles and your stocks will soar. Not that you can tell from the average. Today I was hoping that things would be a little more, say, tame and yes, even logical. So I could spend some time with you about what happens when artificial intelligence meets health care. Last night we went to hear Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang and Dave Ricks from Eli Lilly talk about AI and drug development. They've opened this facility out here. It will apply accelerated computing and generative AI with the work of Lilly scientists to speed up the creation of critical new drugs. But somehow Wall street treats that monumental effort like it's just a gigantic sideshow and simply at a Conference of earnings news the earnings season started along with softer inflation courtesy of a decent consumer price index figure that came out this morning and an insane new love for retail. Let's start with the market's temper transfer. Though it's kind of cogent. JP Morgan is the world's biggest bank. We all know that. But CEO Jamie Dimon. Cautious guy and whenever the bank reports he tends to say things that the market doesn't want to hear. And that's what happened three months ago when he talked about cockroaches in the credit market. He sent the stock into a one day nosedive that crushed the bank supporters. This time JP Morgan actually put a weaker than expected quarter. Not enough underwriting and the stock eventually got hammered again. Worse, Jamie was back urging caution and getting tough about the right to charge high fees for credit cards make up for losses. That combination created a tsunami of selling. We saw the same thing last time. I say wait a day or two just like last time so you can gradually buy this one weakness. Why? Because it will always bounce back. How do I know that? Because it always has. What else? The markets decided that if you make software artificial intelligence will make your business obsolete. And that's why Salesforce, Adobe and ServiceNow were all slammed again today. I mean laid the waste. Meanwhile the hardware that powers AI sword led by once slowly worm intel and amd. Although the market still won't show any love to invidious most fascinating development today. The smothering affection for retail. I can't believe how quickly these stocks have become beloved. After being hated for a year, buyers can't seem to find a level to walk away from when it comes to the dollar stores and the discounters. But the Dollar General Mine's a good one. I don't get it. Stocks aren't supposed to levitate like this. The wave of buying includes Wal Mart of course, and holy cow, target. With that 4% yield and a new CEO, Southeast, Kramer, Faith, Home Depot. The despot has actual buyers in Lowe's. Flirts with new highs. Wayfair won't quit. What's that? Neither will the flawless Ralph Lauren. What gives? I think the inevitable result of what happens when you have tame inflation. Which is what we got from the CPI number this morning. The buyers cannot resist anything that benefits from lower interest rates that come from tame inflation. Even if oil's rallying off a geopolitical newsflip, we're ignoring that one. Hey, you want hate? I'll give you hate. All you have to do is declare you're going for clean energy to power your data centers. If Microsoft and Meta platforms were to abandon their dislike of fossil fuels and go all in, say, and despise clean coal or at least cleaner natural gas, they could actually lift their heads and not have them blown off. Without cheap energy though, what really matters is that Alphabet increasingly looks like the only winner in AI. For the moment, it's partner with Apple Power, Siri and who knows what else winner. Of course, this is all day to day stuff that could be rolled back tomorrow. So why don't we just take one moment and talk about the big picture. We're still at the beginning of the year. We have these, what I call jailbreaks going on. Happens every year. There's a jailbreak in retail, jailbreak in oil, and a jailbreak in transports. Way too much love for those. But let me tell you where you're not getting the love out here in San Francisco, man, open the Golden Gate already. What the heck? Just JP Morgan Health Care conference I spent the last two days, I've seen the guts of pharma, the big health care companies, and I think they may all be undervalued here. Irony of armies, by the way. Johnson Johnson led the pack and it was only one of a handful of drug companies that didn't present. I heard things from the likes of Cardinal Health, Amgen, Novartis, Bowser Loan and Eli Lilly. They were so perfect for this environment of lower interest rates that I cannot lower inflation and lower rates that I can't believe their stocks didn't roar. They should be more on that one later. As I said at the beginning year though, the first two weeks are always a jumbled amalgam of love and hate. Too much of both. But the bottom line, now that earnings season has started, the rehearsals are over and we're going to begin to see the reaction to actual numbers. And if it's anything like JP Morgan, what can I say? It's showtime. Start with Bob in New Jersey.
Len Schleifer (CEO of Regeneron)
Bob.
Jim Cramer
Hey Jim.
Caller/Guest
Thank you for accepting my call and.
Jim Cramer
Thank you for a great show. Oh, thank you, Bob. That's kind of you. Well, I've been following you a long time now.
Caller/Guest
I got a question for you.
Jim Cramer
Hopefully you can help me. I have Siri. I got about almost 4, 400 shares.
Caller/Guest
Of Siri and I'm down 50% now, but.
Jim Cramer
But I've had him a long time.
Caller/Guest
And off and on I've made money with him, so.
Jim Cramer
But right Now I'm down 50% and I like. We got that. The wife. Yeah. Hey, listen, we got a 5% yield. Okay. And it can bounce back. Is it my favorite? No. Why? Because I like growth and it doesn't have growth. And that's the real problem. All right, look, the first couple of weeks are very hard to decipher, but now that earns season has arrived, it's showtime and we'll get a better sense of where we're actually headed. And all this curious amalgam we put to bed on everybody tonight. We have an action packed lineup ahead for our second day at the J.P. morgan Healthcare Conference, I sit down with some of the top leaders in the healthcare industry. Conversation with Novartis, Amgen, Regeneron, Active2 and Cardinal Health. So don't go anywhere. And of course stay with Kramer.
Don't miss a second of Mad Money. Follow imkremer on X. Have a question? Tweet Kramer Madmentions. Send Jim an email to madmoneynbc.com or give us a call at 1-800-743-cnbc Ms. Something? Head to madmoney.cnbc.com.
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Jim Cramer
Restriction supply hey Fidelity, Can I get.
A second opinion on stocks in the Fidelity app?
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Jason Hollister (CEO of Cardinal Health)
Investing involves risk, including risk of loss, online US equity trades and ETFs and retail fidelity account sell order assessment fee not included, some account types and securities excluded. Details@fidelity.com commissions Fidelity Brokerage Services LLC member.
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NYSE SIPC not every sale happens at the register before AT&T business Wireless checking out customers on our mobile POS systems took too long. Basically a staring contest where everyone loses. It's crazy what people will say during an awkward silence. Now transactions are done before the silence takes hold. That means I can focus on the task at hand and make an extra sale or two. Sometimes I do miss the bonding time.
Jim Cramer
Sometimes AT&T business Wireless Connecting changes everything. Very few drug stocks spent most of last year steadily marching higher, but Novartis is one of them. The Swiss pharmaceutical giant rallied more than 40% in 2025 killed by some of the strongest sales growth in the industry. But can they keep up this in the face of some major patent expirations? Let's check in with Dr. Vas Narasimh. He's the CEO of Novartis to find out. Vas, welcome back to Med Body.
Great to see you.
Jim, thanks for following your work. I remember when you came here and you put a stake in the ground. You said you're going to be able to get your PE multiple by getting higher, by getting rid of some companies that will be good, create some value. You delivered on everything and more. And by the time I want people to know, most people thought it was impossible. How did you do it?
Look, Jim, I think over that eight year period, we've made some bold bets. I mean, what we did is we exited Sandoz and Alcon. Those two businesses, a standalone businesses, have over 80 billion of market cap. And along the way, we drove up Novartis's market cap by another 80 billion. So we really have been able to unlock over $160 billion of value by becoming a pure play. And I think it was all about betting on our innovation power. It was believing in our science, believing that what Novartis is at its core is a biopharmaceutical powerhouse. And that's really coming through now.
Well, there's an oddity here. You're a real doctor, you also have public health experience. Those are things that would make it so that you would have great science. But you approach this business the way other business people approach. You actually are willing to make a projection to the, into the 2030s because you, you run this by cash flow. It's incredible.
Yeah, I mean, I think when we look out, I mean, it's all about these medicines that we create. And I think one of the things that comes with being a physician scientist is I can go deep on the science. And what we've been able to do is really bet on novel technology platforms like RNA therapeutics and radio ligand therapy. And what that allows us to do is build a portfolio now where we have, you know, 15 inline blockbusters, we have nine medicines that have multibillion dollar potential, another eight coming along the way. So that portfolio gives us the confidence to call that 5 to 6% growth out to 2030.
I also have to mention your gross margins are well ahead of the rest of the industry. Is that R and D being more targeted is a tight ship. How are you able to do?
Well, I'm a cost hawk too, despite being a doctor.
But you're on course you, but you're also on board. Is that possible?
Len Schleifer (CEO of Regeneron)
Yeah.
Jim Cramer
So I think what we do is we set a high bar. What we say is we're a high support, high challenge culture. We want to set a high bar, challenge people and then provide the support. I have an unbelievable operations team. Those are the unsung heroes. I mean, they've been able to drive over my tenure over 1100 basis points of margin expansion. And that's just ruthless. Being on top of the operations, being on top of the manufacturing costs. And that's what comes through.
All right, so how are you able to tackle things like Neuro? Everyone knows you don't go there. The most recent acquisition you made, that has been a doomed technology for everybody, a graveyard. Why do you take it on?
Look, I think these are diseases that have no standard of care and these patients really suffer. And I think when we saw these technologies like the one with our proposed acquisition of avidity, very unique science. And this, what, what it allows us to do is take RNAs and traffic them to the muscle, traffic them into the nervous system to tackle some of these diseases. And what's really cool about it is we really understand the biology. We know what we need to tackle. The hard part is, is getting the drug to the right place. And we think we can solve that with this technology. We've actually made now four acquisitions now in neuromuscular disease. And I always think to myself, we got to do things that are unique, something different. Obesity. A lot of companies are chasing obesity. Well served. What about all of these other patients that need solutions? And that's where we want to focus our energy.
Okay, I can't help. The first time I learned of you is I sent my daughter to college just when there was H1M1 swine flu vaccine. Your old life, you don't have vaccines now. Good, because that's a tough business. But you talked about on, on the Hill, what it took, how hard it is surprised that the head of the HHS doesn't seem to share your affinity for life saving vaccines.
Look, I think right now we're at a critical moment. I mean, I think vaccines have been truly one of the most important human inventions in our history. And you look at the last hundred years, the fact that childhood mortality is where it is, the fact that we can live in the world that we have is in no small part because of vaccines. And I think we have to just keep reminding the public that vaccines are safe, vaccines are remarkable public health tools and that we need Children to get vaccinated. And that's certainly what I'm all about whenever I talk about the topic.
Now also, you were adamant that, and you said it in a Q and A most favored nation rule would be devastating to the industry. Talking about the notion of what the president was trying to do. And yet you were able to go with it and it didn't hurt your numbers. How is that possible?
Look, I think the administration was very pragmatic. I mean, they actually came with an agreement that I think made sense and what it really allows us to do to go to countries around the world that do not properly value innovation. Because I think the core of this and where the administration is absolutely right, the US Is who is underpinning innovation in our sector. I mean, they're the ones funding the R&D U.S. u.S. Government, U.S. taxpayers. And we need to change that. So what this agreement gives us the opportunity to do is go to these other G7 countries and say, look, you got to pay your fair share or we're not going to be able to launch. So this is a very interesting moment for our sector. I think in the next few years, either of those countries are going to rise to the challenge or there will be fewer drug launches in Europe. And I think that's, that's going to be a really interesting, I think to see how it.
So it was a more sophisticated thing than just listen, we're going to cram down drug. That was not the nature of what Alderman.
I think this is pretty thoughtful. I think, I think there was a long term policy goal and I think that's what we now have to hopefully make happen.
I want to talk about some of the things that you're doing that I think are not getting enough credit. Radio ligand. I mean, this is really incredible. We're talking about a way to make it so that the patient is able to be targeted and not be blown away. You were really interested in taking further cancer research than anybody I know.
I mean, this, this is something I'm really excited about. We made this bet six years ago. We've really done a ton of work to make it happen, actually even now, seven years ago. And we've actually made it pretty mainstream. There's over 700 clinics in the United States that are providing radioligand therapy. We have 19 projects in the clinic to bring the next wave. And just for the viewers, I mean, this is remarkable technology. We can bring a radioactive particle to a cancer cell rather than radiating the body and kill the cancer cell in a very surgical way. And it ends up being very safe. So we've got prostate cancer, we've got neuroendocrine tumors. Now we're working on a whole set of other cancers. And we're the global leader. We have global scale. We have the ability to provide these therapies on time in three to five days because this is radioactive. We have to make the drug and deliver it.
I don't know how you could do that. The half life is ridiculous. But you're incredible at logistics too.
We've learned this, we've learned this over the years. And I think that gives us a big competitive advantage.
One last question. You have been very forward about the notion that is just something in the toolkit. Can you please find anything about earnings per share that AI has really helped? Maybe on chronic highs, maybe it's helped there because it's something new. Just give me something. It says, you know what? AI is saving us money right now.
AI has certainly helped us enroll some of our studies more quickly. I mean, I think so. What we can do is we can use AI right now to optimize which clinical trial sites we're going to put our clinical trials in. And it makes things happen more quickly. I do believe in drug discovery in a five to ten year view. This is going to be transformative. But I think the hype cycle is making people too impatient. I mean, we have, we have 10 to 15 years to get a drug from when we discover a target to actually get it to approval. This is a long process. If I got that down to 10 to 12 years, I would be thrilled. 15 to 10 to 12. Amazing. But that's going to take time and you're not going to see that, you know, in the short term.
Well, I hope you get enough credit for. The stock's been good for. You've had multiple patent question. You can't see them. And so therefore people at home have a company with a stock that goes up over time because it's just like a real company that we've seen. That's secular growth. Most of them are episodic, but because of what you've done, it's not. It's just secular. Congratulations.
Thank you, Jim.
I really appreciate all that stuff. And CEO of Novartis and this is just some stock because you got some guy running the darn thing. Thank you. Thank you very much.
Coming up, will Amgen be the next.
Caller/Guest
Major player to enter the weight loss drug market?
Jim Cramer
Kramer's getting the latest on where things stand from the company's CEO.
Len Schleifer (CEO of Regeneron)
Next.
Jim Cramer
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Opinion on stocks in the Fidelity app?
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With Fidelity, it's easy to get an outside opinion from independent experts in a single score. And then when you're ready, trade US stocks and ETFs with no commissions.
Caller/Guest
That's right.
Fidelity Representative
I am always right.
Jason Hollister (CEO of Cardinal Health)
Investing involves risk, including risk of loss online US equity trades and ETFs and retail fidelity account sell order assessment fee not included Some account types and securities excluded. Details@fidelity.com commissions Fidelity Brokerage Services LLC member.
Fidelity Representative
NYSE SIPC not every sale happens at the register before AT&T business Wireless checking out customers on our mobile POS systems took too long. Basically a staring contest where everyone loses. It's crazy what people will say during an awkward silence. Now transactions are done before the silence takes hold. That means I can focus on the task at hand and make an extra sale or two. Sometimes I do miss the bonding time.
Jim Cramer
Sometimes AT&T business Wireless Connecting changes everything. We got some new data from Amgen on veritide their late stage once a month GOP Dash one Weight loss injection. Now Wall street didn't react to the news but this is a big biotech that's been able to pull off some major drug launches in recent years. So let's take a close look. Bob Bradley he's the chairman and CEO of Amgen. Get a better sense of what's going on here. Mr. Bradley, welcome back to Man Boy.
Caller/Guest
Thank you Jim.
Jim Cramer
Glad to be with all right now first we just got to address what people have been saying about your GLP1 versus what the truth is and the truth is it's entirely possible that maybe you could get to once a quarter. It's entirely possible that you can stop it and still lose weight. You are doing different things from Lilly and I want things put it in context.
Caller/Guest
Well this is the first long acting medicine for obesity and obesity related conditions and potentially type 2 diabetes. So we have a a drug that we're studying as a once monthly injection. We've said that we expect it can be used monthly or less frequently. We've shown what it looks like when it's used every eight weeks and we shared yesterday that we're very encouraged about the data for when it's used quarterly as well. So we think there are a bunch of ways to win for patients when it comes to maritide and maintaining weight loss. And we think we can address one of the reasons that the field is struggling a little bit, which is the patient persistence issue.
Jim Cramer
Right. Meaning they drop off. They just drop off. And there's two. You got two year maintained weight loss. This is an industry publication, just came out after your presentation. I mean, that would be rather remarkable.
Caller/Guest
Yeah. So we have studied now over 104 weeks again across a range of different doses to better understand what we think the appropriate way is to maintain weight loss. So we know that we can induce a very impressive weight loss over the first 52 weeks. And we're going to study that right through 72 weeks. And then we want to understand how do we help people maintain that weight loss over the long term. And we want to understand what will it take for patients to stay on this therapy. Because persistence is the name of the game. The benefit comes from being on therapy.
Jim Cramer
Yeah, look, no one's willing to seem to say it, but the current drugs, 13 months and that's it. And people are done. And it doesn't work like that.
Caller/Guest
And the drugs provide tremendous benefit, but only when the patients are on the drugs. And so again, we think Maritide has the potential to be the first long acting medicine addressing the needs of patients living with obesity or overweight.
Jim Cramer
But I do want to point out, I mean, you've got so much going on, you've got a lot of drugs. You made an acquisition, by the way, that, you know, I champion Horizon because I just said they had great stuff but they didn't have the scale. You have basically blown out what I thought were going to be orphan drugs. Actually, they're going to be drugs for many people.
Caller/Guest
Yeah. Well, our rare disease business is performing very well. Over the course of last year, we were annualizing at north of $5 billion, growing at double digit growth rates. And we're very excited about what we think.
Jim Cramer
No one was thinking that could be it. You know, that when you were bought, people thought you paid too much money because no one thought that these would ever altogether add up to that much.
Caller/Guest
Well, the acquisition is working very well for us and partly because it plays to our strengths, biologics and autoimmunity. So the medicines we acquired address autoimmune conditions and are largely biologics and are at an early stage of their life cycle. And so we're continuing to explore ways and new diseases that might benefit from these treatments. And so far, so good. We're very encouraged by what we've seen.
Jim Cramer
Now, I want to talk about one of the most important drugs ever, or it should be Repatha, I take it. Why do I take it? Because my doctors at NYU said, look, you want to cut the risk of stroke, you want to cut the risk of a cardiac event, you have to be on it. We insist on it. At first I said, no, it's too expensive, but you put down the cost of it so low, maybe everyone should be taking it.
Caller/Guest
Well, we've lowered the list price of Repatha twice. Repatha is a medicine that profoundly lowers LDL cholesterol. LDL is the bad cholesterol, so we profoundly lower ldl and in doing that, profoundly reduce the risk of heart attack or stroke. So, for example, a few weeks ago, we demonstrated that in people who'd never had a heart attack, if we put them on Repatha, on top of what was considered optimized therapy, we were able to further reduce the risk of heart attack, in fact, by 36% for people in this study. So Repatha has helped characterize the benefit of bringing the bad cholesterol down to levels that previously weren't achievable with medicines that were otherwise available on the market marketplace.
Jim Cramer
Now, isn't it true that there is no level that's too low for bad cholesterol?
Caller/Guest
Well, when it, when it comes to LDL cholesterol, Jim, lower is better. And the data have shown over and over again that lower is better. The sooner you get lower, the better. And some would tell you lowest is best.
Jim Cramer
Okay? Now, my doctors also said, look, if you want to have any shot at avoiding Alzheimer's, the only thing that's on the market is repathing. Now, it's not meant for that, but who knows? I mean, why would they give it to me?
Caller/Guest
Well, we've studied Repatha in the study of heart disease, Jim, So we've shown that we can prevent heart attacks, we can prevent strokes, we can prevent what are called major adverse cardiac events. With Repatha, by lowering ldl, we can protect the heart, we can protect the vascular system against these catastrophic things like stroke.
Jim Cramer
How do we get the word out? Sometimes I feel that there's these drugs that remarkable, which is, look, it's every other week it's refrigerated. No one, even you barely notice it. And yet I find that only some of the major healthcare centers, major Hospitals seem to know the benefit and then insist that all their patients be on it.
Caller/Guest
Yeah, well, we need Jim to continue to educate patients, prescribers and payers about the benefits of Repatha and the importance of lowering LDL to reduce these heart attacks and stroke. Heart attacks and stroke are the biggest cause of mortality in the United States, in fact, all around the world. And the largest contributor to that is that people are walking around with their LDL levels too high. And as you point out, nobody in the United States will pay more than $8 a day for access to Repatha. Most patients are paying a small fraction of that amount. And for the benefit that it provides in terms of the reduced risk of heart attack and stroke, we need to get the word out.
Jim Cramer
It's possible that that could be one of the biggest drugs of all time. When the word comes out.
Caller/Guest
Well, I don't know about that, Jim, but it's an important.
Jim Cramer
I think it will be. One of the reasons why I like the stock so much is the, is the mosaic that you have of things that are just consistent. There's no patent cliff I'd be worried about. And at the same time, some of these drugs that are 3, 4, 5 billion, I think could be 6, 8, 20 billion.
Caller/Guest
Well, Repatha grew very well in 2025 and we think it will continue to grow nicely through the rest of the decade. And again, it's growing off the back of data which demonstrate that we can prevent these heart attacks and strokes.
Jim Cramer
Well, I hope people learn not just because the shareholders who's experienced that a 3% yield, good growth, but this is a remarkable drug, one of many that you have. And it's just that people don't know about it. We got to change that.
Caller/Guest
Thank you.
Jim Cramer
Okay, that's Bob Bradley's chairman and CEO of Amgen, a terrific stock with a great deal.
Coming up after a late resurgence in 2025. Is Regeneron ready to take off in 2026? Kramer is finding out their game plan.
Len Schleifer (CEO of Regeneron)
With the CEO next.
Caller/Guest
Jim Cramer, the.
Jim Cramer
Die hard of the doll.
Hey, Jimmy, love the show. My five year old grandson loves to watch your show.
Caller/Guest
I have to thank you for making.
Jim Cramer
Us money when it's there to be made.
Jason Hollister (CEO of Cardinal Health)
Our world is a better place with you in it.
Jim Cramer
Last year was a tough one for health care, but many of these stocks bottomed as 2025 went on. Look at Regeneron, the colossal biotech that's up about 60% from its lows last summer. So can this thing keep running while we're here at JP Morgan Health Care Conference, let's take a closer look with Dr. Len Schlifer. He's the co founder, co chair, president and CEO as well as being one of our first guests on the show. Dr. Schleifer, welcome back to Mad Money. All right, I'm going to start with something that is very congratulatory to you, Len. What is it like to be the longest serving CEO in America?
Len Schleifer (CEO of Regeneron)
Well, I think I'm the second. But Warren Buffett retired.
Jim Cramer
Yeah, no, I did the work. You're number one.
Len Schleifer (CEO of Regeneron)
Listen, longevity always isn't a prize, but I'm enjoying what I do.
Jim Cramer
Okay, so you have developed what I regard as a three legged stool of just remarkable drugs. And I want to start with Dupixent, which is a stock that a drug that is moving the stock. And I want people to know why. Why is this so big?
Len Schleifer (CEO of Regeneron)
Well, it's funny, about 10, 12 years ago when we were at this conference, we actually predicted that Dupixent would be a pipeline in a product. We kind of coined that phrase, or at least we're the only ones who actually delivered on that. And what's remarkable about Dupixent is that it's approved for eight different indications and it's the leading drug in seven of those eight. It's used by over a million people around the world. It's a very safe product, It's a very effective product. It's been the leader in so many different areas and people, dermatologists, allergists, pulmonologists, gastroenterologists, ENT doctors, they all touching the drug and find it's making a huge difference for their patients. And that's ultimately what makes a great drug. It's gotta work, it's gotta be safe and the doctors have to believe in it.
Jim Cramer
Okay, so Iah, I thought the people stopped talking about when they did the biosimilar over at Amgen. You came on a long time ago and said, look, we're going to take over the world. You have to inject your eye 12 times a year. And I said, well, that's awful. The other guys though were doing it 52 times a year. Now we're back with a whole new set of reasons to take IHD. And it's working.
Len Schleifer (CEO of Regeneron)
Yeah. HD seems to be the most durable product in the field of anti VEGF therapy for these blinding retinal diseases. And I think it's being well accepted. It's now run rate, it's about $2 billion a year run rate. It's Nearly half of our entire franchise. And so the doctors are enjoying it because it's making a difference to their patients being able to go to longer intervals between injections.
Jim Cramer
Well, everybody wants that. No one wants to.
Len Schleifer (CEO of Regeneron)
You know, you mentioned Jim Watt, that we were talking about in the early days what we were going to do. We were trying to talk about this when we first came on your show.
Jim Cramer
Right.
Len Schleifer (CEO of Regeneron)
When we were nobody.
Jim Cramer
And you stopped was at 5.
Len Schleifer (CEO of Regeneron)
Yes, it's good.
Jim Cramer
Good. Goodbye.
Len Schleifer (CEO of Regeneron)
Absolutely. I think it's one of your better calls.
Jim Cramer
Well, you, you certainly helped they get one lip tio. This is a drug that I think we're all going to hear a lot more about because non melanoma skin cancer is just unfortunately raging.
Len Schleifer (CEO of Regeneron)
Right. So, so your viewers don't get confused. We're still talking about skin cancer. We're talking about those little basal cells or those cutaneous squamous cells that the doctor can knock off, but sometimes they grow in and they're really problematic. And we've had remarkable results there. Interestingly enough, it just shows our technology and our products are different. Where Keytruda, which was the leading IO drug, did a trial there. They came up with a big fat goose egg in an adjuvant study there. And we showed a dramatic improvement, 68% lowering of the risk of this cancer coming back. So it's really important.
Jim Cramer
All right, so you spoke with, with George, who is your partner, Ian Kopos, who's an amazing scientist. Last night, I think you broke a lot of taboos. And one of them I thought was really incredible was he said that AI has limits. I thought that I was limitless. But you're being a little more realistic about AI.
Len Schleifer (CEO of Regeneron)
Yeah, I think George probably said it best. It's not that we don't believe in AI. We do believe that AI can do certain things. But AI isn't going to invent the drugs. AI isn't going to think about how you apply the technology. There are certain tasks that AI can do. We have millions of sequences of people and they're linked to their anonymized medical records. AI can go through that and find associations much more efficiently than you or I can. But AI is not going to invent the antibodies that we already know how to invent and develop and move forward. It's just not going to do it. And if people think that that's going to do it, I hope they believe that because it just gives us a bigger competitive edge.
Jim Cramer
It is true. I think that the next generation chips are able to reason, but could you ask it. Ask a computer. Please solve ALS for us.
Len Schleifer (CEO of Regeneron)
No, look, the AI is as good as the data it can train on. People try and make antibodies with AI. You know what they do? They go to George and say, george, can we have your antibody group? Because we want to train and we've already trained all of us on this, and our mice know how to do this, and our technology is there. So AI can do certain things, but it's not going to magically say, can you come up with a better show than Mad Money? Well, maybe it could do that. I don't know. I think you've got more to worry about AI than we do you.
Jim Cramer
Also, there's another shibboleth. This is one of these conferences where all these big cups are, are getting their pipeline by buying small companies. You don't believe in that. You also have data which says it doesn't work.
Len Schleifer (CEO of Regeneron)
Yeah, look, there's two ways that you can get products. And by the way, getting products is really, really hard. I should add probably three or four more reallys there. You can source them from your own labs, or you can try and buy them from other people. Very few people can source them from their own labs. We've got about, I think it's up to 14 drugs out of our labs. They've been approved. It's sort of a record. And we can source from our own labs, but it's not that we won't source outside. It's just that when you look at the data, the return on the investment is just not there. Either the drugs fail that you buy because you're buying a pig in a poke, or the bankers are so good, they get the price up so high. We've been involved in some of these auctions where we might think something's worth a buck and somebody else is willing to pay eight bucks.
Jim Cramer
Well, that's desperation on their part.
Len Schleifer (CEO of Regeneron)
Yeah, and that's destruction of value. We're trying to create value.
Jim Cramer
Let me one last question out here. Everyone claims that they have a drug that could topple Eli Lilly's dominance at GOP1. You actually have a combination that I think a lot of people would want because it has to do with cholesterol. Cholesterol is much more of a killer than people realize.
Len Schleifer (CEO of Regeneron)
Well, the number one cause of death in the country is still heart disease. And high cholesterol is the main driver of that problem. If you look at what the obesity drugs can do, they actually do lower cardiovascular risk and death. And they're amazing drugs. And Lilly and Novo, they've done great jobs. But if you look at do they lower cholesterol, the bad cholesterol? Minimally. Minimally. Maybe it's 10%. I don't even think it's that much. Our drug Praluent can lower it by 50% or 60%. Really change the risk. Imagine if you could put that together and you grip it's a game changer. You know why? Because half the people who are obese, they also have elevated ldl. So they need something in addition to losing weight, they need something to drive their LDL down. I think it's a perfect marriage of two great opportunities.
Jim Cramer
I think it'll be one of the most prescribed jokes in history. I want to thank Glenn Schlopper as the founder, CEO Generon and of I will say it, a friend of our show.
Len Schleifer (CEO of Regeneron)
Absolutely appreciate it. Very good friend. Good.
Jim Cramer
Coming up, Kramer takes your calls.
And the sky's the limit. It's a fast fire Lightning round next.
It is time. It's over the line rail C R. We're going to be saving this. Talk to the Bobby Bil still because I know of course not my step is the greatest time and then the lightning round is over. Are you ready, Ski daddy from lightning. But let's start with Ron in South Carolina. Ron. Hey, Jim.
Caller/Guest
Good afternoon. We're cruising the the stock market recently and on the NASDAQ exchange. Something caught my eye. It's a company called NewTech1.
Jim Cramer
Yeah, that's a strange bank that I do not know with a high yield. So here's what we're going to do, Ron. We're going to do some work on it because I love a situation that has a big yield and is added high. And we will come back. Let's go to Donna in Michigan. Donna. Hi, John.
Fidelity Representative
I would like to know I'm up 32% on Texas Instruments.
Jim Cramer
Is it time to hold or is it time to sell? No, no. You want to hold it. Why? Because every one of these other semiconductors as ignited. This one hasn't yet. It'll come around specific rotation. I like this. Great. Bob in Connecticut. Bob. Hey, Bully Jim calling on Crane Co. 52 week high. Why not diversified manufacturer? It's like what people want are diversified manufacturers that not necessarily are part of the data center right now. And that includes Crane. Good company. Let's go to Bruce in Illinois. Bruce.
Caller/Guest
Professor Kramer, should I buy more, hold or sell my position in Catalyst Pharmaceuticals?
Jim Cramer
I like Catalyst Pharmaceutical. It actually has by the way real earnings and it's a very inexpensive stock and you got a winner. Sam in Pennsylvania. Sam.
Caller/Guest
Jim, I got an interesting one.
Jim Cramer
I'm talking today about GPR. The company has got an interesting small molecule GLP1. It's a Glynn Prion. It's hard to pronounce, but anyway, it's interesting because it's competitive with the recent one coming out of Novo Nordisk. It. The small molecule nature of this drug means that it has a really low side effect profile. So the probability for this new oral GLP1 coming from GPCR and the stock is GPCR. Oh, okay. So this is. They have a deal with. With Roche and therefore I think it's a legitimate idea. Boy, the stock fully reflects that deal. I don't want to touch it. Lilly is still the gold standard. And that. Ladies, gentlemen, conclusion of the Lightning Round.
The Lightning Round is sponsored by Charles Schwab. Coming up, Kramer is talking to the CEO of Cardinal Health about how the drug deal distributor is planning to replicate its soaring growth from last year.
Len Schleifer (CEO of Regeneron)
Next.
Jim Cramer
Tomorrow, kick off the trading day with Squawk on the street live from post nine at the nyse.
You get a little rest, all right? You get a little rest. We'll be fine tomorrow. The Brionis don't hold up. David, when I go right from the airport to here, you notice the Brionis are wrinkled even with your 150 count.
Caller/Guest
Yeah, that's sad.
Jim Cramer
I do notice that.
Jason Hollister (CEO of Cardinal Health)
It's a problem.
Jim Cramer
200 now. I went to Milan. He got that written into the contract.
It all starts at 9am Eastern.
Everybody in Washington will bash the drug distributors because middlemen get a bad rap in the country. But it never stops them from making fortunes for their shareholders. Look at Cardinal Health. Up 74% last year and surging again today after the company raised its full year forecast this morning. How did they do it? Perhaps they're not middlemen. Let's dig deep with Jason Hollister, the CEO of Cardinal Health. Mr. Holler, welcome back to Van, Buddy.
Jason Hollister (CEO of Cardinal Health)
Thanks, Tim. Great to be here.
Jim Cramer
All right, Jason, a couple of years ago, you came on show and you said, look, we're going to be additive to the system. Our margins are going to go up and people are going to say we saved the system money. You did every bit of it.
Jason Hollister (CEO of Cardinal Health)
We did.
Jim Cramer
How did you do it? Because I didn't think it was possible.
Jason Hollister (CEO of Cardinal Health)
Well, first and foremost, we focused on our core. We simplified what we did. We exited some businesses, we exited some countries, we sold off some businesses. Then we acquired some faster growing, more specialized areas in the specialty space. So we really trimmed pruned the portfolio and really focused not only what's best for the business, but these are also areas that were creating more value for our customers because we understand that the pressure that they're under and we're always looking for ways to improve both our financials as well as their costs.
Jim Cramer
Now you've got a method. Let's just talk about the diabetes distribution announcement today. As typical of what you do and how it's anti friction in the system.
Jason Hollister (CEO of Cardinal Health)
That's right. This is a great example of win win for our customers in the pharmacy space. These pharmacies are dealing with all sorts of different indications for their patients. They're also dealing with all the different payers. So this program, specifically the continued care pathway program, is to allow those pharmacies to pass on their Medicare Part B work, which is more complicated for them to administer. That's what we do. We can manage all payers for diabetes products, especially CGMs, which is, you know, goes hand in hand with GLPs right now. And it's a great business for them. And they want to keep our customers, the pharmacies want to keep those patients even though they can't administer all the different products that they would like to.
Jim Cramer
Well, I want to go into something that I know that people are going to say, their eyes roll over, I don't care. Management services organizations, these are doctors basically in business, they run this, but they're not necessarily sophisticated about how to run a business. We don't even want them to be. Right.
Jason Hollister (CEO of Cardinal Health)
Well, they don't want to be is the main point. I think they want to take care of patients, they want to focus on the clinical side and so they have a variety of needs to run the business side. When you think about, if you're a physician, you need to negotiate with the payers, the insurance companies, you need to hire other physicians, you need to manage the back office. We take care of all that in addition to distribution and we also help them manage their with, with greater value, their data and technology. Our first acquisition especially was actually in the data side. And that allows them to monetize that and work with the manufacturers and innovators to not only help provide better service and care to their patients, but also to help the manufacturers know what the emerging trends are looking like.
Jim Cramer
Okay, let's just use the economics of oral GOP dash 1s and your knowledge to give us. It's well known, it's not necessarily what I think of as cardinal health and maybe it should be.
Jason Hollister (CEO of Cardinal Health)
Well, we distribute any and all products so whether it's the injectables, the orals, all branded, all specialty, all generics, what makes our model unique and why we create so much value for the industry is we literally work with thousands and thousands of manufacturers. Every innovator that's out there, we have some relationship with and then we deliver those products to tens of thousands of different locations. So GLPs are, you know, in some ways are just another product, but they're a very important product to our customers and patients. And so we prioritize that. But we will make sure that every one of those products gets to our customers and their patients.
Jim Cramer
You're willing to tackle things that other people have failed at At Home Solutions. How are you able to do it?
Jason Hollister (CEO of Cardinal Health)
Well, first and foremost, just like the rest of our business, we focus on our core, core distribution. We have made significant investments in our capacity and in our capabilities in that business. 11 distribution centers throughout the United States, which means we can get to most homes within a day for direct shipments into the patient's homes. Three of those 11 DCs are brand new in the last 18, 24 months. Latest in automation technology.
Jim Cramer
These are facilities that you've built with.
Jason Hollister (CEO of Cardinal Health)
Automation so that not only does it help productivity, which is where people typically go with that, it's other KPIs like quality, our quality is much better, our throughput is much better. And even safety, our worker safety is better because there's fewer people and equipment moving around. The products are coming to them. So that's three out of the 11. We have plans, we already made commitments for three additional new DCs. So we're going to be the best at the underlying core of that business. And then we, with our ADS acquisition just this last year, we're also making strides with the commercial side. We were best of the best in operations, ADS was best invest in the commercial and the patient acquisition. The patient patient relationship. Bringing those two businesses together has created a lot of synergy, a lot of value, but also a lot of better service for patients.
Jim Cramer
So multi year, is diabetes one of many? Are there more coming verticals that people should look for?
Jason Hollister (CEO of Cardinal Health)
Yeah, so diabetes is just one area of our business within At Home Solutions. Think about any type of medical supply, chronic diseases, when you need supplies in the home. A lot of whether it's urology is one area that we're the biggest in. Urology within the space, Ostomy, nutrition, those types of products that require replenishment of supplies is what we are best at and what we're going to stay focused.
Jim Cramer
On, I don't know if people understand the moat. You don't want to go against Holler, you don't want to go against Cardinal.
Jason Hollister (CEO of Cardinal Health)
You do not want to go against my team. And that's because we are going to stay focused on the core of the operations, do it better than anyone. So then we then earn the right to do some of the higher value add activities and services.
Jim Cramer
On top of that, is the president going about a good way or a bad way to be able to lower cost of the system?
Jason Hollister (CEO of Cardinal Health)
Well, we love access and we love innovation and we love the affordability. These are all things that at the end of the day, volume is an important aspect to our success. When you think about the utilization, the aging America, the demographics, the innovation, these are all things that drive up unit costs in pharmaceutical as well as other products. Without that volume, it's hard for us to invest into our core of operations to justify that type of payback. So we have a lot of confidence that volume is going to be there because we have a lot of confidence affordability will be focused on so that Americans will get access to the medications and the other medical products that they need.
Jim Cramer
I don't want to slag the people who are there before you because they did a good job at Cardinal, but this is not Cardinal. Sometimes I think you should change the name. I'm not kidding. Because what you've done is become integral to the health care system. Drive down costs, not friction. And it's almost. This is just nothing to do with the cardinal of even 10 years ago.
Jason Hollister (CEO of Cardinal Health)
Well, we're really proud of the operational improvements we put in, the progress in the strategy. One thing that has not changed in this enterprise since the beginning 54 years ago is the culture and the values of the company that has been steadfast and is the strong foundation that we are continuing to build upon.
Jim Cramer
Is that how you're just continually able to beat the numbers? $10? I mean, this is rather extraordinary what you've been able to do.
Jason Hollister (CEO of Cardinal Health)
Yeah, the earnings update that we gave today to be able to achieve at least $10 EPS for fiscal 26, we're proud of that. It's a reflection of both the underlying volume and utilization. Marketplace remains quite robust, but we're translating that into pretty good operating results because of our focus on the operations and the core there, as well as the investments that we've made in Specialty. Those, those are paying off. One of the announcements today is that we now expect specialty to be about $50 billion in fiscal 26. So that's a business that's growing at a 16% CAGR. So got a 50, $50 billion business growing at 16% CAGR. And it brings around with it some, some other nice value add services. It's a good business to be.
Jim Cramer
Well, I want to congratulate you. When you came on the show, I was skeptical because I knew that you were a middleman and that is certainly nothing to do.
Jason Hollister (CEO of Cardinal Health)
As you know, Jim, we talked before. We're the beginning, the middle and the end of the health care industry. We are the backbone the industry and that's why we are confident that we'll continue to provide a lot of value.
Jim Cramer
And that's why the stock keeps going higher. You have a real ethos. Want to congratulate you. Jason Holler is the CEO of Cardinal Health. And by the way, hey, listen, much better than expected earnings. Can't beat that. Thank you. I like to say there's always a more market somewhere and I promise everything just for you and my money. I'm Jim Cramer. So long from San Francisco. See you tomorrow.
Fidelity Representative
All opinions expressed by Jim Cramer on this podcast are solely Kramer's opinions and do not reflect the opinions of CNBC or its parent company or affiliates and may have been previously disseminated by Kramer on television, radio, Internet or another medium. You should not treat any opinion expressed by Kramer as a specific inducement to make a particular investment or follow a particular strategy, but only as an expression of his opinion. Kramer's opinions are based upon information he considers reliable, but neither CNBC nor its affiliates and or subsidiaries warrant its completeness or accuracy and it should not be relied upon as such. To view the full Mad Money disclaimer, please visit cnbc.com madmoneydisclaimer.
Jim Cramer
Choose to show up.
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Jim Cramer
I wake up.
Jim Cramer delivers a west coast, San Francisco-based special episode of Mad Money, focusing on the fusion of artificial intelligence and healthcare innovation, earnings season on Wall Street, and the latest inside scoop from the annual J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference. The episode features deep-dive interviews with top healthcare CEOs from Novartis, Amgen, Regeneron, and Cardinal Health, alongside Cramer’s fiery market commentary and his signature Lightning Round.
Interview with Dr. Vas Narasimhan, CEO (10:12 – 18:41)
Interview with Bob Bradway, CEO (20:12 – 27:21)
Interview with Dr. Len Schleifer, CEO (28:08 – 35:58)
(36:18 – 38:47)
Interview with Jason Hollister, CEO (39:48 – 47:22)
Cramer's high-energy, witty, and highly opinionated style sets the tone for the episode. He is upbeat about innovation—especially in healthcare—cautiously optimistic about markets, and remains candid in both his praise and skepticism regarding companies’ strategies and Wall Street narratives. Interviews with CEOs are lively, direct, and insightful, pairing technical achievements with frank business talk.
This episode is an essential listen for investors interested in AI’s real impact on healthcare, big pharma innovation, and clear-eyed stock market strategies—delivered with Cramer’s trademark enthusiasm and the rare access of the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference.