Share tips: Innovative drugs maker with great upside

This big pharmaceutical company has a pipeline full of innovative new products, and is well placed to benefit from the trends of ageing populations and growth in emerging markets.

If there is a double dip, then it's likely the quantitative easing (QE) taps will be turned on again. That will cause fixed-income investors to lose even more money after inflation. Personally, even after last week's 10% market fall, I'd prefer to chance my arm with equities that pay solid dividends and offer greater upside.

Merck, the world's second-largest drug maker behind Pfizer/Wyeth is a firm jam-packed with best-in-class science, and which spends more than $8bn on research and development alone (or 17% of turnover). It possesses leading franchises tackling Alzheimer's, cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, vaccines, obesity, oncology, pain relief and sleep disorders. Each of its top-ten blockbuster drugs generate sales of more than $1bn per annum.

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Paul gained a degree in electrical engineering and went on to qualify as a chartered management accountant. He has extensive corporate finance and investment experience and is a member of the Securities Institute.

Over the past 16 years Paul has held top-level financial management and M&A roles for blue-chip companies such as O2, GKN and Unilever. He is now director of his own capital investment and consultancy firm, PMH Capital Limited.

Paul is an expert at analysing companies in new, fast-growing markets, and is an extremely shrewd stock-picker.