** Lab equipment maker Waters Corp WAT.N will merge with Becton, Dickinson and Company's BDX.N Biosciences & Diagnostic Solutions business in a stock and cash deal valued at $17.5 billion, the companies said on Monday

** Shares of WAT closed 13.8% lower on Monday

** At least 2 brokerages cut PT on WAT

FODDER FOR THE BULLS AND THE BEARS

** Leerink Partners ("outperform") says investors familiar with WAT CEO Udit Batra's orchestration of the Merck KGaA MRCG.DE - Sigma Aldrich deal are more likely to find comfort in the BDX deal

** "Simply put – investors do expect the business to perform far better under WAT than with BDX" - Leerink

** Jefferies ("buy", PT: $435) expects the story in the near term to stay noisy with debates around synergies and growth

** "Perhaps not surprising given the size of the deal, we have seen fodder for the bulls and the bears as investors digest the news"- Jefferies

** Morningstar (fair value: $330) says WAT may be paying too much, even when considering aggressive synergy targets, and believes BDX's business looks like a lower quality than WAT's legacy business

(Reporting by Padmanabhan Ananthan)

((Padmanabhan.Ananthan@thomsonreuters.com))