Lupin drops on reports of foreign brokerage downgrade

Lupin fell 3.62% to Rs 1,613.80 at 10:40 IST on BSE on media reports that a foreign brokerage has downgraded the stock to underperform from buy.

Meanwhile, the S&P BSE Sensex was up 129.54 points or 0.52% at 24,806.91.

On BSE, so far 1.67 lakh shares were traded in the counter as against average daily volume of 2.50 lakh shares in the past one quarter. The stock hit a high of Rs 1,673 and a low of Rs 1,597.60 so far during the day. The stock had hit a 52-week low of Rs 1,589.40 on 14 May 2015. The stock had hit a record high of Rs 2,127 on 6 October 2015. The stock had underperformed the market over the past one month till 17 March 2016, sliding 3.25% compared with Sensex's 5.54% rise. The scrip had also underperformed the market in past one quarter, declining 8.19% as against Sensex's 4.37% fall.

The large-cap company has equity capital of Rs 90.11 crore. Face value per share is Rs 2.

Shares of Lupin have dropped 7.7% in two trading sessions from its close of Rs 1,748.50 on 16 March 2016. The stock declined 4.23% to settle at Rs 1,674.50 yesterday, 17 March 2016. Media reports suggested that a foreign brokerage has downgraded the stock to underperform from buy in the wake of observations by the United States Food and Drug Administration (USFDA) on the company's Goa facility. The foreign brokerage reportedly said that two out of nine observations by USFDA are critical in nature. The brokerage added that due to the USFDA observations, many pending approvals linked to the company's Goa plant may get delayed.

It may be recalled that Lupin had announced early this week that USFDA recently inspected its Goa facility and cited nine observations. Lupin said that the observations by USFDA were on aspects such as inadequacy and adherence to Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs). Lupin had said that it is in the midst of putting together a response to address the USFDA's observations.

On consolidated basis, Lupin's net profit fell 11.9% to Rs 529.75 crore on 6.8% growth in net sales to Rs 3357.66 crore in Q3 December 2015 over Q3 December 2014.

Lupin is a pharmaceutical company producing and developing a wide range of branded & generic formulations, biotechnology products and APIs globally. The company is a significant player in the cardiovascular, diabetology, asthma, pediatric, CNS, GI, anti-infective and NSAID space and holds global leadership positions in the anti-TB and cephalosporin segment.

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