Ranbaxy shares settle 1.51% down; m-cap erodes by Rs 43 cr

Shares of Ranbaxy Laboratories today settled for the day with losses of 1.51 per cent, pursuant to which the market capitalisation of the company eroded by Rs 43 crore.
Ranbaxy said on Saturday it was withdrawing two lots of Atorvastatin calcium tablets, a generic version of cholesterol-lowering drug Lipitor, after a complaint of wrong dosage.
Reacting to the development shares of the company opened on a weaker note on the bourses and had sank 3.8 per cent during the day to an intra-day low of Rs 356 on the BSE.
At the end of today's trading, the stock was quoted at Rs 364.50, down 1.51 per cent over its previous closing price. Accordingly, the market worth of the company declined by Rs 43 crore to Rs 15,446 crore.

Marketmen said the slump was largely a knee-jerk reaction to the US drug recall.
"The FDA declared the recall of Lipitor generic by Ranbaxy as Class II, which signifies a remote chance of severe adverse consequences or death due to the product flaw," Angel Broking VP - Research - Pharma Sarabjit Kour Nangra said.

Nangra said that "We don't believe, the event will have any major impact on the sales of the company, thus we remain neutral on the stock."
Ranbaxy, majority owned by Japan's Daiichi Sankyo, said it recalled the tablets "because of a remote possibility of the presence of a 20 mg Atorvastatin calcium tablet in a 10 mg bottle."

"This is the basis of the voluntary recall," it added. Till date, Ranbaxy has not received any product complaints related to these batches, the company said.