Mumbai: Shares of Sun Pharmaceuticals Ltd surged 9% on Friday as the US Food and Drug Administration (USFDA) issued Voluntary Action Indicated (VAI) status to the company’s Halol plant in Gujarat.
Sun Pharma shares closed 8.02% higher at Rs527.95 on NSE, while shares of Sun Pharma Advanced Research ended 11.43% up at Rs414.30.
In intraday trade, Sun Pharma shares jumped as much as 9.2%—their biggest intraday percent gain since April 2015—to Rs533.65. Shares of Sun Pharma Advanced Research surged as much as 14%—its biggest intraday percentage gain since 30 October 2017—to Rs424.
Over 29.2 million Sun Pharma shares change hands as against the 30-day moving average of about 5.7 million. More than 3.2 million Sun Pharma Advanced Research shares change hands compared to the 30-day moving average of 250,289.
USFDA issues VAI status to Sun Pharma on its Halol plant. VAI status means that though objectionable conditions were found at the plant, the issues do not justify further regulatory action and any corrective action is left to the investigator to take voluntarily.
A Sun Pharma spokesman said the company was assessing the USFDA update.
The US drug regulator in February had made three observations after inspecting its factory at Halol in Gujarat, for failing to meet good manufacturing practice standards, reported Mint.
The facility at Halol, one of Sun Pharma’s biggest units, holds the key to its US formulation business. Sun Pharma gets about half of its revenue from the US market and the Halol unit contributes a majority of its drug filings.
Analysts believe that this development brings the company closer to obtaining USFDA clearance for its Halol plant.