Pharma stocks sectoral indices recorded a volatile session on Thursday. Nifty Pharma which gained more than 1% in the early trading session, pulled back and was trading on a bearish note. Except for Dr Reddy's Lab, all other stocks listed on Nifty Pharma were trading lower. The index was in a sharp rally the previous day after the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) announced an on-tap liquidity window to the tune of Rs50,000cr for driving the healthcare sector amid the Covid-19 surge.
At around 12.56 pm, Nifty Pharma was trading at 13,684.15 down by 95.55 points or 0.69%.
The index has touched an intraday high and low of 13,960.80 and 13,661.40 respectively.
On the index,
Lupin was the top bear tumbling nearly 2% followed by Torrent Pharma and
Cadila Healthcare plunging 1.4% and 1.1% respectively. Sun Pharma also slipped by more than 1%.
Biocon and Aurobindo Pharma dived by 0.9% each. Alkem Lab dipped 0.8%, while Cipla and Divis Lab fell by 0.5% and 0.2% respectively.
Cipla has entered into a strategic partnership with Roche where the former will distribute the Switzerland-based company's antibody cocktail (Casirivimab and Imdevimab) in India. Roche India has announced that the Central Drugs Standards Control Organisation (CDSCO) has provided an Emergency Use Authorisation (EUA) for Roche’s antibody cocktail.
Dr Reddy's Lab was the only stock in the green, however, with a marginal upside.
As per the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, 4,12,262 new Covid cases were registered in the last 24 hours. Ten states including Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi, Karnataka, Kerala, Haryana, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Rajasthan report 72.19% of the new cases.
On the other hand, the cumulative number of COVID19 vaccine doses administered in the country has crossed 16.25 Cr today as Phase-3 of the nationwide Vaccination Drive expands further.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) governor Shaktikanta Das on Wednesday announced an on-tap liquidity window of Rs50,000cr to boost the provision of immediate liquidity for ramping up COVID related healthcare infrastructure and services in the country. The window has a tenor of 3 years at the repo rate of 4% and is being opened till March 31, 2022.