Once a difficult market to crack, in recent years, China has relatively opened up its drug market, enacting reforms and speeding up approval time.
Benchmark equity indices Sensex and Nifty pared their early gains to close nearly 1 per cent lower on Monday as surging oil prices played spoilsport amid prolonged Russia-Ukraine war. The 30-share Sensex plunged by 571.44 points or 0.99 per cent to settle at 57,292.49. During the day, it tanked 634.85 points or 1.09 per cent to 57,229.08. The broader NSE Nifty declined by 169.45 points or 0.98 per cent to finish at 17,117.60. Among Sensex constituents, Power Grid, Asian Paints, UltraTech Cement, Nestle, Hindustan Unilever Limited and HCL Technologies were among the major laggards.
Once stability returns to the secondary market, companies that have obtained approval from Sebi will start tapping the market.
'We would love to have more players entering the market because that is how the business will grow.'
Equity benchmark Sensex rallied 936 points on Monday, helped by heavy buying in banking and IT counters along with decline in oil prices amid hopes of headway in renewed diplomatic talks between Russia and Ukraine. A fresh round of talks is expected on Monday between Ukrainian and Russian officials. Rising for the fifth straight session, the BSE Sensex jumped 935.72 points or 1.68 per cent to settle at 56,486.02.
Food (ahara) and lifestyle (vihara) have a major impact on the health of your heart.
Drug firm MSD has decided to enter into voluntary licensing agreements for investigational oral antiviral drug candidate 'Mmolnupiravir', which is being studied for the treatment of Covid-19, with Indian drug firms Sun Pharma, Cipla, Dr Reddy's, Emcure Pharma and Hetero Labs, its Indian arm said on Tuesday.
Medicine sales grew at a fast clip in smaller cities like Madurai, Meerut, Agra, and Varanasi in the last 12 months. The domestic pharmaceutical market, overall, has grown 12.3 per cent in this period, according to data from IQVIA MAT for April. MAT refers to the moving annual turnover or the turnover of the last 12 months. The data further showed that the top 30 cities contributed around 32 per cent to sales.
Online travel portals and airlines say the demand from companies is being led by essential services sectors like pharmaceutical, oil and gas, and power.
Covaxin is being indigenously developed by Bharat Biotech in collaboration with the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR).
The country's exports rose by 23.69 per cent to $34.06 billion in January on healthy performance by engineering, petroleum and gems and jewellery segments even as trade deficit widened to $17.94 billion during the month, according to provisional data of the commerce ministry. Imports in January grew by 23.74 per cent to $52.01 billion, the data, released on Tuesday, showed. Trade deficit widened to $17.94 billion during the month as against $14.49 billion in the same month last year.
Patients and pregnant women, people out to buy essential items, and those travelling to or from railway stations, bus stops and airports will be exempted from the night curfew that kicks in at 11 pm on Monday due to rising COVID-19 cases in Delhi, according to a DDMA order.
Sputnik V is already approved in India and Sinovac is unlikely to come in as it does not meet the criteria.
Despite unprecedented levels of uncertainty in Samvat 2077, investors have little to complain about on the returns front. The BSE Sensex delivered returns of 38 per cent in this period, while the Nifty registered a return of over 40 per cent. As is the case in bull markets, companies in the small- and mid-capitalisation basket outperformed the benchmarks, with returns almost twice those of frontliners.
With all major US export-oriented drug manufacturing plants in the country up for inspection in 2022, some estimates peg that at least 20-30 per cent of the new product launches lined up for the US will be subject to on-site inspection by the US Food and Drug Administration (USFDA). The last two years saw limited physical inspections due to travel restrictions during the pandemic. "Pre-Covid, the frequency and number of inspections of manufacturing plants in India by USFDA had increased significantly," analysts from ICICI Securities Research noted. "With growing ANDA filings, especially for complex products. "We expect this trend to return with the environment normalising," analysts from ICICI Securities Research noted.
Total foreign direct investment into India rose 2 per cent to the "highest ever" $83.57 billion in 2021-22 on account of various measures like policy reforms and ease of doing business taken by the government, the commerce and industry ministry said on Friday. Total FDI comprises equity inflows, reinvested earnings and other capital. In 2020-21, the inflow stood at $81.97 billion. It was $74.39 billion in 2019-20 and $62 billion in 2018-19. "India has recorded the highest ever annual FDI inflow of $83.57 billion in 2021-22," the ministry noted in a statement.
The third-quarter financials didn't excite market watchers. But equity investors can still make money if they invest in the right stocks.
Indian Council of Medical Research had also recommended the use of hydroxychloroquine for treating healthcare workers handling suspected or confirmed coronavirus cases and also the asymptomatic household contacts of the lab-confirmed cases.
As many as 20 central public sector enterprises and their units are at various stages of strategic disinvestment, while six are being considered for closure or are under litigation, Minister of State for Finance Anurag Singh Thakur said on Monday.
Even as the bilateral relationship between the two neighbouring countries remains hostile, there is growing coordination between India and Pakistan on one multilateral forum - the World Trade Organization (WTO). Both countries have made two joint submissions at the WTO as co-sponsors in the past two months. In June, Pakistan joined India, Cuba, and 44 African countries, seeking sufficient flexibility in intellectual property rights for developing countries to fight the Covid-19 pandemic.
On the back of rising crude oil purchases, India's bill for imports from sanctions-hit Russia jumped 3.5 times in a year in April to $2.3 billion, showed data from the commerce ministry. In April, India's crude oil imports from Russia were valued at $1.3 billion, 57 per cent of India's total inbound shipments from Russia. Other major imported items during the month included coal, soybean and sunflower oil, fertilisers, and non-industrial diamonds. That month, Russia was also the fourth-largest crude petroleum supplier to India, after Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
Shipments from Russia rose nearly 33 per cent to $1.1 billion in March from $831.17 million in the previous month, which was when the country mounted aggression on Ukraine and faced sanctions from Western nations, the data accessed by Business Standard shows. Growth in imports was largely on account of oil, people aware of the matter said. The Department of Commerce is learnt to have written to the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas (MoPNG), seeking details of imports, including the payment mechanism, which India has not made public.
As India wages a daily battle against the second wave of coronavirus cases, a Mumbai clown turns Covid Warrior.
Human presents an ugly truth -- that some people need to die a painful death in order to facilitate the process of finding a cure for deadly diseases, observes Utkarsh Mishra.
The share of total health expenditure as part of the gross domestic product (GDP) went down to 3.3 per cent in 2017-18 from 3.8 per cent in the previous two years, according to the national health account data released on Monday by the health ministry. The share of government expenditure as part of total expenditure as well as GDP has gone up from from 3.78 per cent to 5.12 per cent between 2013-14 and 2017-18, which could also explain a decline seen in out of pocket expenditure in 2017-18. Health ministry also emphasised the increase in the government health expenditure as part of the total GDP from 1.15 per cent in 2013-14 to 1.35 per cent in 2017-18.
The transition of Class A and Class B medical device makers to the licensing regime by October 1 seems to be an uphill task with several small and medium manufacturers saying they are still awaiting the audit from the government authorities. If the licenses don't come through, either due to lack of audits or MSME units not clearing the audits, then a few thousand small-scale medical device units will face the issue of business continuity in three weeks. Class A medical devices are those with low to moderate risk to the patient or user (surgical dressings for example), while Class B medical devices refer to devices with moderate risks that require special controls (catheters for example).
Floods triggered by the torrential rain since June 14 have wreaked havoc, inundating a vast swathe of flat land in the south and southwest of the country.
I got to know that every referred case for angiography and angioplasty got a kickback of Rs 5,000 and Rs 15,000 respectively. Seeing this trend, doctors started paying referring doctors Rs 1 lakh in advance and adjusting it as and when patients came in. This menace slowly spread its tentacles all over the medical field, including radiological diagnostics and biochemistry laboratories. For every test ordered, 20 per cent of the bill was given back to the referring doctor. This led to doctors recommending unnecessary tests. The pharmaceutical companies also saw burgeoning business. Acclaimed doctors were given televisions sets, refrigerators, air conditioners and cars depending upon the prescriptions. General practitioners would prescribe unnecessary drugs, and were given returns in cash. A fascinating excerpt from Dr Upendra Kaul's When The Heart Speaks.
State Bank of India, the nation's largest lender, has stopped processing transactions of Russian entities that have been sanctioned by the West over Moscow's invasion of Ukraine, sources said. To effect this, SBI has issued a circular as it fears that any transaction with entities or sectors under sanction will invite sanction on it as well, sources said. No transactions involving entities, banks, ports or vessels appearing on a US, European Union or United Nations sanctions list would be processed irrespective of the currency of the transaction, they said. Payments due to such entities have to be processed by other mechanism rather than through the banking channel, sources added.
NTPC was the top gainer in the Sensex pack, rising around 4 per cent, followed by Bajaj Finserv, SBI, Bajaj Finance, Tech Mahindra, Dr Reddy's and Tata Steel.
Earlier in the day, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal also wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi over vaccine shortage, saying the Centre should share the vaccine formula of the two manufacturers with other capable pharmaceutical companies to scale up production in the country.
India lost its competitive advantage as China gave fiscal benefits to its local manufacturers. Besides, recent policy flip-flops have, however, dented India's image as the 'pharmacy of the world'.
'Private banks are well-placed to deliver good performance over the next six months.'
The guidelines listed several services including government and private offices that will be out of bounds during the period, while exempting establishments such as hospitals, ration shops, dairies, banks, insurance offices, and print and electronic media. Delivery of all essential goods including food, pharmaceuticals, medical equipment through e-commerce has also been exempted from the purview of the lockdown.
Of the 23 companies, eight have raised funds after Shark Tank India.
'I am not envious of those who are making millions. It's their era and I had my era.'
Acquisitions may have played a role in much of the increase.
India's exports in January rose 25.28 per cent to $34.50 billion on account of healthy performance by mainly engineering, petroleum and gems and jewellery sectors, even as trade deficit widened to 17.43 billion, according to data released by the commerce ministry on Tuesday. Imports grew by 23.54 per cent to $51.93 billion during the month under review. Trade deficit, difference between imports and exports, stood at $14.50 bn in January 2021.
The government may look at areas around Thonnakkal, in Thiruvananthapuram district, for the facility. If successful, this would be one of the few sites of Sputnik V owned by Russian firms outside that country. Shine Jacob and Sohini Das report.
'We have relatively strong growth and a healthy corporate earnings cycle as positives, but a worrisome current account deficit and high inflation as challenges.'
