After opening in red, the Indian Indices continued the downward trend in the last two hours of trading session. All sectoral indices are trading in the red.
The BSE-Sensex is trading down by 160 points and NSE-Nifty is trading down by 53 points. The BSE Mid Cap index is trading down 0.51%; while the BSE Small Cap index is trading flat today. The Rupee is trading at 62.1 to the US Dollar.
Food and Tobacco stocks are trading mixed today. Golden Tobacco and Britannia are among the stocks leading the gainers. Sterling Biotech and ITC ltd are leading the losers. According to a leading financial daily, ITC Paperboards and Specialty Papers which is an arm of the ITC group wants to invest around Rs 11 bn to rev up their manufacturing capacities in the next two years at two of its plants at Bhadrachalam and Coimbatore. This division of ITC has a major part of its business coming from the packaging segment (about 75%) and the rest from papers and specialty papers. Since there is a slowdown in the packaging industry such as pharma and FMCG, ITC Paper too is facing a downward trend in its growth. Therefore, it is investing heavily in technology to cut down the production cost and making the production process efficient at its plants. ITC is trading 0.6% down today.
Indian Pharmaceutical stocks are trading mixed today. Wockhardt Ltd and Dishman Pharma are leading the gainers. Indoco Remedies and IPCA Laboratories are leading the losers. As per a press release on BSE, Cadila Healthcare Ltd. has settled a patent litigation with US-based Warner Chilcott Company LLC. Cadila and its US subsidiary- Zydus Pharmaceuticals (USA) Inc have entered into an agreement with Warner Chilcott to settle all outstanding patent litigation related to Asacol HD (a brand name of mesalamine) delayed-release tablets. This drug is used to treat ulcerative colitis that affects any part of the colon. As per the terms of the agreement, Warner Chilcott shall give Cadila and Zydus a royalty-bearing license to market a generic version of its patented drug Asacol HD from November 15, 2015 or earlier. The license shall be granted after Zydus gets the nod from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (USFDA) of its Abbreviated New Drug Application (ANDA) for generic version of Asacol HD. Also, if Zydus does not receive USFDA approval of its generic version of Asacol HD by July 1, 2016, Zydus will be permitted to launch an authorized generic version of Asacol HD from July 1, 2016 onwards. However, any other terms of the settlement were not disclosed. Cadila is trading flat today.
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