Pharmaceutical and biotech shares are suffering a massive blow from repercussions of Samsung BioLogics’ alleged window dressing. Pharmaceuticals had been losing steam after the financial regulator’s tighter monitoring of listed drugmakers and analysts’ warning of a bubble in the biotech sector.
Biotech and pharmaceutical stock prices have been falling since the Financial Supervisory Service said Wednesday that Samsung BioLogics violated accounting standards.
Almost all major pharmaceuticals listed on KOSPI and KOSDAQ failed to avoid stock price tumbles.
On KOSPI, the top 10 biotech and pharmaceutical firms by market cap have seen their share prices go down since Wednesday.
Samsung Biologics had the steepest drop, plunging by 20 percent on Wednesday alone, and by 11 percent additionally during the following two days. Its stock price closed at 359,500 won ($332.9) on Friday.
The biopharmaceutical unit of Samsung has been losing for four consecutive trading days since April 30. Its transaction volume spiked to 2.3 million shares on Wednesday and remained at high levels of 1.2 million on Thursday, and 1.5 million on Friday.
During the same period from Wednesday to Friday, Daewoong Pharmaceutical lost 4.6 percent, Hanmi Science, 4 percent, Green Cross Holdings, 3.7 percent, Celltrion, 3.5 percent, Hanmi Pharmaceutical, 2.9 percent, Kolmar Korea, 2.5 percent, Yungjin Pharmaceutical, 1.8 percent, Yuhan Corp., 1.7 percent, and GC Pharma, 0.7 percent.
On KOSDAQ, SillaJen had the most significant drop among pharmaceuticals. SillaJen shares rose to exceed 130,000 won per share in March but gradually declined afterward. Since Wednesday, the stock price has nosedived by 12.2 percent from 85,800 won to 75,300 won.
Genexine, which showed an uptick despite the Samsung BioLogics issue on Wednesday, also declined 9.3 percent during the following two days to close at 104,300 won on Friday.
ViroMed fell 6.8 percent, Celltrion Healthcare and Nature Cell, 5.4 percent, respectively, Hugel, 4.8 percent, Kolon TissueGene, 2.8 percent, CHA Biotech, 1.9 percent, and Medytox, 1.8 percent.