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Until last year, as the COVID-19 pandemic became severe, the stock price of biopharmaceutical rose sharply due to the expectations for the development of vaccines, treatments, and the strengthened government supports. As the number of confirmed cases has recently dropped significantly and the fatality rate has fallen sharply, the stock price of biopharmaceutical is also fluctuating.

MedigateNews compared biopharmaceutical companies with market caps of more than 1 trillion won based on the Korea Exchange data (as of the market closure of June 8, 2021 and 2022) and found that a sharp decline continues as the infectious disease becomes endemic.

As of June of this year, Samsung Biologics recorded a market capitalization of 58.9321 trillion won, ranking the first among biopharmaceutical companies. During the same period last year, the market cap stood at 56.5710 trillion won, which went up slightly this year. Celltrion recorded 22.8044 trillion won in the first half of this year and Celltrion Healthcare recorded 9.7265 trillion won, down by 38.53% and 47.48% respectively from the same period last year.

SK Bioscience, which went public last year, recorded a market cap of 9.6364 trillion won as of June this year, and SK Biopharmaceuticals recorded 6.4608 trillion won. The market caps of these companies fell down by 18.73% and 31.24% respectively, but the ranking in the biopharmaceutical companies did not change.

SD Biosensor, which achieved significantly large amount of exports and sales of COVID-19 diagnostic devices after listing the company in July of last year, rose to the top of the list with a market cap of 4.8383 trillion won as of June 8 of this year.

This year, the market caps of Yuhan Corporation and Hanmi Pharmaceuticals decreased only by 4-5% compared to the same period of the previous year, recording 4.2547 trillion won and 3.7878 trillion won and they showed relatively good results. However, as Hanmi Science, the holding company of Hanmi Pharmaceutical, fell sharply, and its market cap in June this year was 3.2253 trillion won.

Celltrion Pharm also recorded a drop of more than 40% to KRW 3.785 trillion. While Alteogen rose in its ranking, its market cap fell down by 27% to KRW 2.2902 trillion won. Seegene also had the same market cap as last year, but decreased by 30% this year to 2.2457 trillion won. Although the ranking of SK Chemicals increased, its market cap decreased by 29% to record 2.1321 trillion won only.

ST Pharm, which is promoting the development of a domestic COVID-19 mRNA vaccine, recorded a market cap of 1.8922 trillion won in June this year, maintaining a similar performance to the last year.

While the biopharmaceutical market cap was generally frozen, Daewoong Pharm made a good lead, not only in ranking but also in market capitalization of 2.392 trillion won, going up significantly from the same period last year. On the other hand, Daewoong, the holding company of Daewoong Pharmaceutical, recorded 1.6774 trillion won, a lower performance than the same period last year.

Hugel's market capitalization also decreased by 47.41% compared to the same period of the previous year. Despite the recent record-breaking sales of Retivo due to the company’s global expansion, it was only at 1.5135 trillion won due to the issues caused by the selling of GS and the cancellation of the product license from the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety, and the lawsuit recently filed by Medytox against ITC. Ildong Pharmaceutical surpassed 1 trillion won in market capitalization this year for the first time on the news of the development of a treatment for COVID-19.

by Min-ji Seo