KUALA LUMPUR: Further earnings growth for Pharmaniaga Bhd can come from the Sinovac vaccine’s potential to be approved as a booster shot and for adolescents, says Kenanga Research, although this will likely to be rolled out in the first half of 2022.
The research house noted that after recording bumper profits in the third quarter of financial year 2021 (Q3FY21), there could be no sequential earnings growth for Pharmaniaga in the final quarter of this year, as any requirement for the Sinovac vaccine booster shot would potentially start from December.
Most of the Sinovac recipients had received their second dose between June and September.
“We are factoring in a concession extension beyond the interim extended concession period from Dec 1, 2019 to Dec 31, 2021 for the procurement of drugs to ensure no supply chain disruption nationwide.
“This is in view of Pharmaniaga’s infrastructure setup via the computerised system called the Pharmacy Information System which has an integral role in ensuring the distribution of drugs to patients and effective management of stock levels,” said Kenanga Research in a note.
The research firm added that there are about 11 million Sinovac recipients who would require the booster shot.
Meanwhile, the group is currently in talks with Sinovac Biotech to supply vaccines to neighbouring countries via their fill-and-finish facility.
Kenanga Research said Malaysia is one of five countries outside of China that have been authorised to conduct fill-and-finish for Sinovac.
Last week, Pharmaniaga marked its maiden entrance into the vaccine international market by successfully exporting the first batch of the Sinovac filled and finished Covid-19 vaccine to Myanmar with an initial order of 200,000 doses.
Post-results, Kenanga Research had raised its FY21 to FY22 net profit forecasts for Pharmaniaga due to the better-than-expected vaccine sales and concession extension.“Correspondingly, we raise our target price to 85 sen from 54 sen,” it said.
The research firm had also upgraded the stock to “market perform” from “underperform” previously.