Shares of pharma companies Wyeth Ltd and Pfizer Ltd were on fire this morning after the former announced that its board of directors will on November 23 meet to consider merger of the company with Pfizer Ltd.
While Wyeth was locked in an upper circuit after the stock gained 20 per cent, shares of Pfizer hit a fresh 52 week high today before easing a bit.
The deal itself is not something new as Pfizer Inc had announced the purchase of its rival Wyeth in January 2009 in a $68-billion deal that was touted as one of the biggest buyouts in the pharma sector at that time. Though at the operation level, the Indian arm of the two companies had achieved synergy, technically they remained two separate listed entities in the stock exchanges here. Now this is sought to be addressed when the Wyeth board meets on November 23 when a formal merger decision might be taken and other issues like the share merger ratio etc may come for consideration.
Wyeth's announcement drove the stock up by Rs 130 or 20 per cent on the NSE with the stock locked in upper circuit at Rs 780.10. Pfizer shares hit a new 52-week high of Rs 1,521.95 before easing to Rs 1,477, a gain of Rs 131.10 or 9.74 per cent.