Gedeon Richter Gains on Chinese Sales Expansion: Budapest Mover

Gedeon Richter Nyrt. (RICHT), Hungary’s biggest drugmaker, advanced for the first time in four days after announcing a joint venture to expand sales in China.

Richter shares rose 1.1 percent to 35,125 forint by the end of trading in Budapest. The benchmark BUX stock fell 0.2 percent.

Richter signed agreements with the owners of its marketing partner Rxmidas Pharmaceuticals Co. Ltd. to create a joint venture, according to a statement to the Budapest Stock Exchange today. The deal, which will give Richter seven regional offices and more than 200 staff in China, will help expand the company’s 2013 revenue by 7.3 billion forint ($33 million), according to KBC Groep NV (KBC)’s broker unit.

“We welcome the expansion and diversification plan as China is one of the fastest growing pharmaceutical markets in the world,” Gergely Palffy, a Budapest-based analyst at KBC Securities, wrote in a research report.

To contact the reporter on this story: Andras Gergely in Budapest at agergely@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Wojciech Moskwa at wmoskwa@bloomberg.net