China Watch P253:Supply shortage persists for plasmaderived therapeutics
Supply shortage persisting, IVIG shortage rising.
We continue to believe the supply shortage for plasma-derived therapeutics inChina is persisting. Based on our survey among retail drug stores and ananalysis of hospital data, ASPs remained stable at the retail channel level andincreased by 5% at the hospital procurement level in 2016, while IVIG enjoyed18% and 5% growth, respectively. Additionally, there were price differences of22% and 16% for albumin and IVIG between the retail and hospital channels.
While we expect low single-digit price erosion for albumin in the mid term, wehighlight healthy growth prospects for IVIG and a significant impact from newproduct launches. We reiterate CBPO as one of our top picks.
DB proprietary survey on retail drug stores.
We conducted a survey among 55 drug stores in nine cities in 4Q16/1Q17,similar to the survey we did in 2015. Our observations indicated that: 1) retailASP for albumin remained largely stable in YE16 vs. YE15; 2) the ASP for IVIGappreciated by 18% YoY to RMB675 in 2016 from RMB571 in 2015. On aqualitative level, our survey indicated albumin was widely available in 81% ofthe drug stores in tier-1 cities in 2016. As for tier-2/3 cities, 70%/18% of drugstores were found to have albumin inventory. Additionally, IVIG shortage ismore prominent, with 82% of the stores not having any inventory.
DB analysis of hospital data, plasma collection and approval data.
We highlight that plasma collection growth was 23% and 12% in 2016 and2015 respectively, while albumin growth was 25% and 16% in 2016 and 2015respectively. For albumin, global companies achieved 27%/6% growth in2016/2015, while domestic companies delivered 22%/39% growth in2016/2015, respectively. For IVIG, the growth was 20% and 0% in 2016 and2015 respectively. Importantly, average hospital purchasing price increased3.5% in 2016 for albumin and 4.8% for IVIG for domestic companies.
DB thoughts on supply vs. demand: tracking critical indicators.
We continue to believe it is impractical to accurately quantify demand for PDTsin China. Instead, one can track critical indicators, such as ASP, to tell whethersupply shortage exists. Key elements include the ASP gap between retail drugstores and hospitals, the ASP difference between MNCs and domesticcompanies, as well as the growth gap between tier-1 and tier-2/3 hospitals.
We also believe the changes of these three elements are critical. In this note,we attempt to address all these issues.
Valuation and risks.
We continue to like PDT for stable growth and minimal pricing pressure. ForCBPO, we base our price target on 31x 2017E EPS. For Hualan, we base ourprice target on 45x of 2017E EPS. We believe these multiples are justified, astheir global peers are trading at 26x, with 15% EPS growth in 2018E (vs. 24%for CBPO and 33% for Hualan in RMB terms). Key risks include disruption inplasma collection, price erosion, and delays in product launches.