Sumitomo Pharma shares slide nearly 16% despite panel backing for iPS-derived parkinson's treatment

2026-02-20 06:20:58 ET

Sumitomo Pharma ( SMDPY ) shares fell on Friday, a day after a Japanese government panel backed conditional approval of its regenerative therapy based on technology developed by a Nobel Prize–winning scientist....

According to Japan’s Ministry of Health, Labor, and Welfare, formal approval will be granted within the next one to two months, NHK reported.

The stock fell as much as 15.6% on Friday on what appeared to be profit-taking after the company was granted a seven-year clearance. Sumitomo Pharma shares, up more than 300% in 2025, reached their highest level since 2019 last week as investor optimism grew around its Parkinson’s treatment.

“Reports of the smooth green-lighting of the drugs could lead to some profit-taking in the short term,” Morgan Stanley MUFG analysts, including Shinichiro Muraoka, wrote in a report.

The endorsement comes years after Kyoto University professor Shinya Yamanaka, who later won a Nobel Prize for his stem cell research, first succeeded in generating iPS cells from mice in 2006.