The skyrocketing prices of APIs, which at one time threatened the availability of even commonly used medicines in the country, have started cooling off as the traders are learnt to be under tremendous pressure and started releasing the products to the market. Most traders and some of the formulators had stocked the APIs to capacity anticipating a crisis situation.

Sources said that the pharma market is witnessing a kind of panic selling by traders on strong rumours that the Chinese government might relax the pollution norms immediately after the Olympics, which will come to a close on August 24. The prices of APIs had started soaring due to short supply from China after the Chinese government closed down several pharma units in and around Beijing due to pollution concerns.

With hardly three weeks left for Olympics to be over, the traders are under tremendous pressure to clear the stocks because once the Chinese government relaxed the norms, the prices will automatically come down. Besides, when the prices of APIs witnessed unprecedented rise, the demand started dwindling as a large number of formulators had also stocked the products anticipating short supply due to Chinese effect.

Traders dealing with APIs said that prices of almost all commonly used products have come down during the last few days due to the stock unwinding by the traders. While the price of pencillin G (Pen G), the basic drug for producing a number of antibiotics, has come down from USD 19 per billion unit to less than $12 per billion unit, the price of another widely used drug, paracetamol, has come down from Rs 350 per kg to Rs 230 per kg.

The downward trend is visible across all the products of mass use. The prices of azithromycin, which was quoting at Rs 10,000 a kg some days ago is now available at Rs 8,500 per kg. The price of amoxycilin has also come down from Rs 2,200 a kg to Rs 1,950 per kg. Likewise, the price of oflaxicin dropped from Rs 3,500 per kg to Rs 3000 per kg.