Celltrion announced on the 27th that it has decided to repurchase its own shares worth approximately 100 billion won. The total number of shares to be acquired is 546,747, and the acquisition is planned to take place through on-market purchases starting on the 30th of this month.
This marks the sixth repurchase of its own shares this year. It previously repurchased its shares worth approximately 75 billion won in March, April, and June, and about 100 billion won in October and November. With this additional repurchase, Celltrion will acquire approximately 2,947,778 of its own shares this year. When combined with the previously disclosed share acquisition amount announced on the 18th, the total for this year alone will reach about 536 billion won.
A Celltrion official noted, "While we expect to achieve record-breaking results each quarter and meet our annual sales target of 3.5 trillion won, we have decided to proceed with the additional share buyback to maximize shareholder value, judging that the corporate value is undervalued."
The repurchase and cancellation of shares are typical shareholder-friendly policies of corporations. When a corporation buys back its shares and cancels them, the number of shares circulating in the market decreases, leading to a natural rise in the value of the shares held by shareholders.
Celltrion also repurchased its own shares worth approximately 1.239 trillion won last year. Since the merger with Celltrion Healthcare, the unified Celltrion has been engaging in both share repurchases and cancellations, including cancelling shares worth a total of 700 billion won, such as approximately 2,309,813 shares (about 49.55 billion won) in January and about 1,119,924 shares (about 20 billion won) in April.
By the end of the third quarter this year, Celltrion recorded consolidated revenue of 2.4936 trillion won, surpassing last year's total annual revenue of 2.1764 trillion won.