Ipca Laboratories Ltd (IPCALAB) — share price & stock analysis

Market cap

₹43,038 Cr

P/E

35.8×

ROE

16.0%

vs own 10-yr valuation

45th pctile

Book value / share

₹318

EPS (TTM)

₹41.6

10-yr median P/E

36.6×

Revenue (FY26)

₹9,646 Cr

Profit after tax (FY26)

₹1,184 Cr

Weinstein stage

Stage 2 (26 weeks)

Data as of

1 July 2026

5 of the 6 things we track are currently moving the right way — nearly everything is pulling in the same direction.

Where the levels actually stand: ROCE 17% — decent; effectively no debt; margins mid-band. Momentum says which way things are moving; these say where they are.

Read this number for what it is: it measures the DIRECTION of change, not the quality of the business. A mediocre business getting better scores high here; a great one having a soft quarter scores low. Profit, sales and margins count double.

The price has run ahead of the profits

Since Jun 2017, the stock is up 589% while earnings per share grew 413%. The difference is re-rating — investors paying more for the same rupee of profit.pricettm_eps

That works until it doesn’t: from here, earnings have to do the lifting, because the multiple has already done its part.

Today’s P/E of 35.8× is the middle of its own range against its own 10-year history (45th percentile) — neither a bargain nor a stretch, by its own standards.pe_ratio

Price is the weekly close (₹). EPS is trailing-twelve-month profit per share, anchored on Screener's own snapshots (the window starts at the first stable snapshot — earlier IPO-era share-count revisions are excluded, since they are not earnings events); between snapshots it is filled from price ÷ P/E (an exact identity), and any fill straying more than 18% from the neighbouring snapshots is dropped rather than shown. The lower panel is the P/E — what the market pays per rupee of profit; the dotted line is its long-run median (36.6×).

The price is in a confirmed uptrend — 26 weeks and counting

Stock prices move through four repeating stages: basing (1), advancing (2), topping (3) and declining (4). This one is in Stage 2: advancing, 26 weeks in, confirmed.stage

The price sits above its rising 200-day average (₹1,498 today) and its strength against the index is still improving — trends like this persist more often than they reverse, which is why the system rides them instead of guessing the top.dma_200

Beating NIFTY 500 for 26 weeks — relative strength is the market’s live opinion, and right now it is on this stock’s side.rs_mansfield

What would end it: two Friday closes in a row below the 200-day line. That is the house exit rule — mechanical, no debates.dma_200

Profits are at an all-time high

Over 12 years, sales went from ₹3,282 Cr to ₹9,646 Cr (about 9% a year), and profit from ₹479 Cr to ₹1,184 Cr.revenuenet_profit

Margins gave up 2.1 points along the way — growth bought at a price.operating_profit

Sales have gone quiet — growth has stalled

Mar 26 sales were ₹2,388 Cr, up 6% on the same quarter last year.revenue

That makes 11 quarters of growth in a row — this is a trend, not a blip.revenue

Margins have been rebuilt — 15.0% in FY23 to 20.5% now

Of every ₹100 of sales, the company keeps ₹20.3 as operating profit (a year ago it kept ₹19.1).opm_pct

Zoom out and this is the page's quiet hero: annual operating margin bottomed at 15.0% in FY23 and has been rebuilt to 20.5% — that recovery, not sales alone, is what powers the profit growth elsewhere on this page.operating_profit

The gross margin moved the same way (68% → 71%), so this is about input costs and pricing power — the raw-material equation improved.gpm_pctopm_pct

Profit exploded 380% — mostly from income from outside the core business

Mar 26 profit after tax was ₹307 Cr, up 380% year on year.net_profit

A caution: a meaningful slice of this jump came from income outside the core business — that is lower-quality profit and may not repeat.other_income

The profits are real — they turn into cash

Over the last 5 profitable years, the business reported ₹3,861 Cr of profit and collected ₹5,070 Cr of operating cash — about 131% conversion.operating_cash_flownet_profit

When cash tracks profit this closely, the earnings need no asterisk.

The cash cycle is stable

One rupee now takes about 308 days to go out the door as materials and come back as collected cash — up from 302 days the year before.cash_conversion_cycle

The biggest mover: inventory sitting longer in the warehouse (336 → 353 days).inventory_days

Building hard — new capacity is under construction

The productive asset base has gone from ₹1,354 Cr (FY14) to ₹4,638 Cr, with another ₹762 Cr of capacity under construction right now.fixed_assetscwip

Work-in-progress is 16% of the existing asset base — that is a serious bet on future demand. Capacity like this shows up in sales with a lag; it is tomorrow’s growth being paid for today.cwip

The build is self-funded: the last 3 years' investing outflow (₹2,332 Cr) fits inside the operating cash the business generated (₹3,408 Cr).investing_cash_flowoperating_cash_flow

Almost no debt — this company cannot be killed by a bad year

For every ₹100 shareholders have put in (and left in), the company has borrowed ₹10.borrowings

Every ₹100 kept in the business earns ₹17 — decent, not special

Return on capital employed is 17.0% (a year ago: 15.0%). This is the single best test of business quality: what the company earns on the money it keeps.roce_pct

Promoter holding dropped in one step — an event, not a slow exit

Promoters hold 44.7% (down 1.6 points over 8 quarters). Foreign funds own 10.6%, domestic funds 37.1%.promoters_pctfiis_pctdiis_pct

The promoter move came in a single step (Dec 24) — promoters rarely buy on-market, so a jump like this is almost always an allotment, infusion or restructuring: a capital event, not a slow accumulation of conviction. Worth knowing which, before reading it as a signal.promoters_pct

A good business — the question is the price

The numbers are genuinely mixed, and the price already assumes the good news continues.

Best thing in the data: profit rising (₹64.0 Cr → ₹307 Cr).net_profit

Machine-written research from Screener data — every number traces to its source column. Sector Alpha is not a SEBI-registered investment adviser; nothing here is a recommendation to buy or sell. Not investment advice.

Straight answers from the data