Technical Analyst DD Sharma of Anand Rathi Securities has maintained 'buy' rating on Ranbaxy stock to achieve a short term target of Rs 490.

According to Mr. Sharma, interested traders can purchase the stock with a stop loss of Rs 445.

Today, the shares of the company opened at Rs 464.70 on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE). The share price has seen a 52-week high of Rs 538 and a low of Rs 171 on BSE.

Current EPS & P/E ratio stood at 16.19 and 28.52 respectively.

For the three month period ended March 31, the country's largest drug maker has registered a net profit of Rs 963 crore as against a net loss of Rs 761 crore in the same quarter of 2009.

The company's net sales for the period surged 60% to Rs 2,486.7 crore as against Rs 1,577.1 crore in March 2009.

Ranbaxy said that it saw an improvement in its operating margins during the quarter on the back of monetization of FTF chances in US, better growth in top market areas and a complete focus on expenditures.

Moreover, Ranbaxy is all set to establish a manufacturing facility in India in order to fulfill the needs of its Japanese generics market.

It will strengthen its functioning in the Japanese market by the year 2012 when Japanese govt's directive to gain 30% of the prescription volume from generics kick in.