Shares of Novo Nordisk slipped in Monday morning trading after the company announced results of its latest weight-loss drug trial.
Novo’s results from its Redefine 2 late-stage trial of CagriSema showed that patients on the highest dose of the drug lost 15.7% of their weight. Patients who were placed on the placebo lost 3.1%, according to the data.
The trial included 1,206 people with obesity or who were overweight and had type 2 diabetes. They had a mean baseline body weight of about 224 pounds.
Shares of the Danish pharmaceutical giant fell more than 9% after the company released the results.
Wall Street had been eyeing the results of the trial to see how the drug compared to the company’s other drugs, Ozempic, which is approved by the FDA for diabetes, and Wegovy, which is approved for chronic weight management.
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In December, the company saw its market value drop by as much as $125 billion following the results of a separate trial, Redefine 1, of CagriSema in overweight or obese patients without type 2 diabetes.
In the latest trial that spanned 68 weeks, 61.9% of patients were given the highest dose of the drug, which combines the GLP-1 agonist semaglutide, the active ingredient in Wegovy and Ozempic, and a cagrilintide, a synthetic version of the hormone amylin, which is released by the pancreas.
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Cagrilintide is currently being developed in combination with semaglutide to see if it helps overweight and obese people achieve sustained weight loss.
Novo said it will detail results from both trials that will be presented at a scientific conference in 2025, and expects to file for the first regulatory approval of CagriSema in the first quarter of fiscal year 2026.
“The Redefine 2 results confirmed the superior efficacy of CagriSema in people with overweight or obesity and type 2 diabetes,” said Martin Holst Lange, executive vice president for development at Novo Nordisk. “We look forward to bringing this second pivotal trial to regulatory authorities with the aim of making this next-generation therapy available to the millions of patients in need.”
Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly have been ramping up their offerings and creating direct-to-consumer platforms for patients without insurance to boost demand as competition in the highly lucrative market stiffens.
Novo’s revenue exceeded Wall Street expectations in its latest fiscal quarter, but it forecast slower sales growth in 2025, partly due to increasing competition.
Last week, Novo cut the cost of its blockbuster weight-loss drug Wegovy in half for U.S. patients paying cash through its direct-to-patient online pharmacy to try and boost sales.
The company’s announcement came just after Lilly announced it is expanding the supply and cutting the costs of its weight-loss drug Zepbound, again, effectively broadening access to more patients without insurance with its own self-pay pharmacy.
Reuters contributed to this report.
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