Novo Nordisk's GLP-1 pill momentum faces pricing test, says leading bank

The Danish pharmaceutical institution has shed 27% of its marketplace worth twelvemonth to date, deed by full-year 2026 guidance that came successful importantly beneath marketplace expectations and a disappointing objective proceedings readout for CagriSema, a operation cause that proved inferior to rival Eli Lilly's Zepbound successful the REDEFINE-4 study.

UBS highlights the oral mentation of Wegovy, the company's flagship injectable weight-loss drug, arsenic the cardinal absorption for investors, with play medicine volumes approaching 100,000 according to IQVIA data, though UBS notes those figures seizure lone astir 60% of existent scripts written.

The slope forecasts first-quarter oral Wegovy income of $235 million, but cautions that a wide scope of outcomes is imaginable fixed uncertainty astir pricing crossed antithetic income channels, including nonstop diligent enactment programmes, telehealth providers and commercialized insurers.

On the broader injectable Wegovy business, UBS notes that measurement maturation successful the archetypal 4th has been stronger than Novo's ain guidance assumed, raising the anticipation that the institution could assistance the bottommost extremity of its full-year income maturation guidance range, presently acceptable astatine minus 5% to minus 13% connected a changeless speech complaint basis.

Gross margin, which UBS estimates astatine 79% for the quarter, is flagged arsenic a cardinal unknown, with clarity expected to travel erstwhile results land.

UBS besides points to the ongoing motorboat of Eli Lilly's rival oral GLP-1 cause oforglipron arsenic an further hazard to Novo's momentum.

UBS maintains its neutral standing connected Novo Nordisk with a terms people of DKr332.