The Danish pharmaceutical company Novo Nordisk will in future be allowed to sell its weight loss drug Wegovy in the USA as a tablet and no longer just as an injection.
Sales are scheduled to start at the beginning of January, as Novo Nordisk announced late on Monday evening in Bagsvaerd. Novo Nordisk shares, which have been under strong pressure since mid-2024, rose significantly. The shares temporarily gained 8.99 percent to DKK 330.80 in Denmark on Tuesday.
According to experts, the approval could be a decisive step in asserting itself against strong US competitor Eli Lilly in the lucrative and highly competitive market for so-called GLP1 weight loss products. The Americans have stolen market share from the Danes with their own injectable weight loss drug Zepbound because the drug is considered more effective.
This was also reflected in the share prices of both companies. Since Zepbound was approved at the end of 2023, the Lilly paper has almost doubled in value, whereas Novo Nordisk has lost more than half of its value. The Scandinavians’ paper even reached a high of a good 1,033 Danish crowns at the end of June 2024, but after that it went steeply downhill. Even including the price gains, a Novo share only costs around 320 crowns – a loss of more than two thirds compared to the previous record. This year alone, the paper has lost almost half of its value.
Novo Nordisk with a lead
When it comes to pills, Novo now has a small lead: Lilly’s own tablet is not yet available, but just a few days ago the company submitted an application for approval for the drug (Orforglipron) for the treatment of overweight and obesity to the US FDA. A quicker decision can be expected since the FDA has issued a corresponding “Priority Review Voucher”. Lilly expects to receive the green light by March.
In the tests, however, Orforglipron performed somewhat worse than the Novo Nordisk preparation; the average weight loss of the test subjects was lower. “No other oral GLP-1 treatment currently available can match the weight loss achieved with the Wegovy tablet,” emphasized Novo boss Mike Doustdar, who has been in office since the beginning of August, and added: “And we are very excited about what this will mean for patients in the USA.” According to the company, the approval is based on a study in which the test subjects lost an average of around 16.6 percent of weight when taking a pill every day.
Novo and Lilly have high hopes for the tablets, as they are considered to be more convenient to take compared to injections and therefore more patients could potentially take the preparations.
Novo Nordisk could use this boost, because in the USA the company has been struggling for a long time not only with competition from Lilly, but also with cheaper copycats manufactured by pharmacies. Sales development therefore fell short of its own expectations, which is why management had to reduce its outlook several times this year. In September, the Danes also announced that they would cut 9,000 jobs. A little later, Novo Nordisk agreed with the US government to reduce the prices for Wegovy and cut them drastically in November.
However, this was also a result of US policy against the entire pharmaceutical industry, because US President Donald Trump is a thorn in the side of high drug prices in the USA. Similar to Novo Nordisk, competitor Lilly has already concluded an agreement. Both manufacturers have committed, among other things, to selling their weight loss products significantly cheaper to self-payers and those receiving benefits under government health programs such as Medicare and Medicaid. Last week, the White House announced a similar agreement with other companies, including Novartis, Roche subsidiary Genentech, Sanofi, GSK, Bristol Myers Squibb and the German manufacturer Boehringer Ingelheim.
The price for the monthly 1.5 milligram dose should be $149 for self-payers, the company said in an email, according to the Bloomberg news agency. Novo Nordisk will only announce further pricing details for higher doses of its Wegovy pill shortly before market entry. The price for insured people could even be as low as $25 per month for all dosages.
Analyst opinions at a glance
Lilly still expects approval in the USA for the second quarter of 2026, analyst Akash Tewari from the investment house Jefferies recently wrote in a study. Industry expert Kerry Holford from the private bank Berenberg expects sales of 2 billion euros for Orforglipron in the first year, which should then gradually increase to a peak annual sales of around 17 billion euros.
After the price rally of the past few months, Holford saw no room for improvement for Eli Lilly in her study from the beginning of December. She gave the shares a “Hold” rating with a price target of $950.
In 2025 alone, Eli Lilly has already gained almost 40 percent on the stock market to $1,076.48, thus making up for a temporary setback. Since around the end of June 2024 – the period in which Novo Nordisk fell by around 70 percent – Lilly has seen a price increase of around 20 percent.
This brings the US group to a market value of over one trillion US dollars. Novo Nordisk still has the equivalent of around $225 billion in market capitalization left.
dpa AFX
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