Boxes of Ozempic and Wegovy made by Novo Nordisk are seen at a pharmacy.
Hollie Adams | Reuters
Shares of Danish pharmaceutical giant Novo Nordisk plummeted more than 24% at one point on Friday after reporting results in a late-stage trial for its experimental CagriSema weight loss drug that missed expectations.
The maker of the wildly popular Wegovy obesity drug said its new drug candidate helped patients reduce their weight by 22.7%, below the 25% it told CNBC it had previously forecast.
The stock had pared some losses to trade down around 18.8% at 12:30 p.m. London time. Shares of rival obesity drug maker Eli Lilly jumped 10% in pre-market trade but came off highs to trade around 5% higher.
The trial results deal a blow to expectations that CagriSema could become a next-generation obesity drug. The two-drug injectable treatment combines semaglutide, the active ingredient in Wegovy, along with amylin analog Cagrilintide, a nascent form of weight loss treatment.
The phase three trial was based on around 3,400 people with obesity, or who were overweight with one or more comorbidities, and took place over 68 weeks.
In comments to CNBC, however, Novo said that CagriSema had outperformed Wegovy in weight reduction and that its performance was “on par with best-in-class treatments.”
“We are encouraged by the weight loss profile of CagriSema demonstrating superiority over both semaglutide and cagrilintide in monotherapy in the REDEFINE 1 trial. This was achieved even though only 57% of patients reached the highest CagriSema dose,” Martin Holst Lange, executive vice president for Development at Novo Nordisk, said in a separate press release.
“With the insights obtained from the REDEFINE 1 trial, we plan to further explore the additional weight loss potential of CagriSema,” he added.
Novo added that topline and full results will be presented next year and that it expects regulatory submission of the drug by the end of 2025.
Results from a second phase 3 trial, REDEFINE 2, based on adults with type 2 diabetes who are either obese or overweight, are also expected during the first half of next year.
The company faced another setback earlier this month when a head-to-head clinical trial showed Eli Lilly’s Zepbound resulted in superior weight loss compared with Wegovy.
The trial, sponsored by Lilly, showed Zepbound helped patients shed 20.2%, or roughly 50 pounds, on average after 72 weeks, while Wegovy helped them lose a lesser 13.7% on average over the same period. Novo said at the time that it was awaiting the complete data.
