The Danish-maker of Wegovy and Ozempic has warned that its full-year sales and profits will not grow as quickly as expected as more “knock-off” weight-loss drugs emerge.
Novo Nordisk’s share price tumbled by more than 20% as it cut its outlook and named a new chief executive to replace Lars Fruergaard Jørgensen, whose surprise exit was announced in May.
Maziar Mike Doustdar, currently vice president of Novo Nordisk’s international business, will take over on 7 August.
As well as slower-than-forecast growth for Wegovy in the US obesity market, Novo Nordisk also said that sales of Ozempic to Americans with diabetes would be lower.
Novo Nordisk has seen its market value tumble as other weight-loss treatments have come onto the market.
In its trading update, Novo Nordisk claimed that since May more “unsafe and unlawful” drugs have been released. The company said it “is pursuing multiple strategies, including litigation, to protect patients from knock-off ‘semaglutide’ drugs”.
Semaglutide injections are used to treat diabetes but, in recent years, have become wildly popular with people looking to lose weight, especially after the enforced lockdowns of Covid.
While Novo Nordisk blamed rival drugs and its own tepid expansion for downgrades to sales and profit growth, some analysts said the company had been too slow to pursue the market for people willing to pay for its weight-loss treatments.
Markus Manns, a portfolio manager at Union Investment, which is a shareholder in Novo Nordisk, said that its “problems are much deeper” than Wegovy in the US and extend to the international market.
“Novo has underestimated the self-pay market in obesity and just recently started to focus on this important patient segment,” he said.
Mr Manns also described the cuts to Novo’s growth outlook as “a shocker”. Full-year profit is now expected to expand by 10% and 16%, down from an increase of between 16% and 24% predicted in May.
Sales are predicted to increase by between 8% and 14%. In May, Novo forecast growth of between 13% and 21%.
Benjamin Jackson, an analyst at Jeffries, questioned why Novo Nordisk has decided to appoint an internal candidate to replace Mr Jørgensen.
Mr Doustdar first joined Novo Nordisk in 1992. The company said that he had been appointed “as the result of a comprehensive process that included external and internal candidates”.
But Mr Jackson said: “We are surprised by the appointment of Mike Doustdar as chief executive with feedback suggesting an external candidate may have been preferred.”
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