Novo jumps after solid Q1, strong Wegovy pill sales drive improved guidance
The drugmaker reported earnings results on Wednesday.
Novo Nordisk rose in premarket trading after it reported first-quarter earnings results that beat Wall Street expectations and raised its full-year guidance on demand for its new weight-loss pill.
For the first three months of 2026, the drugmaker reported:
Sales of 96.8 billion Danish kroner ($15.1 billion). That was significantly ahead of the DKK 70.8 billion ($11.1 billion) analysts polled by FactSet were expecting, though the headline figure was boosted by a ~$4.2 billion one-off from a provision reversal related to the 340B Drug Pricing program.
Revenue that included DKK 2.26 billion ($353.6 million) in sales of its new Wegovy pill, more than double the DKK 1.1 billion ($172.5 million) analysts were penciling in.
Adjusted operating profit of DKK 32.8 billion ($5.15 billion).
For full-year 2026, the company now expects:
Sales and operating profit to fall by between 4% and 12%, having previously forecast a 5% to 13% drop.
Going into the report, investors were eager for signs of how the weight-loss pill, which came to market January 5, is performing. Novo, which was the first to market GLP-1 injections, has lost ground in the past year to Eli Lilly.
Investors will be buoyed by early signs that its Wegovy pill is off to a strong start and not cannibalizing sales of its older treatments.
The pill has been prescribed 2 million times since launch, Novo said, “which marks the strongest-ever GLP-1 volume launch in the US.” About 80% of those patients are taking a GLP-1 for the first time, according to Novo. Eli Lilly gave the same stat for its GLP-1 pill, which came to market in April.
The higher-than-expected sales for the pill were thanks to “pre-launch pipeline fill with wholesalers and telehealth partners,” Novo said. The company said it would launch the pill outside the US in the second half of this year, pending regulatory approval.
Competition has driven down the prices of Novo’s blockbuster GLP-1 shots, Ozempic and Wegovy, resulting in lower sales despite higher volume. The company’s patent on semaglutide, the active ingredient in those shots, has expired this year in key markets like Canada, Brazil, India, and China.
Lilly, the company’s chief rival, reported earnings results last week that showed its GLP-1 shots are still driving sales growth. The company also gave updates for its GLP-1 pill, which came out during the current quarter, and appeared to quell investor fears that the pill had lost too much ground to Novo’s.
