Novo Nordisk shares slide despite earnings beat on Wegovy pill miss

Novo Nordisk ↗ 2.81% shares fell more than 6% on Tuesday after the Danish drugmaker released its second-quarter 2026 earnings a day ahead of schedule, with investors seizing on a narrow miss in oral Wegovy sales and a cautious full-year outlook despite an otherwise strong quarter.

Beat on Profits, Miss on the Pill

The company reported second-quarter sales of 78.49 billion Danish kroner (approximately $12.09 billion), a 3% increase at constant exchange rates, with adjusted operating profit climbing 11% to 33.39 billion kroner — surpassing consensus estimates by more than 16%. Yet the market's attention fixed on the oral version of Wegovy, which generated 3.22 billion kroner in quarterly revenue, narrowly missing analyst expectations of 3.3 billion kroner.cnbc+2

"The only surprise I see is that oral Wegovy was just in line with expectations," said Markus Manns, portfolio manager at Union Investment, according to Dagens.dagens

Novo raised its full-year 2026 guidance, now expecting adjusted sales and operating profit to range from a 6% decline to flat at constant exchange rates — an improvement from its prior forecast of a 4% to 12% decline. But the revised outlook still projects contraction, leaving investors underwhelmed.ibtimes+1

Competition and Legal Headwinds

The results land amid intensifying rivalry with Eli Lilly ↘ 0.52%, which launched its oral GLP-1 competitor Orforglipron in April and continues to dominate the injectable market with Zepbound prescriptions outnumbering Wegovy injections by more than two to one. Lilly is set to report its own quarterly results on Wednesday.ad-hoc-news+1

Novo also faces a legal overhang after a U.S. federal judge this week allowed portions of a shareholder lawsuit over the company's CagriSema obesity drug to advance to discovery. Investors allege Novo made misleading statements about CagriSema's tolerability and trial design. A company spokesperson called the claims unfounded.ad-hoc-news

Adding to the pressure, Novo took a 6.3 billion kroner writedown on pipeline assets, including 4 billion kroner tied to Monlunabant after the Phase 3 ZEUS cardiovascular trial failed on July 31.ts2+1

Bright Spots Amid the Gloom

The oral Wegovy pill has nonetheless reached more than 5 million U.S. prescriptions since its January launch, with weekly prescriptions topping 265,000 as of mid-July. CEO Mike Doustdar described the Wegovy portfolio as "a key growth driver" and pointed to overseas rollouts, including a European launch following regulatory approval in July.cnbc+2

Barclays analyst James Gordon noted that Lilly's competing pill "doesn't really seem to have impacted the product," though he cautioned that some distribution channels may not be captured in the data.ts2

Novo's full earnings presentation is scheduled for Wednesday at 13:00 CEST, where management is expected to address pricing, refill rates, and the path to growth in 2027.ts2