Amgen’s shares down after obesity drug fails to meet expectations
MarTide, the new weight loss drug from Amgen, works. Not just well enough for Wall Street.
Shares of the Thousand Oaks-based biotech giant fell 10% on Nov. 26 after it announced that MarTide’s latest trial produced a body weight reduction of up to 20%. The results disappointed Wall Street, which had expected results of up to 25%.
The sell-off in Amgen shares weighed on one major market indicator, contributing heavily to a 200-point drop in the Dow Jones Industrial Average which includes Amgen and 29 other large company stocks. Bloomberg reported the share drop was the largest in 23 years on a percentage basis.
Analysts believe meeting the 25% weight loss bar will be necessary for Amgen to compete with a new generation of therapies from market leaders Novo Nordisk and Lily. Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy and Lily’s Ozempic have become the latest blockbuster drugs with success in treating stage 2 diabetes and other chronic diseases.
The Amgen trial lasted a year and was widely anticipated. Lily and Novo Nordisk are targeting 25% body mass reduction from their next generation of drugs.
