Soaring sales of diabetes drug Mounjaro, widely used for weight loss, sends Eli Lilly to new heights
Eli Lilly’s diabetes treatment Mounjaro, which is widely used for weight loss, raked in nearly $1 billion in second-quarter sales, or more than $200 million above what Wall Street had expected
INDIANAPOLIS — Eli Lilly’s diabetes treatment Mounjaro, which is widely used for weight loss, raked in nearly $1 billion in second-quarter sales, or more than $200 million above what Wall Street had expected.
Shares of the drugmaker soared 17% to an all-time-high Tuesday after Lilly said Mounjaro sales swelled more than 70% since the first quarter to $980 million. Almost all of that came from the U.S., and the company said significant demand was leading to delays in filling orders for some doses.
Analysts expected the drug to bring in about $740 million during the quarter, according to FactSet.
Executives said Tuesday that they expect tight supplies will lead to some spot shortages of Mounjaro through year's end. Lilly is building a new manufacturing plant in North Carolina and expanding at another location there.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved Mounjaro at the end of last year's second quarter to treat type 2 diabetes, but analysts see a lot of potential for it in the booming market for weight-loss treatments, and doctors have already been prescribing it off-label for that.
Regulators are currently deciding whether to also make weight loss an approved use. Lilly said earlier this year that the injectable treatment helped people with type 2 diabetes who were overweight or obese to lose up to 16% of their body weight, or more than 34 pounds, over nearly 17 months.
If approved, Lilly’s drug would compete with Novo Nordisk’s popular weight loss drug Wegovy — also sold to manage diabetes under the brand Ozempic — in a
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