2025 was a miserable year to own Novo Nordisk (NVO 2.05%) stock.
Shares of the Danish pharmaceuticals giant and inventor of Wegovy and Ozempic crashed 40% last year as the company steadily lost market share to rivals such as Eli Lilly (LLY 2.26%), which has competing Mounjaro and Zepbound drugs, and Novo Nordisk's earnings fell in tandem. Novo Nordisk earned $6.53 in the first quarter of the year. By the third quarter, earnings had shrunk nearly 30% to just $4.50 per share.
Image source: Getty Images.
But does a 30% decline in profitability justify a 40% decline in stock price?
Perhaps not.
2026 started with a bang for Novo Nordisk stock. It almost seems like investors completed their 2025 tax-loss harvesting in December and were just waiting for the calendar to flip to 2026 to resume buying. Shares of the Ozempic maker jumped 3% on the first day of trading of the new year -- and they haven't looked back since. As of Thursday's close, the stock is already up 22% year to date.
Is there anything more behind this rally, though, than mere hope that this time will be different?
NYSE: NVO
Key Data Points
There may be. Already on Friday, data shows that prescriptions for an oral version of Novo Nordisk's Wegovy drug hit 18,000 in its second week on the market. That dwarfs the 8,000 prescriptions issued for Lilly's injectable Zepbound drug, and suggests that demand for GLP-1 medications in a convenient pill form might eclipse demand for any competing drugs that come only with a needle attached.
This news helped lift Novo Nordisk stock another percentage point or two by midday Friday.
With Novo Nordisk trading at only a 17 price-to-earnings ratio and demand for the pills already surging, I predict Novo Nordisk stock will continue to rebound in 2026.
