To The Moon

Shares of $Viking Therapeutics(VKTX)$ were up 16.8% on Mar 26 after it announced positive data from an early-stage study that an oral formulation of VK2735, its investigational obesity drug.

Year to date, shares of Viking Therapeutics have skyrocketed 334.3% against the industry’s 0.9% fall.

Zacks Investment Research

I pointed in <Is VTRX the Next Big Competitor to LLY & NVO? Surge of 121% Signals Potential Growth Ahead> on 28th Feb

At that time, the company soared 121%. At that time, the results of the phase 2 VENTURE study of the company's weight loss drug candidate VK2735 were positive. It said in an openly irresponsible voice that its future destination would be to be acquired.

The weight loss drug market is a big cake

The obesity market garnered much interest lately, ever since $Novo-Nordisk A/S(NVO)$ received FDA approval for Wegovy. The FDA approved the Novo Nordisk drug in 2021 for chronic weight management in adults with obesity or overweight. Since approval, sales of the Novo Nordisk drug have been rising consistently, driven by increased demand for the drug.

Another company that recently entered into the obesity drug race is $Eli Lilly(LLY)$ . In December, Lilly received FDA approval for its obesity drug Zepbound. It was launched by Lilly in January.

Anticipating an even bigger market for obesity drugs, Lilly has been evaluating multiple other obesity candidates in its pipeline apart from Zepbound. Eli Lilly’s pipeline currently includes retatrutide (GGG tri-agonist) and orforglipron, which are being developed for type II diabetes and obesity. Last year, Lilly acquired private biotech Versanis to strengthen its position further in the obesity market.

The obesity market is also acquiring interest from other large-cap drug makers like $AstraZeneca PLC(AZN)$ and $Roche Holding Ltd(RHHBY)$, who are also looking into options to enter the lucrative obesity space.

• In December, Roche announced its foray into the obesity market when it entered into an agreement to acquire privately owned Carmot Therapeutics for $2.7 billion.

• Last November, AstraZeneca announced that it has entered into an exclusive deal with Chinese private biotech Eccogene to develop the latter’s oral drug, ECC5004, for treating obesity, type-II diabetes and other cardiometabolic conditions.