Novo Nordisk's bid for Metsera, Eli Lilly boosts revenue outlook

Morning Brief host Julie Hyman tracks several of the day's top trending stock tickers, including Novo Nordisk's (NVO) bidding war with Pfizer (PFE) over who acquires Metsera (MTSR), Merck (MRK) cutting the higher end of its sales guidance, and Eli Lilly (LLY) raising its full-year revenue forecast after topping third quarter earnings estimates.

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Video Transcript

00:00 Speaker A

First up, we got MetSera. The obesity drug company is now in the middle of a bidding war. Novo Nordisk has made an unsolicited bid for the company after MetSera had agreed to a deal with Pfizer last month. Novo offered to buy the company for $6 and a half billion dollars. Now Pfizer has just four days to make a better offer. The tussle follows setbacks for both Novo and Pfizer in an obesity market that's expected to reach $100 billion dollars by 2030.

00:27 Speaker A

Next is Merck, the drug maker trimming the top end of its sales forecast for the full year. While overall third quarter sales did beat estimates, it failed to produce any standout sales beats in the third quarter. Still, sales of Keytruda rose 10% from a year ago. But Merck is facing pressure as it prepares for the loss of its big cancer drug. Keytruda's patent expires at the end of 2027. The pharmaceutical giant is cutting costs in anticipation of that expiration.

00:48 Speaker A

And finally Eli Lily beating estimates and boosting its full-year revenue guidance. Results were uh increased by its boosted by its blockbuster weight loss and diabetes drugs that beat expectations in the third quarter. Diabetes drug Mounjaro and obesity treatment Zepbound outpaced expectations by a combined nearly $1.3 billion. The shares up 3 and a half percent.

01:07 Speaker A

And stay with Yahoo Finance because at 11:30 a.m. Eastern, I'll be sitting down with the CFO of Eli Lily to talk more about the results. You can scan the QR code below to track the best and worst performing stocks with Yahoo Finance's trending tickers page.

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