Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk May Soon Sell Weight Loss Drugs on the Planned TrumpRx. Could This Further Boost the Healthcare Giants' Stocks?

Don't look now, but the costs of America's beloved weight loss drugs are about to come down. Way down. At least, that's the promise of a deal reached in early November between the Trump administration and pharmaceutical companies Novo Nordisk (NYSE: NVO) and Eli Lilly (NYSE: LLY).

Under its terms, those products will be sold by their developers through a planned national online drug platform called TrumpRx at a steep discount to certain current rates (under agreements set with said developers). That sounds beneficial to consumers, but whether it'll boost the fortunes of the affected drugmakers is another question.

The two heavyweights of weight loss

This particularly affects the two leading Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved GLP-1 treatments indicated purely for weight loss -- Novo Nordisk's Wegovy and Zepbound from Eli Lilly.

Image source: Getty Images.

Since being approved, Wegovy's popularity has soared, to the point where the drug has made its maker, Novo Nordisk -- for decades a fairly under-the-radar Danish healthcare company -- a well-recognized name. Regarding Eli Lilly's Zepbound, sales of the drug just keep climbing, from just over $517 million in the initial quarter after approval (first quarter of 2024), to nearly $3.6 billion in the third quarter of this year.

A recently published survey conducted by researcher Gallup found that the percentage of respondents answering "yes" to the question "Have you ever taken an injection for weight loss?" more than doubled from the first calendar quarter of 2024 to the second and third quarters of 2025 (from 5.8% to 12.4%).

Priced to move?

Compared to other superstar medications, Wegovy and Zepbound aren't necessarily expensive for some folks. Still, they can burn a hole in a wallet for a person or household on a modest budget without some form of support.

Wegovy's list price for a 28-day box is a shade over $1,349, while a similar supply of Zepbound can set a user back more than $1,250. Depending on the coverage of one's insurance or federal government assistance program (like Medicare) and eligibility, that figure can come down, at times to $0.

Manufacturer self-pay programs also provide eligible users a financial break. Specifically, $499 is the standard Novo Nordisk rate for its Wegovy initiative, and it's either $349 or $499 for Zepbound under Eli Lilly's LillyDirect, depending on dosage.

In the White House's official statement on the Novo Nordisk/Eli Lilly deal, an essentially one-month supply of Wegovy (and its sister medication indicated for diabetes, Ozempic) is to cost $350 when bought through TrumpRx, which is not yet up and running. Zepbound -- and Eli Lilly's next-generation investigational obesity/diabetes drug orforglipron, if and when approved -- would sell for an average of $346.

The Medicare prices of Wegovy, Ozempic, Zepbound, and Mounjaro (basically Zepbound approved for diabetes) will each be $245. Eligible patients in the program will fork over a copay of $50 for the drug of their choice.

Attractive discounting

That's a lot of numbers, so let's try digesting them into a single observation. The prices set by the executive branch with Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly are clearly advantageous as advertised, but only to those who lack decent coverage from private or government-sponsored healthcare insurance.

Theoretically, this is a wonderful way to get the likes of Wegovy and Zepbound into the hands of the less prosperous. Such an effort should go some distance toward democratizing pharmaceutical-assisted weight loss in an America that needs to shed pounds.

The Trump administration, however, has shown a tendency to waver in some of its policy efforts -- for evidence, we don't have to look much further than its clutch of stop-and-start, up-and-down tariffs of late. TrumpRx could suffer from the same dynamic, and in the worst-case scenario not get off the ground at all.

Open questions

If it does, though, it's sure to ramp up the still-considerable demand for weight loss products. So yes, both Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly should reap the benefits from this if everything goes according to plan, but bear in mind their margins will be smaller due to those beneficial prices.

How much could this increase demand from an already budget-squeezed population? And to what extent would this change affect sales volume and margins? These are questions we don't yet have enough information on to form good estimates. The proof, as they say, will be in the pudding.

What any investor in, or observer of, the two companies should watch is adjustments to guidance in their quarterly earnings reports. They're likely to be revised by their finance teams soon before and following the TrumpRx rollout, if that happens. It would also be wise to keep an eye on potential analyst revisions to their takes on the two stocks inspired by the same development(s).

As of now, though, since there are more questions than answers in this situation, I wouldn't base any Novo Nordisk or Eli Lilly investment decision on the two companies' involvement in TrumpRx, which, don't forget, is still in the planning stage.

Eric Volkman has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool recommends Novo Nordisk. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.