Latest news with #Jørgensen
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
2 Top Stocks to Buy With Less Than $100
Novo Nordisk should perform well thanks to new leadership and a strong underlying business. Exelixis' main oncology franchise is safe for now even as it seeks to develop newer products. 10 stocks we like better than Novo Nordisk › When investing on a budget, buying fractional shares of top companies is one option. Another is to find stocks with relatively affordable price tags per share. Although it's sometimes the case that the most attractive companies quickly draw attention, which bids up their share prices, it's still possible to find promising stocks for well under $100. Two great options right now are Novo Nordisk (NYSE: NVO) and Exelixis (NASDAQ: EXEL). Here's why these healthcare companies are worth investing in today. Novo Nordisk had been flying high since the beginning of the decade, until it ran into significant clinical and regulatory headwinds last year. Its challenges eventually came to a boiling point and the company parted ways with its longtime CEO, Lars Fruergaard Jørgensen, a decision it announced in mid-May. It's worth noting that Jørgensen led Novo Nordisk through a period of rapid clinical advancements, particularly within its GLP-1 segment. Novo Nordisk's top medicines, Wegovy for weight management and Ozempic for diabetes, continue to deliver excellent results. Jørgensen leaves a solid foundation for the next head of the company to build upon. Given Novo Nordisk's lineup, pipeline, and track record, the stock is likely to recover eventually. Here's one reason why. Despite recent challenges, Novo Nordisk's revenue continues to grow faster than that of almost every similarly sized pharmaceutical company. In the first quarter, net sales totaled 78.1 billion Danish kroner ($11.9 billion), a 19% increase compared to the same period last year. And on the bottom line, earnings per share were 6.53 DKK ($1), up 15% year over year. Meanwhile, Novo Nordisk should continue making moves to remain competitive in the fast-growing anti-obesity market, despite incurring some losses recently to its biggest rival, Eli Lilly. Novo Nordisk recently submitted an application to U.S. regulators requesting approval for an oral version of semaglutide, the active ingredient in Wegovy and Ozempic. Current GLP-1 therapies are typically administered by injection. Novo Nordisk also has several early-stage assets in this field, including a potential triple agonist -- a GLP-1 medicine that also mimics the action of two other gut hormones. Elsewhere, the FDA (U.S. Food and Drug Administration) accepted the company's regulatory application for Wegovy in treating metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis (MASH) and granted it priority review; it's also under review by regulatory authorities for this indication in Europe. There is only one FDA-approved medicine for MASH, despite the millions of patients affected and the condition's growing prevalence. Lastly, Novo Nordisk is making progress across its pipeline, including in other therapeutic areas, such as Alzheimer's disease, where it has upcoming data readouts. Recent headwinds notwithstanding, the company remains well- positioned to lead in diabetes and obesity care for the long term, while also making strides in other areas. The stock could still deliver superior returns to patient investors. And with shares trading for just under $71 each, $100 can get you one of them. Exelixis is an oncology specialist; its most important medicine, Cabometyx, treats some forms of liver and kidney cancer. Some investors have long been worried about Exelixis' overreliance on this drug, and with good reason. In the first quarter, Exelixis' revenue came in at $555.4 million, up 30% year over year; Cabometyx's sales came in at $510.9 million. If something were to happen to this medicine -- like generic competition -- it would be a disaster for the company. Fortunately, Exelixis fended off this threat last year with a significant win in a legal battle against a generic-drug manufacturer, which should keep its cheaper competitor off the market until 2030. Still, Exelixis has continued to grind out indications for its crown jewel. One of the latest was in treating metastatic, well-differentiated pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors, a nod it received in March. Cabometyx has long been one of the top-prescribed cancer medicines of its kind in renal cell carcinoma (kidney cancer), and additional indications have helped it continue to grow its sales. Exelixis should maintain that momentum through the end of the decade. Meanwhile, it's developing other cancer medicines. It tends to target areas of the field with high unmet need, such as metastatic colorectal cancer. Despite being the second leading cause of cancer death worldwide, colorectal cancer is highly treatable when caught early -- but once it has metastasized, five-year survival rates drop. Exelixis is developing zanzalintinib to address this problem. The medicine is being tested in other clinical trials as well. Exelixis' revenue and earnings should maintain a solid upward trajectory as it secures more clinical and regulatory wins. That's how the stock can deliver strong returns. Shares are trading for about $43, so you can grab two of them with $100. Before you buy stock in Novo Nordisk, consider this: The Motley Fool Stock Advisor analyst team just identified what they believe are the for investors to buy now… and Novo Nordisk wasn't one of them. The 10 stocks that made the cut could produce monster returns in the coming years. Consider when Netflix made this list on December 17, 2004... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $651,761!* Or when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $826,263!* Now, it's worth noting Stock Advisor's total average return is 978% — a market-crushing outperformance compared to 170% for the S&P 500. Don't miss out on the latest top 10 list, available when you join . See the 10 stocks » *Stock Advisor returns as of May 19, 2025 Prosper Junior Bakiny has positions in Eli Lilly, Exelixis, and Novo Nordisk. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Exelixis. The Motley Fool recommends Novo Nordisk. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. 2 Top Stocks to Buy With Less Than $100 was originally published by The Motley Fool
Forbes
6 days ago
- Business
- Forbes
3 Governance Lessons From Novo Nordisk's Stunning CEO Dismissal
Novo Nordisk, maker of the blockbuster diabetes and weight-loss treatments Ozempic and Wegovy, ... More outside their building in Bagsvaerd, Denmark (Photo by Mads Claus Rasmussen / Ritzau Scanpix / AFP) / Denmark OUT (Photo by MADS CLAUS RASMUSSEN/Ritzau Scanpix/AFP via Getty Images) The abrupt firing of Lars Fruergaard Jørgensen exposed a fatal flaw in Scandinavia's most stable ownership model: too much separation between social and business considerations. But the governance reforms sparked by this crisis may be exactly the fix Novo Nordisk needed. When Novo Nordisk announced on May 16 that CEO Lars Fruergaard Jørgensen was "stepping down," the pharmaceutical world was stunned. The real shock wasn't the departure itself—it was how it happened. The board leaked the decision before informing the CEO, who told Danish broadcaster TV2 that he never saw it coming. This mess exposed vulnerabilities in one of the world's most respected ownership models—foundation-owned firms—used by corporate giants from Patagonia to Ikea to the Tata Group. The Novo Nordisk crisis may offer a chance to fix these cracks, and Carlsberg's foundation structure shows how. Jørgensen's firing followed a spectacular market meltdown. Novo Nordisk shares plunged almost 50% since mid-2024 as U.S. rival Eli Lilly stole market share. The company lost approximately $300 billion in market value from its peak of $615 billion in March 2024. WASHINGTON, DC - SEPTEMBER 24: Novo Nordisk President and CEO Lars Fruergaard Jorgensen (Photo by ... More) This collapse happened despite Novo Nordisk operating in what analysts call the most lucrative pharmaceutical market in decades. The company stumbled badly. Compound copycats—temporarily allowed to ease supply shortages—hurt demand. Disappointing trial results for its next-generation obesity drug shook investor confidence. Meanwhile, Eli Lilly got its drugs off shortage lists faster and ramped up manufacturing more effectively. Even though Novo Nordisk's Foundation had good reason to worry about Jørgensen's performance, the company is organized to ensure that the Foundation stays out of Novo Nordisk's operations. Yet, this was clearly not the case in Jørgensen's firing. Novo Nordisk Board Chair Helge Lund said explicitly that the decision came from "an expression from our main owners to accelerate the CEO succession process." This level of interference broke the rules that Novo Nordisk seemed to have established. Here's how the Novo Nordisk Foundation is structured. Novo Nordisk Foundation has full ownership of Novo Holdings A/S, which is their profit arm. The 'A/S' is equivalent to 'Inc' in the US or 'PLC' in the UK, signaling a joint-stock, limited liability company. The Foundation appoints two members to Novo Holdings A/S, which owns 28.1% of the share capital of Novo Nordisk A/S. The Novo Nordisk Foundation, then, is quite removed from the Novo Nordisk board, but retains some influence through the Novo Holdings. This helps to separate the Foundation's philanthropic activities from the pharma business, which generates the philanthropic funds from their business activities. This setup was designed to prevent the Foundation from meddling in the operations of the business – the type of meddling seen with Jørgensen's firing. Chair of the Novo Nordisk Foundation Board, Lars Rebien Sorensen. Photo taken February 17, 2014. ... More (Photo by JEAN-FRANCOIS MONIER) But the recent crisis shows that too much separation creates its own problems. When foundations feel cut off from their companies, they may act rashly. In the case of the Novo Nordisk Foundation, these feelings may have been especially acute, because the Foundation Board Chair, Lars Rebien Sørensen, ran Novo Nordisk from 2000 to 2016. In 2015, the Harvard Business Review placed him at the top of their 'Best-Performing CEOs' list. Sørensen likely had strong opinions about Jørgensen's performance. Yet, Novo Nordisk Foundation did not waste this crisis. It is taking steps to fix the original problem. Sørensen will now sit in on Novo Nordisk board meetings as an observer and will also be nominated for a full board position at the 2026 Annual General Meeting. This marks a major shift toward dual-board representation. The question is whether this change undermines the foundation model or improves it. Industrial foundations are nonprofits that combine business ownership with philanthropy while prioritizing social goals. Foundation ownership challenges traditional shareholder capitalism's profit-first mentality and is gaining recognition as a viable way to control large public companies. Foundation-owned firms are common in Denmark, controlling about 25 of the country's 100 largest companies and 60% of its stock market value. Examples include Bertelsmann, Heineken, Ikea, Robert Bosch, Rolex, and the Tata Group. Although the evidence is not recent, a foundation-owned structure performs at least as well as dispersed ownership and family ownership, yet systematically performs better on its social impact. The key to their success is the clear separation of the foundation from the enterprises it owns: foundations advance social interests, businesses pursue profits. The foundation ensures the company doesn't violate core values but otherwise remains independent. Blur the boundaries between foundations and their companies, and the companies could lose focus while foundations develop conflicts of interest. But some communication is needed—if done right. Carlsberg shows how. Two of the Carlsberg Foundation's five board members sit on the brewery's board, including the Foundation Chair who serves as the company's Vice-Chair. This creates 'governance bridges'—formal channels that let foundations oversee without emergency interventions that can destabilize management and spook investors. Regular communication prevents the kind of crisis that hit Novo Nordisk. Some distance between foundations and companies helps both pursue their missions. But too much distance can trigger crises. Even well-designed governance separation becomes dangerous when communication breaks down during crises. Separation without communication channels can be as harmful as excessive meddling. I gained a genuine interest in this corporate form after interviewing the former CEO of Novo Nordisk, Mads Øvlisen, and 'father of CSR'. I became so intrigued that I investigated this form of ownership and also wrote about Yves Chouinard's decision to divest control of Patagonia to a trust. The Novo Nordisk crisis teaches three key lessons: Novo Nordisk's governance experiment faces close scrutiny in coming months. Whether the company can restore investor confidence while preserving foundation ownership's long-term stability will determine if this crisis becomes a cautionary tale or a successful reform model for foundation-controlled enterprises worldwide.
9 News
23-05-2025
- General
- 9 News
Norwegian man sleeps through massive container ship running aground on his front lawn
Your web browser is no longer supported. To improve your experience update it here A Norwegian man managed to sleep through an enormous container ship running aground on his front lawn. Johan Helberg, who lives in Byneset, on the Trondheim Fjord, was woken by his neighbour on Thursday morning asking if he had noticed a boat outside, TV2 Norway reported. When he looked out his door, he saw a 135m-long container ship parked up in his front yard. Bystanders look at the grounded ship. (Jan Langhaug/AFP/Getty Images) "If the ship had hit the rocky outcrop right next to it, it would have lifted up and hit the house hard. It only missed by a few metres," Helberg told TV2. His neighbor, Jostein Jørgensen, who lives about 40m from the beach, told TV2 he was woken around 5 a.m. by the sound of a boat approaching. "When I looked out the window, I saw a boat speeding toward the shore," he told the local TV network, adding that he ran outside and shouted to raise the alarm. Jørgensen said the boat, the NCL Salten, got closer and closer until it ran aground about eight metres from the wall of his neighbour's house. "He was lying asleep and surprised he had a visitor," Jørgensen told TV2. The vessel was reportedly bound for Orkanger, at the southern end of the fjord, and had 16 people aboard when it ran aground. This aerial view shows the 443-foot NCL Salten grounded in the Trondheim Fjord. (Jan Langhaug/AFP/Getty Images) Bente Hetland, managing director of the shipping company NCL, called it a "serious incident" and said the company was "grateful that nobody was injured in the grounding." "At present time, we do not know what caused the incident and are awaiting the conclusion of the ongoing investigation by the relevant authorities," Hetland said in a statement. "We are currently assessing the damage to the ship." A tugboat was initially sent to try to pull the vessel free, to no avail. On Thursday evening, a salvage company tried to mount an attempt to refloat the ship at high tide, but it was later decided it was not possible, the Norwegian Coastal Administration said in a statement. It said geotechnical investigations were now needed before another attempt could be made. While there have been no signs of oil leaking from the vessel, the authority said it had an oil response vessel on standby to respond, if needed. CONTACT US
Yahoo
23-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Watch: Norwegian man wakes to find cargo ship in his yard
May 23 (UPI) -- A Norwegian man was roused by a neighbor in the early morning and alerted to an unusual situation: a cargo ship was in his front yard. Johan Helberg said he was asleep inside his home in Byneset, on the Trondheim Fjord, when neighbor Jostein Jørgensen rang his doorbell and called his phone to alert him to the fact that a cargo ship had run aground in his back yard. "If the ship had hit the rocky outcrop right next to it, it would have lifted up and hit the house hard. It only missed by a few meters," Helberg told TV2. Jørgensen said he woke up just a few minutes earlier to the sound of the boat approaching. He ran outside and attempted to sound the alarm. Jørgensen said he was surprised to learn Helberg had slept through the incident. "I was sure that he was already outside, but no, there was no sign of life. I rang the doorbell many times and nothing," Jorgensen said. "And it was only when I called him on the phone that I managed to contact him." Bente Hetland, managing director of the shipping company NCL, said officials are investigating what caused the ship to run aground. "At present time, we do not know what caused the incident and are awaiting the conclusion of the ongoing investigation by the relevant authorities," Hetland said in a statement. "We are currently assessing the damage to the ship." Hetland said there were no injuries resulting from the incident. Local police said an initial investigation indicates the officer who was responsible for steering the ship may have fallen asleep at his post.
UPI
23-05-2025
- General
- UPI
Watch: Norwegian man wakes to find cargo ship in his yard
May 23 (UPI) -- A Norwegian man was roused by a neighbor in the early morning and alerted to an unusual situation: a cargo ship was in his front yard. Johan Helberg said he was asleep inside his home in Byneset, on the Trondheim Fjord, when neighbor Jostein Jørgensen rang his doorbell and called his phone to alert him to the fact that a cargo ship had run aground in his back yard. "If the ship had hit the rocky outcrop right next to it, it would have lifted up and hit the house hard. It only missed by a few meters," Helberg told TV2. Jørgensen said he woke up just a few minutes earlier to the sound of the boat approaching. He ran outside and attempted to sound the alarm. Jørgensen said he was surprised to learn Helberg had slept through the incident. "I was sure that he was already outside, but no, there was no sign of life. I rang the doorbell many times and nothing," Jorgensen said. "And it was only when I called him on the phone that I managed to contact him." Bente Hetland, managing director of the shipping company NCL, said officials are investigating what caused the ship to run aground. "At present time, we do not know what caused the incident and are awaiting the conclusion of the ongoing investigation by the relevant authorities," Hetland said in a statement. "We are currently assessing the damage to the ship." Hetland said there were no injuries resulting from the incident. Local police said an initial investigation indicates the officer who was responsible for steering the ship may have fallen asleep at his post.
