Business

Investors see big Novo stock boost if weight-loss drug Wegovy shows heart benefit

Positive trial data showing Novo Nordisk’s obesity drug helps save and extend lives, not just lose weight, could propel Europe’s best-performing stock even higher, according to 10 investors and industry analysts interviewed by Reuters.
Demand for the Danish company’s weight-loss treatment Wegovy is soaring in the United States, leading it to significantly raise its full-year profit and sales expectations last month.

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But Novo faces challenges in getting broad health insurance coverage from European governments as well as insurers, and the US Medicare health plan for older Americans that classifies weight-loss treatments as lifestyle drugs.
Showing a clear medical benefit in addition to weight loss could change that.
“It doesn’t take a lot of leaps of faith to understand if you lose weight, you will have a lower risk of heart disease,” said Jeff Elliott, lead health care portfolio manager at BMO Global Asset Management, and a Novo shareholder.
“But most insurance companies (…) may need to see that data, to definitively see the correlation between weight loss and improved outcomes.”
Novo launched a large-scale study involving 17,500 patients almost five years ago to assess whether Wegovy reduces the risk of major cardiovascular events like strokes or heart attacks in overweight or obese people with a history of heart disease.
It has said it expects results between June and August, though analysts and investors will be looking for any signals on the out-come when Novo releases quarterly earnings on Thursday.
The company declined to comment for this story citing its quiet period ahead of quarterly results.
Barclays analysts reckon a positive outcome from the study, called SELECT, could boost uptake of Wegovy by a quarter by 2030 if the drug is approved for expanded use for treating cardio-vascular conditions.
Investors, including BMO and AllianzGI, said a reduction in the risk of a major cardiovascular event like a stroke of 17 percent or more would be considered a positive result which would likely boost Novo’s shares.
Less than 15 percent could put downward pressure on the stock while around 10 percent would be a major disappointment, some of the investors and analysts said.
A 20 percent risk reduction could boost the stock to as high as 1,500 Danish crowns ($220), a third higher than its current
price, Barclays said, while failure could see it fall to 900.
In an informal poll of six analysts by Reuters, two agreed with Barclays’ prediction that shares could be up by a mid-
single-digit percentage if the trial shows a risk reduction of 17 percent. Four see a more muted reaction, saying they expected shares to rise only by a low-single-digit percentage.
Some said the trial’s importance has been overhyped. “The trial will give important data, but it won’t give all the answers in one go and won’t blow the doors open for reimbursement,” said UBS analyst Michael Leuchten.

$100 billion market

The stock’s 140 percent rally since Wegovy’s US launch in June 2021 may limit the immediate upside for the shares too.
Worth more than 340 billion euros ($372.91 billion), Novo overtook Nestle in March to become the second most valuable company on the pan-European STOXX 600 index after luxury goods group LVMH. Its shares are up more than 20 percent this year.
Barclays estimates the global market of weight-loss therapies could be worth as much as $100 billion in the next 10 years, with most of the benefit accrued to early leaders, Novo and Eli Lilly.
Booming demand and production issues have caused shortages of Wegovy though, forcing Novo to delay launching the weekly injection in most of Europe.
Even with the medical benefit, investors say the company faces a challenge convincing Europe’s cost-conscious health authorities to pay for the drug. It costs nearly $1,350 a month in the United States.
In Europe, it is only available in Norway and Denmark, where it costs between $160 and $350 per month without reimbursement from private insurers.
The countries’ public health authorities have said they will recon-sider their assessments of whether to cover the drug, which they currently do not, after publication of the SELECT trial data.
But in an indication of the hurdles, Denmark’s largest private insurer announced last week it will stop reimbursements from next January.
“What we have seen in Denmark with some providers already coming out and saying ‘we can’t do this for everybody’ will happen elsewhere and will add some volatility,” said Lars Skovgaard Andersen, investment strategist at Danske Bank.

Business

Almarai signs multiple agreements to localize jobs through training and recruitment programs

Almarai signed a cooperation memorandum with the Food Industries Polytechnic, the
Transport General Authority, and the Saudi Logistics Academy to localize jobs in the
food and beverages sector through training and rehabilitation programs ending in
employment. This came within the first international conference on the labor market,
organized by the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Development on 13 – 14
December 2023 at the King Abdulaziz Convention Center in Riyadh.

‘These agreements are part of Almarai’s corporate program for the social responsibility
to achieve localization in the food industry sector, which is one of the top priorities of the
comprehensive strategic plans in Almarai, especially since the company is one of the
largest working environments in the kingdom, with more than 9,000 Saudi employees,
including more than 900 Saudi female employees.”Fahad Aldrees, Chief Human
Resources Officer of Almarai, said.

He added that the agreements signed to train and qualify young people are part of the
integrated initiatives and training and rehabilitation programs for national human
resources in Almarai. He pointed out that the company provided about half a million
employee training hours during 2022, raising its retention rate to 90% during 2022.

It is worth mentioning that Almarai is the world’s largest vertically integrated dairy
company, and the largest food and beverage producer and distributor in the Middle
East. Almarai was ranked among LinkedIn’s top 15 Saudi companies for professional
career development for 2022.

Business

SEBA Bank rebrands to AMINA Bank and continues to write its success story

a fully licensed Swiss crypto bank, announced today its new brand identity: AMINA Bank AG. The group operates
globally from its regulated hubs in Zug, Abu Dhabi and Hong Kong, offering its clients traditional and crypto banking services.
SEBA Bank made history in 2019 by becoming one of the first FINMA-regulated institutions to provide crypto banking services. This rebrand marks a new chapter for the company, which has proudly been in operation for more than four years. AMINA Bank is inspired by the same trailblazing ambition to lead the way for its clients and to write its own future as a Swiss-
regulated crypto bank offering services to its traditional and crypto savvy clients around the globe. The name ‘AMINA’ stems from the term ‘transAMINAtion’, meaning transference of one compound to another. AMINA is a brand driven by perpetual change, bringing together the various ‘compounds’ of traditional, digital, and crypto banking to unlock new potential and
growth for our clients. This vision of change represents the transformation of our clients’ financial future. Franz Bergmueller, CEO of AMINA, said: “We are delighted to introduce the world to our new brand identity. While we say goodbye to the SEBA name, we remain forever proud of the achievements made by the group under the former brand. “Our brand signifies a new era in the company’s growth and strategy; we are a key player in crypto banking and are here to define the future of finance. With our client-focused approach, our years of traversing traditional and crypto finance, we offer a platform for investors to build
wealth safely and under the highest regulatory standards.” “We are grateful to be encouraged by our supportive and committed investors who have been very helpful, supporting the growth of the company. We thank our employees in all the regions
for their dedication and client focus. As we look forward to 2024, our ambition is to accelerate the growth of our strategic hubs in Switzerland, Hong Kong, and Abu Dhabi, and to continue our global expansion, building on all the successes we have laid down over the past years.” Current clients of AMINA Bank (formerly SEBA Bank) will be unaffected by the rebrand other than encountering the new name; all operations will be business as usual across the board. The branch office based in Abu Dhabi and the subsidiaries in Hong Kong and Singapore will subsequently apply for a name change to align with the head office in Zug.

Business

Uptime Appoints Mustapha Louni Chief Business Officer

Uptime Institute is pleased to announce the appointment of Mustapha Louni to the position of Chief Business Officer, a role specifically created to drive strategic leadership and client success. In this new role, Mr. Louni will assume responsibility for the global Uptime sales and marketing organizations and drive overall business value for all Uptime clients. He will retain his existing responsibilities overseeing operations in the Middle East, India, Africa, and the Asia Pacific regions. In this elevated capacity, Mr. Louni is poised to play a pivotal role in driving Uptime’s next phase of global expansion through strategic initiatives to enhance market awareness of the dramatically expanding global service lines and delivery capabilities of Uptime that uniquely support the global data center industry in its pursuit of ever higher performance through elevated availability, resiliency, sustainability, and cyber-security of digital infrastructure. Louni’s appointment renews and expands Uptime

Institute 39;s 30-year commitment to advancing excellence in the data center sector on a global scale. “Today we are experiencing the next phase of the one-time, planetary transformation from analog to digital. This unprecedented, once-in-a-generation growth in data center demand is primarily driven by continuing cloud adoption, the new promise of AI, and the demonstrable fact
that hybrid digital infrastructure is here to stay for the foreseeable future,” said Martin McCarthy, CEO, Uptime Institute. “These complex and nuanced market demands require a visionary talent like Mustapha Louni. He is someone who cannot only deftly manage specific aspects of the business but also remain ahead of accelerating changes and trends. He continues to earn client
trust and respect by timely delivery on demanding commitments while he also inspires and energizes colleagues and clients alike. I am delighted to announce Mr. Louni’s new position and know that he will continue to expand the impact that he has already brought to Uptime since his arrival.” In 2014, Mr. Louni joined the Uptime organization in the United Arab Emirates, leveraging his extensive experience from roles at Panduit and Schneider Electric in Paris and Dubai. As the company’s first commercial resource in the Middle East and Africa region, Mr. Louni played a pivotal role in expanding Uptime’s presence. Within a year, he successfully established what became and remains Uptime’s fastest growing regional office. Under his leadership, Uptime has
extended his impressive trajectory of growth in MEA to the Asia-Pacific regions, augmenting the Uptime workforce with dedicated team members spanning more than a dozen countries across these regions. A new Uptime office has been inaugurated in Riyadh, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) this year, further fortifying the company’s ability to meet its commitment to sustained
growth and excellence and serve clients in critical, accelerating markets for digital infrastructure.

Uptime Institute began development of its proprietary and now globally recognized Tier Standards and its Tier Certifications 30 years ago to ensure that the mission critical computing needs of all organizations could be met with confidence and understood by executive management. Since that time, Uptime Tier Certification as well as other Uptime offerings including assessments and awards in digital infrastructure for ensuring business performance in areas of management and operations, risk and resilience, sustainability, and more recently cyber- security have gained global adoption. Uptime’s expanding success is based on delivering a
unique business service that is based upon unparalleled engineering excellence and technical mastery, while remaining vendor independent and technology agnostic.