Eli Lilly & Co. (NYSE:LLY) was raised to Buy from Hold at Jefferies on Wednesday, with analysts raising the price target to $615 per share from $430.
The upgrade follows two positive data points for the pharmaceutical company. The analysts explained that "SELECT showed outstanding 20% CV RR," exceeding the firm's base case of 11-13%, while "Mounjaro beat consensus est by ~28% in Q2, driven by volume & continued GTN improvement."
"What a day for the GLP-1 class. We were skeptical that NVO-SELECT would show 15%+ benefit (our base case was 11-13%), but we were wrong. SELECT had a home-run result," they wrote.
"We think NVO opens the door to broader payer adoption & potential CMS coverage for the GLP-1 class. Thus, we're meaningfully boosting our Mounjaro peak sales est to $70B & orforglipron to $8.5B," they added.
Jefferies also sees upside to LLY's near-term revenue and earnings per share.