Eli Lilly’s market capitalisation hit the $1tn mark in the past week, becoming the first healthcare company in the world to join the exclusive club dominated by technology companies.
Buoyed by unprecedented demand for its weight loss drugs, the US drugmaker hit the trillion-dollar mark for the total value of its shares on 21 November.
Share price in Lilly closed at $1,059.70 on 21 November, reflecting a 27% increase since January 2025. By trading at market open 24 November, share prices retreated slightly to $1,056.77.
Eli Lilly now joins Nvidia, Apple, Microsoft, and others, as companies with market caps of $1tn or more – a significant feat for a pharmaceutical company given that tech-centric sectors currently dominate investment landscapes.
GlobalData senior analyst Shehroz Mahmood said: “Eli Lilly's ascension to a trillion-dollar market capitalisation represents a watershed moment for the pharmaceutical industry.”
Lilly breaking through the $1tn market cap ceiling comes as investors have increasingly turned to pharma stocks. The S&P 500 pharmaceutical index has risen by 19% since the start of September as tariff and drug pricing worries in the industry receded amid big pharma company agreements with the White House.
Eli Lilly owes much of its success to tirzepatide – its flagship weight loss product. Marketed under the brand names Zepbound and Mounjaro for obesity and type 2 diabetes (T2D) treatment, respectively, tirzepatide’s sales have skyrocketed since first coming to market in 2022.
Mounjaro generated sales of $6.5bn in Q3 2025, up 109% from the same period in 2024. Zepbound exhibited even higher growth – up 185% from Q3 2024 – to bring in $3.6bn.
GlobalData analysis forecasts that the two brands will generate a combined $64bn in global sales in 2031.
GlobalData is the parent company of Pharmaceutical Technology.
Mahmood added that Lilly’s tirzepatide franchise has “fundamentally reshaped the obesity treatment landscape”.
Tirzepatide’s growth has helped Lilly gain an edge over Novo Nordisk, its main rival in the glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonist (GLP-1RA) market. Despite being first to market with semaglutide, Novo’s share prices have been falling amid the company’s market erosion to tirzepatide. Unlike semaglutide – known under the brand names Wegovy and Ozempic for obesity and T2D treatment, respectively – tirzepatide has a dual-action mechanism, which produces better efficacy.
Tirzepatide’s performance could also herald a changing of the guard in the wider pharma industry. The drug’s sales have overtaken MSD’s Keytruda (pembrolizumab) – an immunotherapy that has been the top-selling drug globally over the past few years. For comparison, MSD, which specialises in cancer treatment, has a current market cap of $242.6bn.
Mahmood said: “The milestone shows how the obesity pharmaceutical sector has evolved to a core growth driver capable of creating billions in revenue, meaning other pharmaceutical firms with breakthrough obesity drugs could also achieve similar success in the future and transform their entire business prospects.”
Lilly could be set for even more growth in the obesity space as it readies regulatory submissions for its oral GLP-1RA, orforglipron. The pill has demonstrated positive Phase III results and the drugmaker is set to build billion-dollar production facilities to meet the high level of anticipated demand. Lilly is also developing retatrutide, known as a “triple G agonist,” for obesity and T2D treatment.
“The company's robust pipeline positions it exceptionally well for sustained growth beyond its current GLP-1RA dominance,” Mahmood concluded.
