Zealand Pharma's Year Just Keeps Getting Worse

Since our coverage of the initial survodutide data drop last week, the full picture on the drug has arrived.

Zealand Pharma's shares fell 22.7% on Monday, landing at the bottom of the pan-European Stoxx 600 index. That's on top of a nearly 50% drop year-to-date. The company's stock is in freefall, and the full Phase 3 data for its weight-loss drug survodutide explains why.

The headline efficacy numbers aren't bad. Adults living with obesity, tested over 76 weeks, lost up to 16.6% of their body weight on survodutide versus 3.2% on placebo. That's meaningful weight loss.

But 19% of patients quit the trial entirely because of gastrointestinal side effects. Nearly one in five people couldn't tolerate the drug long enough to finish a clinical trial. More than 40% reported vomiting.

What Analysts Are Actually Saying

Barclays put it bluntly: "Safety/tolerability remains the key issue."

Citi analysts went further. According to their note Monday, "A 19% treatment discontinuation rate due to adverse events is not a rounding error, and nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, and constipation incidence at the levels reported here sit well above what we consider commercially viable."

They're comparing survodutide directly to Eli Lilly's tirzepatide and Novo Nordisk's semaglutide — the two dominant drugs currently eating the obesity treatment market. Those drugs have side effect profiles. But not at this level.

Commercial viability is the real question now. A drug that roughly one in five patients abandon before the trial ends will have a serious problem competing for prescriptions against established alternatives that patients actually stay on.

Two Problems, Not One

Survodutide isn't Zealand's only headache. The company is also developing petrelintide with Roche. That drug disappointed investors back in March with weaker-than-expected weight loss numbers. Barclays said Friday's additional petrelintide data provided "incremental detail around its clinical profile, but little to change our view since the topline in March."

So Zealand has two experimental obesity drugs. One tolerability problem, one efficacy problem. Neither is close to clearing both bars at once.

A 19% dropout from side effects means real people in a real trial were sick enough to quit. For patients, a weight loss drug you can't tolerate is no solution at all.

Corning: The Quiet Infrastructure Giant Cashing In on AI

While Zealand's pain continued, Corning had a strong Monday of its own.

Amazon announced a multi-billion-dollar deal to purchase optical fiber from Corning to power its expanding U.S. data centers for artificial intelligence. The deal will unfold over several years and create 1,000 jobs at Corning's North Carolina manufacturing facilities, according to the joint announcement.

Corning stock rose 4% on the news. Amazon shares were essentially flat.

This is Corning's third AI megadeal of 2026. In January, Meta committed up to $6 billion as the anchor customer for Corning's optical cable plant in Hickory, North Carolina — a project creating roughly 1,000 jobs. In May, Nvidia committed up to $3.2 billion for Corning to build three new advanced manufacturing plants exclusively for the chipmaker.

Corning CEO Wendell Weeks has been on a run. The company's stock has more than doubled year-to-date and is up nearly sixfold since the end of 2023.

Why Fiber Optic Cable Is Suddenly Everything

Most people think of AI as chips and software. The infrastructure story gets far less attention.

Data centers don't just need GPUs. They need fiber optic networks moving massive amounts of data between servers, racks, and chips at high speed. Corning makes the cable that makes that possible. It also makes the display glass in every iPhone — but right now, AI infrastructure is the growth engine.

AWS CEO Matt Garman said in the press release that Amazon's investments in North Carolina have created over 26,000 jobs. Last year, Amazon committed $10 billion to new data centers in that state alone.

The Amazon deal expands a Corning training program for fiber optic technicians in North Carolina. American manufacturing jobs, funded by private AI investment, without a government subsidy program in sight.

The Bottom Line

Two stories from one Monday. One company riding a wave of real infrastructure demand with concrete deals, real jobs, and real revenue growth. Another company watching experimental drugs stumble through the gap between promising efficacy and tolerable side effects. For the obesity drug market, results like Zealand's show that weight loss numbers alone don't win. The drug a patient can't stay on doesn't help anyone.