Pharma shares slump after Trump price threat

Shares in European pharmaceutical firms slumped on Friday following a threat by President Donald Trump to punish them if they don't lower prices for medicines in the United States.

Shares in Novo Nordisk, the Danish maker of the blockbuster diabetes and weight-loss treatments Ozempic and Wegovy, saw shares drop 4.5 per cent shortly after trading got under way in Copenhagen.

Shares in Britain's AstraZeneca fell 2.8 per cent in London, while Sanofi fell 1.1 per cent in Paris.

Meanwhile, shares in Novartis shed 0.9 per cent and Roche 1.0 per cent after Trump announced Swiss goods will face a 39 per cent tariff starting next week.

Trump told major pharmaceutical firms Thursday to lower prices or face punishment, as he moved to give Americans relief from medicine costs much higher than elsewhere in the world.

In letters to 17 drug companies published on his platform Truth Social, Trump said he wants the firms to work with his administration to institute a series of changes within 60 days.

"If you refuse to step up, we will deploy every tool in our arsenal to protect American families from continued abusive drug pricing practices," Trump wrote without specifying what the consequences would entail.

Trump is following up on an executive order he signed in May to address US drug prices that are among the highest in the world -- more than three times what people in similarly developed countries pay, the White House said Thursday.