An ice cream remains an ice cream as long as you look at it from the freezer counter. Glossy paper, chocolate, stick, that little craving that comes after dinner or on a too hot day. Then the gaze of the markets passes and the same thing becomes an indicator: how hungry consumers will be tomorrow, how many snacks will end up in the cart, how many snacks they will skip because someone simply will have less appetite.
The technical word is GLP-1. The most immediate translation, for many, is: anti-obesity drugs like Ozempic. Within this family there are medicines created for type 2 diabetes and which have also become central in weight management, with effects on appetite, satiety and gastric emptying. In Italy, Ozempic is indicated by AIFA for adults with inadequately controlled type 2 diabetes mellitus, together with diet and exercise; use for weight management is off-label. Wegovy, also based on semaglutide, is authorized in Europe for weight management in adults with obesity or overweight associated with health problems, always together with diet and physical activity.
The bet against Magnum tells of a broader fear
The most visible case, in Europe, comes from The Magnum Ice Cream Company, the company that produces brands such as Magnum, Ben & Jerry’s and Cornetto after the spin-off from Unilever. According to data from S&P Global Market Intelligence cited in market analysis, the share of shares lent out, used as an indicator of bearish bets, reached 19% of the float in April, more than double the previous month. A number that made the stock among the most sold short in the Stoxx 600.
The easy reading would be: the markets are pointing against ice cream because drugs like Ozempic will make people eat less sweets. The matter is more interesting. Magnum, meanwhile, presented a first quarter of 2026 that was anything but disastrous: revenues at 1.77 billion euros, down 1.2% on a reported basis due to the exchange rate effect, organic sales growing by 4.5%, volumes at +2.9% and prices at +1.6%. The company also confirmed its targets for 2026, with organic growth expected between 3% and 5%.
Here is the detail that makes the piece more solid: investors are looking less at the ice cream sold today and more at the ice cream that could be sold tomorrow. Part of the consumption of snacks, sweets, biscuits, ice cream and fast food has always lived on impulse. The sudden hunger, the small prize, the quick desire, the package taken without thinking. If the GLP-1s turn that volume down, the industrial model begins to vibrate differently.
Magnum is already moving into a sector weighed down by expensive cocoa, raw material costs, more prudent consumption and fragile purchasing power. Anti-obesity drugs add new pressure because they touch the least visible and most profitable part of packaged food: the repetition of desire. The problem for the markets arises there. A package left on the shelf is worth little. Multiplied by millions of people, that’s a lot.
In the United States, the first data on shopping carts show lower food spending among those who use GLP-1
The transition from drugs to shopping has already been measured. An analysis by Cornell University, based on purchasing data from approximately 150,000 US families, observed that within six months of starting GLP-1 therapy, household food spending drops by an average of 5.3%. In families with higher incomes the reduction exceeds 8%. Spending in fast food restaurants, coffee shops and quick-service places also fell by about 8%.
The cut mainly affects calorie-dense foods. Savory snacks are down about 10%, with similar drops for sweets, baked goods and biscuits. However, a few categories that are more compatible with a diet of small portions and nutritional attention are growing: yogurt, fresh fruit, nutritional bars and meat snacks. Let’s leave the collective conversion to virtue to the press releases. Here we see something more concrete: when the appetite wanes, the ranking of things that seem necessary changes.
In the United States the phenomenon is already widespread. According to Gallup, in 2025, 12.4% of American adults said they were taking GLP-1 drugs to lose weight, compared to 5.8% recorded in February 2024. In the same period, the obesity rate in adults fell to 37%, after the peak of 39.9% in 2022. The data should be read with caution, because health, income, access to treatment and therapeutic continuity weigh heavily. But the movement is big enough to show up in statistics, refrigerators and balance sheets.
The World Health Organization has also taken action. On December 1, 2025, it published its first global guideline on the use of GLP-1s for the treatment of obesity in adults, with conditional recommendations and within a broader path of healthy diet, physical activity and professional support. The WHO also reports high costs, unequal access, long-term data still to be consolidated and health systems to be prepared. Even with a rapid scale-up of manufacturing, by 2030 these therapies could reach fewer than 10% of the people who could benefit from them.
From protein meals to “GLP-1 friendly” labels
Part of the industry fears the decline of snacks, sweets and fast food. Another party is already trying to sell the new normal. If a person eats less, he or she may look for smaller, higher-protein, higher-fiber products that are easier to manage within a controlled diet. The key word becomes satiety. Marketing, as always, comes in stride.
Nestlé has launched protein frozen meals with the Vital Pursuit line. Danone has focused on yogurts also designed for those who want to preserve muscle mass. In the UK, Morrisons has signed agreements for products presented as compatible with GLP-1 users. In the United States, several companies are working on ready-to-eat meals, smoothies and products with “GLP-1 friendly” labels. The business reasoning is simple: those who lose weight quickly may need more protein, more fiber and less aggressive portions.
This is where the slippery part begins. A formula like “GLP-1 friendly” sounds reassuring, almost clinical, but it can become a comfortable dress for products that change little. The same goes for protein-washing, the tendency to load a package with protein boosters to make it seem healthier than the recipe actually says. A bar remains a bar even with the right font. A yogurt can be useful, of course, but ingredients, sugars, fats and real quantities matter. The body reads the nutritional table, not the promise printed on the front.
The point, therefore, goes beyond Ozempic used as a name-symbol. GLP-1 drugs are forcing industrial food to rethink an old certainty: sell a lot to people who want it often. If desire becomes less automatic, if hunger decreases, if quick snacks become less frequent, a part of the market changes its skin. Some brands will lose volumes. Others will sell protein, fiber, small portions. Still others will just change labels, hoping that’s enough. In the freezer the ice cream remains the same. On the shelf the snack still has its colorful packaging. Fast food continues to smell of salt, fried food and habit. Except that some of the customers pass by, look, and keep going. For the stock market, this is already enough noise.
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