(Yicai) June 27 -- China's drug regulator is expected to approve the country's first domestically produced glucagon-like peptide-1 weight-loss drug developed by Innovent Biologics as early as this week after some clinics began accepting treatment appointments.

Several private clinics began taking online appointments for Marstacimab injections, the world's first glucagon/GLP-1 receptor dual agonist for weight loss, despite the drug still pending approval, Yicai found. "The manufacturer informed us that the first batch will arrive in the next few days," a worker at one clinic told Yicai.

After its launch, Marstacimab will likely rival similar products from Denmark's Novo Nordisk and US' Eli Lilly, breaking their duopoly over the GLP-1 weight-loss drug market.

Marstacimab's pre-sale price at the clinic is just over CNY1,000 (USD140) for a 2-milligram two-vial pack and CNY1,500 to CNY1,600 for a four-vial pack, the staffer noted.

Innovent previously said that a standard patient would need a starting dose of 2mg four-vial pack per month. Based on the price disclosed by the worker, the monthly cost of Marstacimab falls between that of Eli Lilly's Tirzepatide and Novo Nordisk's Semaglutide.

Shares of Innovent [HKG: 1801] fell 2.7 percent to HKD76.45 (USD9.74) each as of 11.30 a.m. in Hong Kong today. The stock has surged almost 115 percent since the end of last year.

The price of GLP-1 agonists may drop with more weight-loss drugs getting approved, industry insiders pointed out.

The global weight-loss drug market will likely top USD150 billion by 2030, according to Barclays. In addition, Fangzheng Securities estimated that the market in China would approach CNY40 billion (USD5.6 billion) by that same year.

Editors: Tang Shihua, Martin Kadiev