(Yicai) Oct. 18 -- Shares of China's Brightgene Bio-Medical Technology plunged after the securities regulator warned the developer of an Ozempic-like weight-loss drug about breaking information disclosure rules due to the chairman's early announcement of losing 15 kilograms of weight due to self-experimenting with the drug candidate.

Brightgene [SHA: 688166] closed 3 percent lower at CNY41.79 (USD5.70) today, still almost 90 percent higher since the beginning of this year. 

The Suzhou-based drugmaker yesterday said that local authorities of the China Securities Regulatory Commission handed a warning letter to the firm after Chairman and General Manager Yuan Jiandong talked about losing weight after trying BGM0504, a drug in Phase 2 clinical trials, during a teleconference held on Oct. 12. 

China Securities Journal reported that Yuan said his weight went to 76 kg from 91 kg and after that, Brightgene’s share price soared by 20 percent on Oct. 13. 

The efficacy of the medicine has not been proved so Yuan's words are misleading and violate rules about listed companies’ information disclosure, per the regulator.

The BGM0504 injection is a glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonist, a class of medicines used for Type 2 diabetes and weight loss. GLP-1s have become famous after Tesla’s Chief Executive Elon Musk attributed his weight loss to Ozempic and Wegovy, two drugs made by Novo Nordisk that became Europe's most valuable company in early September.

Founded in 2001, Brightgene develops BGM0504 for the two purposes of weight loss and treatment of Type 2 diabetes, it disclosed earlier. 

Editors: Dou Shicong, Emmi Laine