Weekly news, topics & discussion

This week, Equinor reported Q1 results in line with expectations. However, we continue to see valuation downside due to Empire Wind risks and a likely sharp YOY drop in 2026e buybacks. OKEA also reported in-line Q1 results. In other news, Equinor announced it agreed to sell its 60% Peregrino stake at a solid price, although we believe the proceeds would have to support near-term shareholder returns to drive a positive share price reaction.

MTG (Buy, TP: SEK130.00) - Encouraging organic growth trend

MTG’s 2025 organic growth outlook of 3–7% YOY was a key positive in an otherwise difficult market for mobile gaming, in our view. However, the adj. EBITDA margin guidance of 21–24% fell shy of our expectation. We have only finetuned our 2025–2026e sales, but cut adj. EBITDA by 18–7% on the margin outlook, with some upside potential if synergies from the Plarium acquisition should materialise in 2025. We reiterate our BUY, but have lowered our target price to SEK130 (140).

Pareto Bank (Buy, TP: NOK84.00) - Solid start to the year

Helped by still-solid core revenues and firm cost efficiency, PARB reported a Q1 ROE of 13.5%, despite some provisions. With deposit volumes rising by ~8.1% QOQ, the bank somewhat increased its bond holdings in the quarter, resulting in a ~5bp lower CET1 ratio at quarter-end, offset by strong earnings generation. We have made only minor changes to our 2026–2027e EPS. With the stock trading at a 2026e P/E of ~8.0x, we still find the valuation attractive, and reiterate our BUY and NOK84 target pri...

Borregaard (Buy, TP: NOK230.00) - Agricultural products boost Q1 EPS

The solid Q1 results included a 6% EBITDA beat, led by record-high sales and profits from growing agricultural product sales – management said the underlying trend was driven by demand for ‘green’ food production products. Our 2026–2027e EPS are largely unchanged (tweaked by c1%) as the USD depreciation and lowered bioethanol price guidance largely offset the higher agricultural product sales. We still see this as an attractive entry point, and reiterate our BUY and NOK230 target price.

Higher prices, but negative FX

Q1 EBITDA +6%

Valuation update

In this note, we show updated valuation statistics for the E&P sector.

Energy Morning - 28 April 2025

Weekly news, topics & discussion

This week, Vår Energi reported Q1 results very much in line with expectations. The company also reaffirmed its 2025 guidance and maintained its dividend. Also, OKEA reported a solid Q1, with production and prices slightly above our estimates. While a technical goodwill impairment reduces its dividend basket for 2025, we view this as non-material, as we do not expect any dividends before 2027. Meanwhile, we are 5% below consensus on Q1e EBIT ahead of Equinor’s Q1 results on 30 April (07:00 CET), ...

AUCTUS ON FRIDAY - 25/04/2025

Panoro Energy (PEN NO)C; Target price of NOK49 per share: Reserves addition much larger than expected – YE24 2P reserves were independently estimated at 42.3 mmbbl (+7.6 mmbbl vs YE23, representing a Reserve Replacement Ration of 309%). This figure far exceeds our previous expectation of 34.5 mmbbl for YE24 2P reserves - an estimate that included a 4 mmbbl addition in 1H24 to counterbalance 2024 production. The higher than expected reserves addition is driven by robust reservoir performance in G...

Steady ground in shaky times

Solid NCS production in March

The Norwegian Offshore Directorate’s (NOD) preliminary NCS figures for March showed liquids production of 1,972kboed (1.6% above its forecast) and gas production of 351mcm/d (0.4% above its forecast). Overall, production was 4.18mmboed (1.1% above its forecast), flat MOM, but down 4.9% YOY. Company-wise, the February production figures should be well known as most companies have already reported their production figures for Q1.

Energy Morning - 23 April 2025

Valuation update

In this note, we show updated valuation statistics for the E&P sector.

Large US exposure turns into a headwind

MTG (Buy, TP: SEK140.00) - First quarter including Plarium

Q1 will be the first quarter including the transformative Plarium acquisition (consolidated from 1 February), set to roughly double MTG’s revenue and adj. EBITDA. Our impression is organic growth trends have held up alright in Q1; however, the recent strengthening of the SEK has prompted a ~9% cut to our 2025–2026e revenue and EBITDA. We have lowered our target price to SEK140 (150) but reiterate our BUY.

Stress testing

We have stress-tested our coverage universe at a USD60/bbl oil price, concluding that most names remain dependent on rising oil prices to warrant upside potential from current share prices. Moreover, unless oil prices move higher, we see increasing risk of cuts in shareholder distributions for Vår Energi and Equinor, while the risk appears lower for Aker BP. Overall, we remain cautious as macro risks remain tilted to the downside. We continue to prefer Aker BP as it screens best on valuation and...