Second-quarter net profit of PLN 400.1 million topped the PAP Biznes consensus of PLN 391.8 million, and EBITDA came in essentially in line.

Revenue grew 10.5 percent year-on-year to PLN 9.53 billion, a touch below the PLN 9.56 billion analysts had penciled in. On paper, a clean, unremarkable print.

* EPS consensus derived from PAP Biznes’ net profit estimate of PLN 391.8m; not independently published as a per-share figure.

The number that actually matters sits below the headline: like-for-like sales growth (LFL, sales growth from stores open more than a year) cratered to just 0.3 percent in the second quarter alone, down from 8.8 percent a year earlier and from 4.4 percent as recently as the first quarter. EBITDA margin (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization, as a share of revenue) kept falling too, to 6.98 percent from 7.54 percent.

For context, Biedronka — Dino’s much larger domestic rival — improved its own EBITDA margin by roughly 42 basis points in the same quarter. Dino is still opening stores at pace, but the core business is barely growing organically right now.

What strikes me is that the stock rose about 7,7 percent on a quarter this weak, which tells me expectations had already been reset lower than the headline numbers suggest — this reads more like relief than vindication.

There’s also a new, unpriced risk here: Poland’s competition authority opened an antitrust probe into Dino’s trucking arrangements in June, with a maximum fine of 10 percent of last year’s sales.

The next real test is Q3, when analysts expect the margin trend to start turning.

Revenue rose 27 percent year-over-year to $1.042 billion, beating the roughly $997 million analyst consensus, while EPS came in at $0.01 against a consensus loss of $0.05.

Operating income turned to $27 million, well ahead of the -$6 million the Street had modeled.

The number that actually matters here isn’t the top line — it’s transaction margin dollars, which grew 42 percent to $446 million and reached 42.8 percent of revenue, up more than 4.5 percentage points sequentially.

That’s Klarna’s own preferred yardstick, and it grew faster than revenue, which grew faster than GMV — exactly the sequencing management wants investors to see.

What buried all of it: full-year GMV guidance was cut to $149-151 billion from above $155 billion, and revenue guidance dropped to $4.08-4.16 billion from above $4.34 billion, with Q3 adjusted operating income guided at just $5-15 million as Klarna front-loads spending on new PSP launches ahead of peak season.

What strikes me is that this was, by the numbers, one of Klarna’s cleanest quarters yet — and the stock still fell about 19 percent.

That tells you the market is no longer grading Klarna on the quarter it just delivered; it’s grading the credibility of the guidance band itself, and a second guidance revision in three quarters isn’t building that credibility.

Germany’s retail slowdown, cited as the main driver of the cut, is the thing I’d watch into Q3.

Sales to end customers rose 12.6 percent year-over-year to PLN 16,616 million, revenue climbed 14.7 percent to PLN 14,666 million, and adjusted EBITDA grew 15.1 percent to PLN 1,903 million, with margin expanding to 11.5 percent from 11.2.

Net profit more than tripled to PLN 249 million, and adjusted net profit reached PLN 315 million, up 118.2 percent.

The network grew to 13,063 stores after 778 openings in the half.

The number that stands out is like-for-like growth: 4.0 percent in Q2, up from 3.2 in Q1.

Management had blamed an unusually cold winter for the Q1 slowdown, and this is the first hard evidence that explanation was accurate rather than convenient.

Leverage tells a similar story — net debt to adjusted EBITDA fell to 0.7x from 1.2x a year ago, funding the company’s first-ever dividend.

What strikes me is the timing. This report lands just three days after Seven & i walked away from takeover talks, and it’s a genuinely strong answer to the question that departure raised: is the underlying business still worth owning without a buyer?

The stock rose 2.7 percent during Tuesday’s session, but that move happened before the report — released after the close — so the market hasn’t actually priced these numbers in yet.

Friday’s open is the real test.

The conversion ratio jumped to 30.8 percent from 25.7 percent in Q1 — the first improvement since integration began, and exactly the signal I flagged as decisive two weeks ago.

Guidance was narrowed upward to DKK 23.5–25.5 billion. But adjusted free cash flow fell to DKK 786 million from DKK 3,982 million a year ago, driven by a temporary working capital swing management calls timing, not structural.

Road also had a rough quarter, prompting COO Brian Ejsing’s appointment as division CEO mid-quarter.

Net positive with a real asterisk: the margin story just got its first hard proof, but the cash flow line is a new wrinkle worth watching into H2.

The Swedish alternative asset manager — which manages approximately €155bn in fee-generating assets across private equity, infrastructure, and real estate — delivered a half-year that answered almost every question the market had been asking.

The number that mattered most going into this report was not on the income statement.

It was EQT XI — and it delivered. The fund has secured commitments corresponding to half its €23bn target, with activation expected toward the end of Q3.

That confirmation, combined with FAUM (Fee-generating Assets Under Management) jumping from €141.6bn to €155bn in a single half, was the catalyst the re-rating required.

What strikes me most is the AI Infrastructure strategy. Launched in Q1, it reached $9.4bn in NAV in less than three months — a fundraising velocity that very few strategies in EQT’s history have matched.

The evergreen platform hit €10bn in combined NAV (including Coller Capital), and Private Capital value creation in EQT X accelerated meaningfully, with weighted average EBITDA growth of 24 percent over the last twelve months.

The fee-related EBITDA margin came in at 50 percent versus 54 percent in H1 2025, which looks like a miss at first glance — but the decline is entirely explained by lower retroactive fees that inflated H1 2025.

Adjusted for that effect, underlying fee-related revenue growth was plus 5 percent. The market read through it correctly.

Coller Capital remains on track for a Q3 close. EQT Infrastructure VII has set its target at €21bn.

The pipeline of new strategies — Scaleup Europe Fund, Active Core Infrastructure, US Industrial Value VII — adds four platforms each with expected FAUM above €5bn, all launched within six months. The next inflection point is EQT XI activation in Q3 and EQT Infrastructure VII activation around year-end.

The stock’s 11 percent move to SEK 318 on the day felt proportionate. The market spent six months pricing in “good business, bad timing.” The H1 2026 report closed that debate.

The Swedish packaging paper producer posted adjusted EBITDA of SEK 661 million on net sales of SEK 9,834 million, with group EBITDA margin recovering to 7 percent from 5 percent in Q1.

The stock is up around 7 percent on the session — the first meaningful positive market reaction since the Verso acquisition era.

What strikes me most is the European number. Region Europe delivered an EBITDA margin of 8 percent in Q2, up from 2 percent in Q1 and 5 percent in Q2 2025.

Excluding maintenance shutdown costs — which were actually lower this quarter than last year (SEK 271 million versus SEK 381 million) — Europe nearly doubled its EBITDA compared to the prior two quarters.

That’s the first clean signal that the cost-saving program, lower fiber input costs, and price increases are stacking. It’s not a recovery yet, but it’s directional proof the thesis isn’t broken.

North America remains the complication. Currency-neutral net sales grew 11 percent year-on-year and shipments were the highest since end of 2022, but EBITDA margin compressed to 13 percent from 22 percent a year ago.

The culprit: the biennial Quinnesec maintenance shutdown, which cost SEK 171 million — roughly SEK 50 million above expectations due to higher fixed costs and a delayed restart.

Exclude the shutdown and North America’s underlying margin sits closer to 18 percent, consistent with the structural story.

The Tribute containerboard product line sold 7 ktons in the quarter, up sevenfold, with more than 20 customer production trials now in the pipeline.

Cash conversion of 97 percent was the other number worth highlighting. The balance sheet remains under pressure — net debt/adjusted EBITDA is now 2.2x versus 1.1x a year ago — but the free cash flow quality suggests the debt trajectory can stabilize without further operational deterioration.

The Q3 guidance is cautious but incrementally positive: solid North America, “somewhat improved” Europe, positive pricing impact in both regions, flat input costs.

CEO Ivar Vatne also added a notable line: Billerud is “evaluating all opportunities to play an active role in addressing industry challenges” — language that reads as consolidation optionality, not just operational management. That’s new.

The 7 percent move today is rational. This is the first report where the narrative shifted from damage control to early evidence of recovery.

The trigger I flagged in our Deep Dive — one quarter of European margin improvement not explained away by one-time items — has been partially delivered. Q3 will tell us whether 8 percent holds or was partly a maintenance schedule artifact.

The company delivered revenue of SEK 2,025.9 million, up 10.9 percent year-on-year, with an adjusted EBIT (operating profit) of SEK 104.7 million and an adjusted EBIT margin of 5.2 percent.

The stock is up roughly 8 percent on the morning of the report.

What strikes me most isn’t the top-line beat — it’s the cost structure.

Personnel costs fell to 7.2 percent of revenue from 7.7 percent a year ago, and other external costs dropped from 13.1 to 12.8 percent.

Varberg depreciation is still a headwind at SEK 52.4 million versus SEK 34.8 million a year ago, and gross margin dipped slightly to 27.5 percent from 28.0 percent — the question I flagged in the preview.

But management absorbed that pressure through operating leverage elsewhere, which is exactly what the bull case requires.

The 8 percent move up this morning makes sense. This print removes the lingering doubt from Q4 2025 and puts two consecutive quarters of 5.2 percent EBIT on the board.

The next test is whether Q3 can hold the same level without the seasonal tailwinds that Q1 tends to carry. I’m watching the November lock-up window for Laulima more than the next earnings date.

Group organic growth came in at 4.7 percent for the quarter, a sharp reversal from Q1’s 1.2 percent, and net sales rose 10.8 percent to SEK 7,695 million against a consensus estimate around SEK 7,522 million.

EBITA of SEK 1,776 million beat the roughly SEK 1,660 million the market had modeled, with the margin expanding to 23.1 percent from 22.5 percent a year earlier — comfortably ahead of the 22.1 percent SEB had pencilled in.

This is also the first report under Lifco’s new five-segment structure, splitting Environmental Technology and Transportation Products out of the old Systems Solutions bucket.

The debut could not have landed better for the thesis behind the change: both new segments were the standout performers.

Transportation Products grew EBITA 30.0 percent for the half, with the margin climbing to 23.4 percent from 22.4 percent, while Environmental Technology posted a 26.4 percent EBITA margin — the highest of any segment in the group — on 12.3 percent EBITA growth.

These were exactly the pockets of strength the aggregated Systems Solutions numbers had been obscuring.

The number I was watching most closely, Demolition & Tools, showed real signs of stabilizing.

After a rough Q1 in which EBITA fell 15.7 percent on weak demolition-robot demand, the segment’s Q2-only EBITA actually rose 2.7 percent year-over-year, with the margin ticking up to 25.3 percent from 25.1 percent.

The six-month figures still show a 6.2 percent EBITA decline because of how bad Q1 was, but the sequential trend inside the quarter is the more useful read, and it points the right way.

Four acquisitions were consolidated in the first half — Karl Kaps and Ethoss Regeneration in Dental, Metalltech and Glass Umbrella in Systems Solutions — adding roughly SEK 500 million in combined annual sales.

A fifth, the Italian crane-attachment maker Boscaro, was consolidated in Demolition & Tools just after the period closed in July. Interest-bearing net debt ticked up to 1.2 times EBITDA from 1.1 times at the end of Q1, still comfortably inside the three-times ceiling management targets, and there’s no sign the acquisition pace is slowing.

Shares are up 3.4 percent today, about SEK 11, to roughly SEK 334.

That’s a reasonable reaction to a genuine beat, but it’s worth noting the stock had already climbed since the Q1 report even before this print, so some of today’s good news was arguably anticipated.

What strikes me is that the market seems to be rewarding the segment restructuring almost as much as the numbers themselves — investors finally have visibility into which parts of the old Systems Solutions conglomerate were actually driving returns, and it turns out the answer was Environmental Technology and Transportation Products all along.

Headline operating profit (EBIT) fell 8 percent to SEK 347 million, but the number that actually matters is different: strip out the SEK 30 million real estate gain that inflated last year’s comparable, and the adjusted result was essentially flat.

Revenue grew 5 percent to SEK 1,441 million.

The detail worth paying attention to is other external costs, up 29 percent year-over-year to SEK 310 million, driven by higher HVO diesel and electricity prices, plus marketing spend tied to Easter price campaigns.

That is the real margin story this quarter, and it is the same energy cost theme that appeared in Q2. Whether it normalizes heading into fiscal 2026/27 is the key variable to watch.

The stock surged 9 percent

What strikes me is that the market looked straight past the headline miss.

The stock surged 9 percent in early trading and I think that reaction is correct.

The nine-month numbers are solid: revenue up 7 percent, adjusted EBIT up 9 percent, operating cash flow up 14 percent, and net debt-to-EBITDA down to 0.93x from 1.51x a year ago.

Ski pass prices increase

Forward bookings for winter 2026/27 are 3 percent ahead of last year. Management confirmed 489 new snow cannons, the rebuilt Tusenmetersliften in Åre, and ski pass price increases of 4-4.5 percent – the most concrete investment pipeline the company has communicated in years.

The year-end report on September 30 is the next catalyst.