Nel ASA's Order Book Is Roaring — But JPMorgan Is Dialing Back Expectations
Published on 08/07/2026 at 13:02 | Redaktion boerse-global.de
The Norwegian electrolyser maker finds itself in an uncomfortable spot: customers are lining up faster than ever, yet the company is burning through cash, losing its chief executive, and watching analysts trim their ambitions.
JPMorgan's Patrick Jones cut his price target on Nel ASA to NOK 1.80 from NOK 2.90 on Wednesday, keeping a "Hold" rating on the stock. The rationale: persistent pressure on near-term fundamentals, even as order momentum improves. That tension — a swelling pipeline against a deteriorating income statement — is now the defining feature of the hydrogen equipment maker's investment case.
The Numbers Tell Two Different Stories
Nel's second-quarter results, released on July 15, laid the contradiction bare. Revenue from customer contracts fell 12 percent year-on-year to NOK 182 million, while the company swung to an EBITDA loss of NOK 155 million. A chunk of that red ink — roughly NOK 70 million — traces back to a legal settlement with Iwatani Corporation, resolved in early June after Nel agreed to pay $7.5 million to end the dispute. The net loss for the quarter came in at NOK 189 million.
Strip out the one-off, however, and the underlying picture remains weak. Both the alkaline and PEM segments posted flat-to-declining revenues against the prior-year period, and group revenue contracted at a double-digit clip. The order book, meanwhile, tells a far more encouraging story: order intake jumped 224 percent year-on-year to NOK 230 million, with PEM electrolyser equipment accounting for 96 percent of new bookings. Total backlog rose 9 percent quarter-on-quarter to NOK 1.213 billion — though it still sits 3 percent below year-ago levels.
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Cash Concerns and a Leadership Void
The balance sheet adds another layer of caution. Nel ended the quarter with NOK 1.328 billion in cash, down sharply from NOK 1.928 billion a year earlier. That drawdown reflects ongoing operational losses and raises questions about how much runway the company has before it needs to tap markets again.
Compounding the uncertainty is a leadership transition. CEO Håkon Volldal announced his resignation in June to join packaging group Elopak, remaining at the helm through a six-month notice period. The search for a successor is underway, but the timing — at a critical juncture for the company's technology rollout — is hardly ideal.
The PA-Series Bet
At the heart of Nel's turnaround thesis is the PA-Series, a pressurized alkaline platform launched commercially in May. The company claims the new design cuts system investment costs by 40 to 60 percent and requires 80 percent less floor space than earlier generations. Management is targeting 500 megawatts of production capacity by the end of 2026, doubling to 1 gigawatt in 2027, with support from a EUR 135 million EU grant.
Early prototype tests have been described as "encouraging," and the PEM segment showed a glimmer of life in the quarter: revenue rose 31 percent sequentially and EBITDA turned positive. But translating those signals into sustained, billable revenue is the crux of the matter. The gap between order intake and actual revenue recognition remains wide, and scaling new electrolyser platforms from prototypes to stable series production historically takes longer than planned.
Sector Headwinds Add to the Gloom
The broader hydrogen landscape isn't helping. BP announced on Monday it would scale back its hydrogen ambitions — a move widely read as a negative signal for the entire sector, including equipment suppliers like Nel. The stock fell 6.03 percent to NOK 2.18 that day, erasing a 9.02 percent gain from the prior session that had followed a dip below the stock's 38-day moving average.
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What to Watch Next
In German trading, the shares closed Thursday at EUR 0.1970, roughly 46.10 percent below their 52-week high. A technical analysis service recently upgraded the stock from "Sell" to "Hold/Accumulate," though such signals carry limited weight against the fundamental headwinds.
The next real test comes on October 21, when Nel reports third-quarter results. By then, investors will want to see whether the spring order surge has finally started converting into revenue — and whether the company's cash position has stabilized. Until then, the market's skepticism, reflected in a share price still deep in the red, seems unlikely to lift.
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