Bonheur: Renewables EBITDA Nearly Doubles, the Backlog Slips Under EUR 1bn — and the Room Falls Silent
A solid NOK 385m print in wind, a 100%-owned Muir Mhor heading toward consent, a first-ever 6-year green bond, and not a single analyst question at the end of it.
BONHR.OL · Earnings Call · 2026-10-30
A beat with a caveat stapled to it
Bonheur's third quarter was, in Richard Olav Aa's own framing, "yet another solid quarter": revenue up NOK 209 million year on year, EBITDA up NOK 113 million, and in renewables “almost a doubling of the EBITDA to NOK 385 million, mainly driven by higher electricity prices” — Richard Olav Aa, Chief Financial Officer · 2026-10-30. But the CFO bolted a caveat onto the headline that is really the whole story: “underlying improvements in local currency in all companies, yet there are still not full utilization of the assets in the business this quarter” — Richard Olav Aa, Chief Financial Officer · 2026-10-30. Mid Hill was offline for most of it, Blue Tern produced idle days before starting an O&M contract off Germany, and Cruise still has occupancy to fill. The rolling twelve-month picture is unchanged — revenue around NOK 13–14 billion, EBITDA between NOK 3.5 and 4 billion, with NHST roughly covering the group's overhead. Two things are genuinely new in the numbers. First, the kroner — a stronger Norwegian krone is now the dominant translation drag; every segment earns abroad and reports in NOK, and Cruise's EBITDA fell in kroner even as it edged up in pounds. Second, the funding profile stepped up with a NOK 800 million green bond in September, “the first 6-year bond we have had and one of the very few 6-year bond in the Norwegian bond market” — Richard Olav Aa, Chief Financial Officer · 2026-10-30. The financial policy boxes all get ticked — NOK 1.9 billion of net cash across the wholly owned entities, no Bonheur guarantee behind any bank or bond debt, subsidiaries self-financing their own growth.The engine goes quiet in 2028; the pipeline gets louder
FOWIC ran well — 98% uptime, 77% utilization, EUR 32 million of EBITDA on EUR 53 million of revenue — but the order book is the thing:Haakon Magne Ore then restated a market view he has held for several quarters: very tight large-crane vessel availability next summer, then “some reduction in the T&I activity in '28 and further in 2029 before we then expect to see a rebound in activity next decade” — Haakon Magne Ore, CEO of Fred. Olsen Windcarrier · 2026-10-30. That is not new — Daniel Haugland pressed him on Ørsted's Hornsea 4 cancellation and the Vestas and Siemens Gamesa factory pauses back in October 2025 — but the slope is now materially closer. What is new is where management puts its narrative weight instead. Muir Mhor is now 100% Bonheur following Vattenfall's 31 July exit, offshore consent is expected in Q4, and with the UK's next CfD round pooling hybrid and floating foundations in a single budget pot, Maren Lundby is maturing both technologies and a bid strategy aimed at an early allocation round. Codling — the 50/50 with EDF in Ireland, 1,300 MW of CfD already secured — has become a first-half-2027 consent story. And then there is BRIZO, the floating solar pitch handed its own slot and the call's most forward-leaning language: “Up to 3.5-meter HS is what we have targeted and what we have tested for” — Per Holth, Unknown, likely executive or senior management (focus on solar segment) · 2026-10-30, a DNV-verified design chasing first certified cost-competitive status by year-end, sold as an OEM model that needs no large capex from Bonheur. Meanwhile the mature onshore fleet is entering its own recycling loop: Crystal Rig and Brockloch Rig 1 stop producing when their ROCs expire at the end of March 2027, then get decommissioned and repowered — 600 kW machines from the mid-1990s replaced by the 4.2 and 4.4 MW units now being erected at Windy Standard III, still tracking to Q1 2027. The binding constraint on all of it is the wire, not the wind. “At Lista in Norway, we have 12 turbines currently partially curtailed in strong winds due to fatigue-related foundation issues” — Sofie Jebsen, CEO of Fred. Olsen Renewables · 2026-10-30 — capping the site at 84% of capacity with repairs running into 2027 — plus a second 10-week Mid Hill outage slated for the second half of 2027 and residual risk on Scottish Power Transmission's substation upgrade. grid availability is a theme the wider market has been circling; Bonheur is living it quarter by quarter.the backlog fell marginally. I don't like it, but it fell slightly below the EUR 1 billion mark as progress on the different projects was only partly offset by some O&M additions to the backlog.
Cruise became a product story, not a capacity story
Cruise Lines had a good quarter dressed as a modest one: more shorter sailings, occupancy and utilization up, bookings ahead 17%, Net Promoter Scores up ten points across all three vessels, forward sales strong for 2027 and the first half of 2028 already launched. The levers are soft — food, itineraries, a new entertainment program, drinks and gratuities bundled in — and Samantha Stimpson was candid that one Q4 Balmoral fly-cruise "isn't performing in line with expectations," with corrective action taken. Pre-announcing a soft sailing is a small but telling act of conservatism. Note what has quietly left the conversation. In February, Lars Christensen opened with “You're starting to have a pretty old fleet in the Cruise segment” — Lars Christensen, Analyst · 2026-02-25; this quarter there is no fleet question at all. The narrative has migrated from tonnage to yield per berth — from buying capacity to filling it.The room with no questions
That is the strangest datapoint on the call. Previous quarters drew DNB Carnegie, ABG Sundal Collier, Fearnley and Clarksons. And the question that used to lead is precisely the one that went unasked: what happens to the cash? “you now have a lot of cash, and I've been asking almost the same question for a couple of quarters” — Daniel Vårdal Haugland · 2025-10-24, Haugland said a year ago, probing a newbuild wind vessel. In February he asked whether external interest existed in the onshore portfolio after Ørsted's European onshore sale to CIP; Sofie Jebsen replied that “we are very much focusing on progressing a solid and healthy portfolio of projects in the markets that we are in” — Sofie Olsen Jebsen, CEO · 2026-02-25. The tension is sharper now than at any point in that sequence: NOK 1.9 billion of net cash, a longer-dated green bond just placed, a 100%-owned 1,000 MW deepwater project moving toward consent and an allocation round, and a repowering queue behind it — all capital-hungry. Taking Muir Mhor to 100% in a market that has been rewarding capital partnering is a deliberate bet. Bonheur reported a solid quarter, and nobody asked how it pays for the next one. That silence is the story.There are no questions at this time. I'll now turn the call back to the room for closing comments.