Attendo Aktie

Welcome to Attendo Q2 Report 2026. [Operator Instructions] Now I will hand the conference over to CEO, Martin Tivéus; and CFO, Mikael Malmgren. Please go ahead.

Thank you, and good morning, everyone. Today, we present Attendo's results for the second quarter of '26. As usual, we'll focus on the key drivers behind our performance, our operational progress and how we continue to execute our strategy. I will start by giving a general update on the development in the quarter, and then our CFO, Mikael Malmgren, will take you through the financials in more detail. Next slide, please. So let me start with the key highlights from the quarter. I'm pleased to present a strong quarter with improved results in both business areas, driven by higher occupancy, improved operational efficiency and a strong delivery on our quality indicators.

Customer satisfaction reached the highest level we have measured so far and employee satisfaction continues to improve from already high levels. While reported net sales increased by 1%, underlying growth in continuing operations remained strong at around 5%. The delta is explained by ended or ending outsourcing and Home Care contract in Sweden as well as currency effects. Profitability improved significantly with lease adjusted EBITA increasing by 56% to SEK 321 million. On a rolling 12-month basis, lease adjusted EBITA margin improved by 2 percentage points to 7.8% for the group. Adjusted earnings per share increased by close to 80% in the quarter, and we delivered a strong free cash flow of SEK 269 million, supporting increased investments in new capacity. By continuing to develop quality of care and by adding new capacity to society, we are part of the solution to the care challenges of both today and tomorrow.

Next slide, please. Before we go into the quarter in more details, just let me briefly recap the plan we presented in February. Since 2023, we have doubled our adjusted earnings per share from SEK 3 to SEK 6 for the full year of 2025. That was the delivery of our previous financial plan. In February this year, we announced a new financial target to reach an adjusted EPS of at least SEK 9 per share by 2028. In other words, another 50% increase from last year's level. We illustrated the EPS journey from SEK 6 to at least SEK 9 per share with three building blocks. The first building block is margin improvement in Scandinavia, where we communicated an expected margin uplift throughout 2026, driven by improved staffing accuracy, focusing on operations, exiting of unprofitable contracts and improvements in ways of working. As you can see in our Q2 numbers and also later in this presentation, the margin uplift in Scandinavia is already well underway.

The second building block is our core growth model that we have followed over the past 5 years, what we call the balanced growth model. I will return to that in a moment. And the third building block is active capital allocation, primarily through continued share buybacks conducted within our mandate, where we target to buy back around 5% of outstanding shares per annum. After the second quarter of 2026, our rolling 12-month adjusted EPS reached SEK 7.14, well on our path towards our financial target of reaching at least SEK 9 per share by 2028. So let me now just spend a moment on the balanced growth model itself.

Next slide, please. Our model for balanced growth contains several growth levers that over time can fluctuate a bit between quarters and years, but together, they build up to an EBITA growth of at least 10% per annum. New capacity through greenfield openings contributing to average around 2% to 3% of growth per year, margin-accretive bolt-on acquisitions contributing around 2%. Occupancy improvement, where we assume at least 1 percentage point of improvement per year in existing capacity. That 1 percentage point higher occupancy together with better ways of working, typically also translate into higher productivity contributing to around 2%. Further, we have economies of scale effects and finally, price compensating for annual cost inflation. On top of annual growth in EBITA, continued share buybacks supports an even higher growth rate in adjusted earnings per share.

As I said in the beginning of this presentation, in this quarter, we were in line with or ahead of plan on all these growth levers. Let me show you 3 where we have the most to report today, which is new capacity, acquisitions and occupancy. Next slide, please. So starting with new capacity. This slide shows our project pipeline. As you can see, we now have around 900 places under construction, 600 in Finland, around 300 in Scandinavia, and we have signed agreements for a further close to 600 places where construction has not yet started. Over the next 12 months, we will open around 770 new places across Finland and Sweden. Already construction started projects, as you can see, now correspond to around 4% of our total capacity. After planned closures of units with low occupancy or weak economics, that well supports the 2% to 3% net capacity growth in our balanced growth model and gives us good visibility on openings into '27 and '28.

Next slide, please. The second growth lever is M&A, where we, over time, expect around 2% EBITA growth per annum. Our approach is to acquire high-quality, margin-accretive bolt-ons in segments we know well, and we integrate them into our own quality systems and ways of working. Year-to-date, we made 4 transactions, 2 smaller bolt-ons in Finland completed earlier in the year and another 2 strategic acquisitions signed during the second quarter. One is Skåningegård in Southern Sweden with 9 units within Disability Care, Individual & Family Care and Elderly Care and the other one being A-klinikka in Finland with 17 units within substance abuse and addiction treatment. Combined, these businesses represent around SEK 450 million in net sales and around SEK 50 million in lease adjusted EBITA before synergies. That corresponds to roughly 4% EBITA growth relative to our 2025 results.

Hence, we've already delivered more than the full year ambition of at least 2% from acquisitions. Further, A-klinikka in particular, strengthens our position in specialist care in Finland and broadens what we can offer develop regions. Next slide, please. The third growth lever is occupancy. And here, we continue to deliver above the 1 percentage points per year that we assume in the model. We ended the quarter at 88% for the group, up around 2.5 percentage points year-on-year. In Scandinavia, we see a clear improvement in occupancy from more sold beds and from active capacity management. During the quarter, we closed 1 old nursing home with 4 locations. In Finland, occupancy was 87% against 85% last year and stable sequentially. The second quarter is seasonally softer in Finland in combination with several openings during the quarter.

Occupancy carries a very high drop-through to earnings, and we continue our path back to our target of reaching at least 92% average occupancy for the group, which is in line with historical levels. Next slide, please. So let's turn to the development of our rolling 12-month lease adjusted EBITA margin. So we see a continued margin uplift in both business areas, both sequentially and year-on-year. Rolling 12-month group margin is up to 2 percentage points from a year ago to 7.8%. Finland has now delivered a steadily improving margin trajectory for 14 consecutive quarters. In Scandinavia, we expect to continue to gradually improve margins during 2026. You can also note that rolling 12 months net sales has been broadly flat at around SEK 19 billion for a number of quarters as an effect of the transition in Scandinavia in combination with currency effects. We expect to gradually return to net sales growth from the second half of this year as the effect of the transition in Scandinavia wears off in combination with acquisitions.

With that, I hand over to our CFO, Mikael Malmgren. Please go ahead, Mikael. Next slide, please.

Thank you, Martin, and good morning, everyone. So let's take a look at the sales development for the quarter. Reported net sales increased by 1.3% to north of SEK 4.7 billion. Our continuing operations grew by 4.9% with growth in both business areas, where Scandinavia grew 7%, driven by more sold beds in own homes and products. Finland grew close to 4%, excluding the divested Individual & Family Care business and currency, driven mainly by own nursing homes. However, reported growth was partially offset by first, ended and ending outsourcing and home care contracts in Scandinavia, which reduced reported net sales by SEK 113 million.

Secondly, last year's divestment in Finland impacted sales by SEK 24 million. And finally, FX headwind had a SEK 22 million negative impact. Ending and exiting contracts net sales impact will gradually wear off during the remaining part of 2026 and first half year of 2027. In Scandinavia, only 2 decided outsourcing exits remain in the portfolio and both leave in the fourth quarter of this year. Next slide, please. Moving to EBITA development. Reported EBITA improved by SEK 121 million to SEK 470 million. Lease adjusted EBITA increased by SEK 160 million to SEK 321 million and up 56% versus same period last year. The improvement is broad-based with lease adjusted EBITA in Scandinavia improving SEK 62 million and substantially higher than last year. And Finland also performing very well, improving lease adjusted EBITA by SEK 53 million, excluding FX effects.

Group and other items was broadly neutral in the quarter, and currency had a marginal effect on reported EBITA and lease adjusted EBITA. Next slide, please. Turning to Finland. Net sales was SEK 2.8 billion, up 1.9% reported and 2.7% adjusted for currency. Excluding the divested business and currency, growth in continuing operations was approximately 4%, driven mainly by more sold beds in primarily owned nursing homes. Going forward, we expect to see continued growth driven by new openings and further supported by recent acquisitions. Lease adjusted EBITA was SEK 235 million against SEK 183 million, an increase of 29% or plus SEK 52 million, with the margin improving to 8.4% from 6.7%. Earnings improved in all segments, but the largest contribution came from care for older people. Two things drive it. First, occupancy, up to 87% from 85% last year, supported by higher inflow of new residents and a well-managed start to the summer period.

Second, staffing is now well matched to the needs of the operations, driven by investments in staff development, working conditions, support systems and improved sick leave. This has been our biggest focus on our agenda in Finland for the past 2 years. Occupancy development was further supported by our active work to improve our geographical footprint. On capacity, we opened 3 new homes with 103 places during the quarter. We also took over a home with 59 places in high occupancy from a welfare region. At the same time, we continue to improve our geographical footprint, closing down around 100 places in units with low or no occupancy. We also started construction of 2 new homes with 65 places. During the quarter, we had a positive net inflow of new customers. And as a result, occupancy was stable despite some summer seasonality. Looking ahead, we plan to sustain our investment in new capacity with currently 600-plus places under construction in Finland, of which 440 are planned to open during 2026.

In addition, we have a strong pipeline of signed lease agreements equal to a further 270-plus places where construction has not yet started. Finally, as Martin covered earlier, we completed 1 bolt-on acquisition in Finland during the quarter and A-klinikka, an additional strategic acquisition closed on August 1. A-klinikka is expected to deliver incremental EBITA from January 1 onwards post integration is completed. Next slide, please. So turning to Scandinavia. As communicated already last year, we expect to improve margins in Scandinavia during the whole 2026. In Q2, growth in continuing operations was 7% and offset by ending outsourcing and home care contracts. In line with our financial plan and margin uplift in Scandinavia, lease adjusted EBITA increased more than SEK 60 million to SEK 106 million, with the margin improving to 5.4% from 2.2%. The improvement has 3 key drivers: higher occupancy in our own homes, better operational efficiency, primarily more accurate staffing planning and improved central support function ways of working.

In addition, the second quarter of last year carried nonrecurring costs in home care contracts that were being exited. Also in Scandinavia, we continue to improve our geographical footprint, closing an own nursing home, which had zero occupancy already end of Q1 and which will have a positive impact on the results going forward. At the same time, we're starting to increase our investments in new capacity with new openings from Q4 onwards. And so we expect to see gradually positive net sales growth, further supported by the recent acquisition of Skåningegård.

Next slide, please. As mentioned previously, net sales growth in continuing operations grew 7% in the quarter to SEK 1.9 billion and lease adjusted EBITA grew close to 8%. This marks the third consecutive quarter of improved margins, reaching 5.7%. At the same time, the ended and ending contracts decreased SEK 130 million. The revenue base is now small and the impact year-over-year will continuously diminish over the next couple of quarters. As a result of our actions, total lease adjusted EBITA increased 141% with the margin now up to 5.4%. Next slide, please. We continue to see strong free cash flow on a rolling 12-month basis. That said, free cash flow to firm was slightly lower in the quarter due to timing of working capital. The working capital effect was negative SEK 53 million in the quarter against positive SEK 178 million last year.

The change is the main explanation for the year-on-year movement in free cash flow, where the comparison quarter had a more favorable working capital timing development. There's no change in the underlying payment behavior, and we expect this to be reversed ahead of next quarter update. CapEx investments was stable at SEK 44 million against SEK 49 million, again, a positive reminder of how capital-light our business model is. Free cash flow to firm was therefore SEK 269 million in the quarter and SEK 1.2 billion on a rolling 12-month basis. Worth noting is that we paid our first of 2 dividends, SEK 129 million, and we repurchased shares of SEK 241 million against SEK 36 million in the comparison quarter.

Since start of share buybacks in February 2024, we have repurchased 5% of outstanding shares on average per year and the pace we aim to at least continue. As such, I'm happy to announce that the Board has approved a new repurchase program, targeting to repurchase an additional SEK 250 million worth of shares until the time of the Q3 report in November. Next slide, please. So a quick look at the key metrics, all of which continue to move in the right direction and ahead of plan. Starting with the earnings per share bridge on the right. Adjusted earnings per share improved by 79% from SEK 0.85 to SEK 1.52. By far, the largest contribution comes from the higher lease adjusted EBITA at around SEK 0.8 per share. Financial items contribute positively as financing costs come down. Tax takes some of it back as expected on higher profits and buyback adds further. On a rolling 12-month basis, adjusted earnings per share is now SEK 7.14.

If we look at the top right, the rolling 12-month lease adjusted margin was 7.8%, up from 5.8% a year ago and improving every quarter throughout the period. At the bottom left, our leverage was 1.1x, down from 1.7x comparable period and in line with previous quarters. Going forward, we expect leverage to increase slightly due to increased investments in new capacity, the recent acquisitions in both Scandinavia and Finland and due to our active capital allocation. And bottom right, net interest expense was SEK 25 million in the quarter against SEK 31 million. During the quarter, we also refinanced the company 1.5 years ahead of time, improving our financial flexibility by an additional SEK 1 billion. With improved financial flexibility supported by our bank group, we are confident to be able to sustain our investments in acquisition, add new capacity and maintain an active capital allocation. At the same time, we expect a gradual improvement in the net interest expense as the effects of the refinancing comes through.

With that, I hand over to you, Martin.

Thank you, Mikael. Next slide, please. So let me summarize. Most importantly, we continue to deliver appreciated care, creating value both for individuals and for society. Our latest surveys show record high and stable satisfaction across stakeholder groups, which confirms the resilience and sustainability of our operating model. For us, delivering high quality of care is not only our mandate for long-term growth, it's also part of our promise to society to deliver better and more appreciated care at a lower cost to society. The higher and stable quality across our operation is paired with strong financial performance, driven by continued improvement in occupancy and strong operational efficiency.

We also continue to strengthen our geographical footprint by gradually leaving less attractive areas and opening new units in locations with stronger long-term demand and better economics. With the 2 strategic acquisitions made during the quarter, we're already ahead of our M&A ambition for the full year. For the second quarter, rolling 12 months lease adjusted earnings per share increased to SEK 7.14, well ahead of plan towards reaching at least SEK 9 per share in 2028.

Our strong financial results and cash flow enable increased investments in new capacity to meet the growing demand for care in society. Currently, we have around 900 new care beds under construction and a total pipeline of close to 1,500 places, capacity that will be well needed given the demographic situation in the Nordics. Overall, Attendo is well positioned to meet increasing care needs in society while delivering sustainable and profitable growth for shareholders.

With that, thank you for your attention, and let's open up for questions. Operator, please go ahead.

[Operator Instructions] The next question comes from Björn Olsson from SEB.

First, a question on Scandinavia. The margin uplift you described was, I guess, a mix of all fronts, but could you break down the different components in terms of how much was the occupancy improvement adding versus the efficiency effects? And I mean, given the high occupancy rate in Scandinavia at the moment, I would assume that the margin improvements to come are from efficiencies. And then would you say that sort of the potential margin level then if operating at peak efficiency, should that be sort of approach the Finland level? Or could you give us a bit of a flavor here?

As you know, we generally don't guide on the margins or margin breakdowns. But on the improvement in Scandinavia, I mean, we -- as I said, we communicated that already last year that we foresee a gradual margin uplift in Scandinavia throughout 2026 and a bit into 2027 due to the transition that we are working on in terms of moving away from outsourcing contracts and unprofitable contracts with a focus on own operations. That's in combination that the demand growth that we're seeing in society also make that the fill-up phase goes faster now than it did a couple of years ago.

So the new units that we opened during 2025 are basically already -- so what you're seeing here is a combination of the transition towards a clear focus on operation in combination with occupancy improvements and ways of working. And that it will continue for another couple of quarters.

Okay. And as I know that you don't guide, but is it -- I guess we should then assume that the sort of the peak margin is still at a lower range than in Finland.

I mean we've said historically that the ways of running operations in Scandinavia is slightly different and more complex than running operations in Finland. In Finland, you have a national regulation with the same ways of working across all units, whilst in Sweden, that is more directed at the municipality level, which then leads to slightly more complex ways of working and increased cost.

So structurally, the slight difference between much higher margin levels in Finland and Scandinavia, yes.

Okay. Makes sense. And then just on Finland. I mean, your occupancy level has flattened out, you still improved margins by optimizing the staffing. Are you done with that work now? Or do you see additional efficiency gains like at the structural margin improving level from here as well?

I mean we operate now at a strong operational efficiency level that we're happy with. We're not still happy with the occupancy levels. That is something that we foresee should be going up until we reach target of at least 92% occupancy level. Q3 is seasonally a bit softer in terms of occupancy because you have a tradition also in Finland to take on people during summer breaks and so forth. Also, we are investing more in the capacity growth in Finland. So we're opening -- we're entering now as from this quarter and onwards, a period of stronger opening pace or higher opening pace. And of course, that will also short term might hold back occupancy growth before it continues to grow.

The next question comes from Anna Salamon from ABG Sundal Collier.

So you've now completed 2 acquisitions post quarter and are already ahead of the plan on the full year M&A target. Does that mean you're accelerating the pace further? Or are you more pausing or slowing down for now?

We have a very disciplined approach to acquisitions. So we acquire only margin-accretive, high-quality well-run companies. We have a strong M&A team both in Finland and Sweden. They're continuously working on the pipeline. So M&A, it's difficult to plan exactly when sellers are willing to sell. But the fact that we reached 4% this year doesn't mean that we will stop looking for good acquisitions. We are continuing that work in the same pace as forward as we have been. So if we can do more than the at least 2% that we have in the model, then we're just happy.

Okay. Perfect. And regarding occupancy, which is improving in both segments. In which of the 2 do you see more room to keep pushing higher from here? And do you see a potential ceiling in any or both of the segments?

We said that our -- the first target is to come back to at least to the 92% that was our historical average pre the pandemic. Having said that, we don't see that as a roof. We said that that's where we at least should come back to. Mind you that we are entering the next 15 years will be a long period of structurally growth in underlying demand, especially within elderly care. That also means that we foresee that we will fill up new facilities faster, and it also might lead to higher occupancy levels than we've seen historically. But the other thing we guided for is that we're going to at least 92%. On the other hand, because if you look at -- we've said that before that if you look at our -- typically in larger cities, we have higher occupancy earlier. And if you look at Stockholm, for example, we're operating at above 98% occupancy currently. So 92% is not a physical threshold.

The next question comes from Julia Angeli Strand from Handelsbanken.

I'll stick to 3 and take them one by one. And firstly, a follow-up on Scandinavia. And I believe you communicated in Q1 that Q1 was the peak of underabsorption of cost and that improvement in terms of margin should strengthen throughout the year. Is this the case in Scandinavia still? Or how should we look at H2?

Yes. As we -- thank you, Julia. As we communicated already in Q4, we expect the margins to gradually improve throughout 2026, and we have not changed that view.

Okay. That's clear. And then to my second, could you give us a sense of what the net impact of beds in H2 will be just so we can balance the openings and the terminations you have, so we don't get too excited on sales.

That's a detailed question. I'm not sure if I can answer that straight away, Julia -- improvement in growth also reported.

Sorry, can you repeat that?

What we do expect is a gradual improvement in also reported net sales from the low levels.

Okay. Got it. And then lastly, I noted that you said you were -- will increase the investment pace, and that sounds very supportive for demand and the sector as a whole. But when you updated the financial target earlier this year, you sort of implied that you had the large investments behind you and that you were aiming for more balanced growth. Is this -- will this have any visible effects on earnings or impact cash generated?

I mean to be clear, if we look at increasing investment pace versus our balanced growth strategy, we see that this is balanced growth. Balanced growth means that we will grow with the market in the pace where we believe that we can fill new open capacity within about a year's time. So it doesn't affect -- so we can grow sustainably and don't sacrifice margin. Now we are entering a period of stronger demand growth. It comes a little earlier in Finland, and we can see that we're starting already this year with increasing opening pace. And then we gradually start increasing opening pace also in Sweden from -- basically from year-end and onwards. That is in line with the underlying demand growth. So we believe that we can do that without sacrificing margin.

The next question comes from Kristofer Liljeberg from DNB Carnegie.

Two quick questions. First on improved occupancy in Scandinavia. Is it possible to break that into how much was or places that you closed down and how much was from demand -- and then on Finland, if you could comment about the outlook to improve occupancy Finland into that question also a little bit about how the demand looks like.

Yes. So we closed nursing homes in Sweden during the quarter. So -- that's it. The rest is sales driven. If we look at Finland, so as I said, Q3 is normally a bit softer. We also seen a combination of new openings that's seasonally a bit softer in terms of occupancy. But we expect to return to sales and occupancy growth in Finland forward. There's no minimum magnitude.

The next question comes from Filip Wetterqvist from SB1 Markets.

I have 2 questions. I'll take them one by one. First one on Scandinavia or Swedish elderly care. We see Ambea expanding its capacity quite rapidly. And even though you're expanding capacity as well, it's well below Ambea's pace. So what's the strategic reasoning why not expanding at the same pace given the significant current and expected in nursing homes in Sweden?

I guess it depends on your perspective. But yes, so short term, we -- in the next couple of quarters, it's a slightly lower opening pace, but then we also see an increased pace during 2027 and onwards. We are a bit ahead in Finland because we believe that the demand for elderly care is slightly stronger there comes a bit earlier.

All right. And then Ambea also signed several contracts in Denmark in recent months as conditions for private elderly care appears to have improved there. Are you also looking at opportunities in Denmark? And how do you assess the current potential in the Danish market?

And then we have 3 elderly care units that are running in Denmark at the moment. Yes, we're also looking at new opportunities in Denmark, but we are also assessing the new regulation because we want to see it play out in practice, not only on paper. So we are testing the regulation during 2026, and we'll decide from there on how we move on in Denmark.

There are no more phone questions at this time. So I hand the conference back to the speakers for any written questions and closing comments.

Well, thank you again for listening in. I appreciate good questions. And if you have any further questions, just don't hesitate to contact us after the call. So thank you for listening, and have a good day.

Thank you very much.

Welcome to Attendo Q1 report 2026. [Operator Instructions]

Now I will hand the conference over to CEO, Martin Tiveus; and CFO, Mikael Malmgren. Please go ahead.

Thank you, and good morning, everyone. Today, we present Attendo's results for the first quarter. As usual, we will focus on the key drivers behind our performance, our operational progress, and how we continue to execute on our strategy. I will start by giving a general update on the development in the quarter. Then our CFO, Mikael Malmgren, will take you through the financials in more detail.

Next slide, please. So let me start with the key highlights from the quarter. We continue to see positive development in both Finland and Scandinavia, driven by higher occupancy, stable quality indicators, and improved operational efficiency. While reported net sales decreased slightly, underlying growth in continuing operations remained strong at around 5%. The delta is fully explained by ended outsourcing and Home Care contract in Sweden as well as currency effects.

Profitability improved significantly with lease adjusted EBITDA increasing by around 40% to SEK 326 million. The comparison quarter last year was affected by the transition to the 0.6 staffing requirements in Finland that came into effect January 1 last year. And this means that this quarter's result in our Finnish operations reflect a normalized run rate based on current staffing ratios. In Scandinavia, we continue to improve earnings according to plan.

Adjusted earnings per share continued to increase, and we delivered a strong free cash flow of SEK 211 million, supporting continued investments in new capacity. During the quarter, we opened 2 new Disabled Care units in 12 new places. Overall, this is a quarter where we clearly see the effects of the actions taken during the past year, coming through both margins and cash flow. By continuing to develop quality of care and adding new care capacity to society, we're part of the solution to solve the care challenges of both today as well as tomorrow.

Next slide, please. Turning to occupancy. Occupancy is a key driver for profitability, and we continue to see improving occupancy across both Finland and Scandinavia. At the end of the quarter, we reached 88%, up 2 percentage points year-on-year. The improvement is driven by stronger inflow of residents, active capacity management, and a continued focus on matching supply with demand in each local market.

Next slide, please. So let's turn to the development of our rolling 12-month lease adjusted EBITA margin. We see a continued uplift in margins in both business areas, both sequentially and year-on-year, with lease adjusted group EBITDA margin reaching above 7% in the quarter. While we've seen a steadily improving margin trajectory in Finland for many consecutive quarters, I'm pleased to show that we continue to deliver on the expected margin uplift in Scandinavia in Q1. As we have previously stated, we expect Scandinavia to continue to improve during 2026.

The improvement is driven by several factors: Higher occupancy, improved operational efficiency, a gradual exit of contracts with unsustainable terms, and better cost control across the organization. At the same time, underlying demand remains strong, and we continue to steer our business mix towards an increased focus on own operations, where we have a stronger control over both nonfinancial and financial results.

With that, I hand over to our CFO, Mikael Malmgren. Please go ahead, Mikael Malmgren, and turn to the next slide, please.

Thank you, Martin, and good morning, everyone. In the quarter, we saw underlying growth in both business areas, approximately 4% in Finland and 7% in Sweden. However, growth was offset by ending contracts in Sweden and FX headwind, which resulted in reported net sales decreasing 1.6% to SEK 4.7 billion. In Scandinavia, the growth was down 1% reported. However, underlying growth in continuing operations, which excludes ended and exiting contracts, was 7% with good development in owned homes. Ending and exiting contracts will continue to weigh on sales throughout 2026.

In Finland, reported net sales was down 1.9%. Adjusting for currency, the business grew 3% and 4% when we exclude the divested child welfare business. Improvement largely driven by an increase in net new customers compared to same quarter last year with a good development in own nursing homes. Currency had, as expected, a larger negative net sales effect. And based on current Euro SEK trading, we expect, although slightly less, still a negative FX effect also in the coming quarter.

Next slide, please. The reported result improved to SEK 470 million. Correspondingly, the lease adjusted EBITA increased from SEK 234 million to SEK 326 million, up 39% versus same period last year. Lease adjusted EBITA in Scandinavia was SEK 24 million higher. And in Finland, the lease adjusted EBITA improved SEK 77 million, excluding FX effects. Currency had a SEK 16 million reported and a SEK 12 million negative effect on lease adjusted EBITA.

Next slide, please. Growth for Attendo Finland was 4%, excluding divestments and FX effects and 1.9% reported due to mainly a weaker euro. Lease adjusted EBITA was SEK 254 million, an improvement of SEK 65 million or SEK 77 million, excluding currency effects. The quarter improved by more sold beds in primarily owned nursing homes, continued improved manning driven by investments in staff development, working conditions, and support systems as well as reduced sick leave. In addition, last year, Q1 was as previously mentioned, impacted by the transition to 0.6 staffing density requirements. The transition is now estimated to have impacted 2025 results negatively by close to SEK 25 million.

And please note that during '26, we plan to exit a few low or no occupancy units, which should lead to further improved productivity. At the same time, we are now scaling up our investments with confirmed plans to add about 400 additional beds during 2026. And in line with our sustainable growth strategy to add 2% to 3% EBITDA growth per year, we acquired one smaller bolt-on in Q1 and 2 more in April, including separately press released [indiscernible].

Next slide, please. In Scandinavia, underlying net sales growth was 7%, driven by growth in own homes and recent acquisition. However, reported net sales growth was slightly negative due to the ended and exiting contracts and which I will come back to on the following page. In line with our communicated financial plan and the building block of margin uplift, the lease adjusted EBITDA improved to SEK 93 million, up SEK 24 million versus last year, improvement primarily driven by own homes and improved central costs with ended outsourcing contracts having no material impact on the result.

The result was slightly negative, affected by Home Care exits where the contracts generated about SEK 5 million in losses. Going forward, we still foresee some minor negative impact from ongoing Home Care contract exits as they roll out. During the quarter, we opened 2 new Disabled Care units with 12 places and also won 3 quality tenders in Disabled Care to a value of SEK 20 million on an annualized basis. Currently, we have 286 beds under construction, and we will open 1 new 60 beds nursing home end of the year.

Next slide, please. So to better showcase underlying growth in Scandinavia, we introduced in Q4 a more detailed reporting of continuing operations versus ended and ending contracts. As you may recall, we showed the total reported net sales and EBITA at the bottom of the page from left to right. While at the top column of the page, we see the Attendo underlying business, which we call our continuing operations and where the ended and ending contracts have been excluded. Attendo margins continued to improve for the second consecutive quarter due to improved ways of working, faster responding to changes in manning and sales, while at the same time exiting nonstrategic outsourcing contracts and exiting non-sustainable Home Care contracts.

As you can see, Attendo continuing operations showed a net sales growth of 7% and a margin of 5% in the quarter, up 1.5% compared to same quarter last year. At the same time, the contracts which have ended or will end had a significant impact on net sales, but limited impact on EBITDA.

Next slide, please. In total, we now have a pipeline of 1,350 beds and up by 100 versus previous quarter, with total 930 new beds expected to open during 2026 and 2027. And worth reiterating is that our pipeline is built on our strategy to open in micro locations where we forecast a strong need for our services, a good payer relationship with a buying mechanism in place, a growing population as well as good commute options for both staff and relatives.

Next slide, please. Our free cash flow to firm showed strong resilience and improved to SEK 211 million compared to SEK 50 million same period last year. As a result, the rolling 12-month free cash flow to firm increased to SEK 1,340 million. During the quarter, we repurchased SEK 201 million worth of shares. And today, we can report that we also reached our target mandate from last report to buy back SEK 200 million worth of shares between February and the time of this report. Since the initiation of our continued share buyback program back in February 2024, we have repurchased approximately 5% per annum of our outstanding shares. And in line with our EPS strategy, our ambition is to continue our share buyback program. And if the AGM later today approves a new mandate, we aim to disclose a new program shortly.

Next slide, please. So let's have a look at some of our key financial metrics. If we start at the top left, the adjusted earnings per share improved by SEK 0.34, up 39% versus last year, improvement primarily due to higher lease adjusted EBITDA and further supported by continued share buybacks. If we turn to the top figure on the right and our lease adjusted margin percent, adjusted for nonrecurring items in '24, we continue to improve our lease adjusted EBITDA margin. In Q1, the rolling 12-month margin was 7.2%, up 1.5% compared to the quarter last year.

And if we look at the figure at the bottom left, our lease adjusted net debt-to-EBITDA ratio remained at 1.1 and down 0.7x compared to same quarter last year. And finally, if we look at the figure on the bottom right, net interest expenses in the quarter was SEK 24 million. SEK 7 million better than same period last year and SEK 38 million lower on a rolling 12-month basis, further supporting our adjusted earnings per share growth.

With that, I hand over to you, Martin.

Thank you, Mikael. So let me summarize. We continue to deliver appreciated care, creating value for both individuals and for society. Our latest surveys show high and stable satisfaction across all stakeholder groups, which confirms the resilience and sustainability of our operating model. The high and stable quality across our operations is paired with solid financial performance, driven by continued improvement in occupancy and strong operational efficiency. We also continue to strengthen our geographical footprint by gradually leaving less attractive areas and opening new units in locations with stronger long-term demand and better economics.

With one new bolt-on acquisition made during Q1 and another 2 signed early Q2, we continue to deliver in line with our strategy for balanced growth, targeting at least 2% annual EBITDA growth through acquisitions. For the first quarter, rolling 12-month lease adjusted earnings per share increased to SEK 6.47, well in line with our financial plan and roll towards our new financial target for reaching at least SEK 9 per share in 2028. Our strong financial results and cash flow enable increased investments in new capacity to meet the growing demand for care in society. Currently, we have around 930 new care beds under construction. Overall, Attendo is well positioned to meet increasing care needs in society while delivering sustainable and profitable growth for shareholders.

With that, I'd like to thank you for your attention and open up for Q&A. Operator, please go ahead.

[Operator Instructions] The next question comes from Julia Angeli Strand from Handelsbanken.

I have 3, and I take them one by one. And firstly, on the Scandinavia margin trajectory. I know you don't provide specific margin guidance, but it seems like Scandinavia is showing a nice turnaround with margins up 1.3 percentage points. So could you elaborate how much of your initiatives that have already materialized and whether you expect impact to come through gradually or be more back-end loaded, looking at the underlying operations?

As we said, we don't guide on margin. But as we have previously stated, we expect a gradual improvement of margins in Scandinavia throughout 2026. So I think this is just a first proof point on that. And just to add as well, you may be aware, last year, we also had some one-off effects impacting the reported results in Home Care in both Q2 and Q3.

And then secondly, a question on Finland. Demand appears to be quite strong. So could you give an indication of how much of the planned openings you expect to fill during 2026? And if you think that this strong level of demand is sustainable?

If you look at the underlying demand growth due to demographics, it's strong in all our markets, but it starts a bit earlier in Finland than in Sweden, supporting capacity growth already from now and onwards. We are -- we will start opening at a higher pace starting Q2, meaning the -- from next quarter on in Finland. And we expect to fill new capacity up to mature level within about 12 months' time period from opening.

And then there's a follow-up question there. Do you -- when do you expect the demand in Sweden to increase In line with what we see in Finland, I mean?

Yes. I mean in Finland, we've already seen it. I mean we expect Sweden demand growth to start picking up from now and onwards. In Finland, it actually started already a few years ago. So we expect demand growth to start picking up basically from now on in Sweden. And we are planning to start opening in -- from Q4, we opened the next one in Sweden and then opening at a higher pace from 2027 Q1 and onwards.

And just my last question then. Can you elaborate a little bit on the rationale behind the latest acquisition, which is a bit outside your core elderly care business? Is this a segment you want to grow within? And also wondering just considering you divested Disability Care unit last year to a competitor. So just maybe a few words there.

Sure. I think this is very much in line with our strategy for Finland. We -- about 75% of our business in Finland is elderly care. That's correct. The remaining part is divided between Disabled Care and service psychiatry, including substance abuse, which is a fairly big segment in Finland. So this is complementary to our already existing substance abuse operations in Finland. A-klinikka is a very well-known brand in Finland. I think it will strengthen our total offering within that segment. So we're really happy about that acquisition.

With regards to the small divestment that we did earlier in Finland, which was child welfare, that is a very small segment for us. That was a bit subscale. So that's also part of us reducing complexity and streamlining our offering.

The next question comes from Philip Ekengren from ABG SC.

So Finnish margins improved considerably. Just trying to understand a bit moving forward here, but how much of the easier staffing comp? Or you went into the year with sort of a different cost base before the change of staffing requirements. So how much of the improvement in margins is the easier staffing comp washing through versus structural improvements that should persist into Q3 and onwards?

So thank you for the question. We estimated now that the impact from the staffing transition impacted negatively Q1 last year by approximately SEK 25 million. So that would correspond to slightly north of 1 percentage point.

And then just on occupancy in Finland perhaps, it's at 87%, if I'm not mistaken. And what's the practical feeling here? And what's the -- and I guess this is sort of hard to quantify and you don't want to give guidance on it, but what's the margin sensitivity for each percentage point of occupancy from here if we were to see 1 percentage point more occupancy, what would that imply on margins?

Thank you for that. That's a great question. I believe as we state in our EBITDA growth -- sustainable growth model, 1 percentage point in occupancy development generally translates into an additional 2 percentage EBITDA growth on productivity.

And then just on the leverage, it's at 1.1. How do you see sort of the trade-off between potential new M&A, any sort of any plans on the pipeline? Could you give us any color on that versus accelerated capacity additions or buybacks and sort of the mix and how you think about that moving forward throughout the coming year?

As we have stated in our growth model, we plan to grow with a combination of organic openings and bolt-on acquisitions. If you look at our cash flow, it's strong enough to support a combination of both dividend, continued share buybacks, organic growth, and M&A. And I mean, I think as you noted, leverage is quite low at 1.1%, in our target range of 1.5 to 2.5. But on the other hand, I mean, it gives us also maneuverability now when we are increasing growth base, we're increasing organic growth. So I think we're in a good position to continue to grow the company forward.

The next question comes from Bjorn Olsson from SEB.

First, just a follow-up then on the occupancy in Finland. The trend seems to be slightly decreasing. And as you're guiding for a higher pipeline of new openings, do you think that will sort of slightly compress the occupancy improvement for the quarters to come, maybe Q2, Q3?

Yes. I think that's a good question. And of course, when we're opening at a higher pace, yes, that will very likely hold back overall occupancy development somewhat if you look at the average overall occupancy, it's only natural. When we look at our growth model for balanced growth, we separate EBITDA growth from new openings and adding capacity from occupancy development in existing portfolio. So we still estimate that -- we still target occupancy improvement in existing portfolio towards our target of reaching 92% on average, while, of course, new openings, it will take -- we expect it to take at least 12 months from opening to fill up new capacity forward.

And do you think -- is it credible to think that the new openings have a steeper path towards 92%? Because I guess you opened where the demand is.

What we can say is that the ones that we have opened over the past 18 months have filled up within a year.

Filled up, you mean 92%-ish?

Yes.

And on Scandinavia, I maybe speaking only for myself, but somewhat extrapolated perhaps to the entire audience of analysts. We still missed your margin improvement by roughly 50 bps on average. And I mean that's -- you're guiding quite transparently on the continuing operations versus existing. So the miss from our side seem to be driven by efficiency initiatives from your side.

Could you give -- I mean, just to follow-up on Julia's questions maybe, but could you give any guidance as if we are to expect additional impact from cost initiatives? Or was this it, so to speak?

I think these are fruits from long-term work, partly work on -- I mean, in a company like this, we have more than 30,000 employees working shifts, so day and night. What is really important is a combination of leadership training, which lowers staff attrition, which lowers sick leave numbers, improve stability in operation. It's also a question of leadership density and get that stability in operations. And then digitalization, which is something that we continuously work with. And we have several AI pilots going on, and we roll them out continuously to save time for administration and improve efficiency. All that combined makes operation more efficient and also that's dependent on, for example, rental staff, which is now at close to 0 level. And that is what we're seeing the fruit of. So it's rather a long-term gradual improvement rather than step changes.

So we could expect some additional cost initiatives to run through to the P&L, I guess, then?

Yes.

Yes. We continuously work on improving our ways of working.

The next question comes from Kristofer Liljeberg from DNB Carnegie.

Three questions. First, on the Easter effect, which I guess should impact margins negatively now in the second quarter versus the first quarter. But I guess, last year in Finland, margins were pretty flat sequentially because you had that staffing transition effect in Q1. So would you be able to -- or would it be possible maybe to quantify the Easter effect for Finland and Scandinavia now?

Very detailed question, Kristofer. I would be happy to come back to all of the analysts on that question specifically.

But I guess it's fair to assume lower margins in both markets in the second quarter versus the first quarter? Or will this be offset by continued underlying improvements, similar to what we saw last year?

I mean, generally, Q2 is a bit, I would say, on the margin compressed for the Easter effect versus Q1. That is correct. And last year, the Easter was in the same quarter. But I don't think you can make the same comparison Finland and Sweden also because of the still ongoing improvement in underlying business in Scandinavia.

So lower margin in Finland, but sequentially, but maybe not in Scandinavia.

Yes, that's the direction we're looking at.

Yes. And then this difference between underlying sales and reported sales, of course, FX is what it is. But for how long do you expect to have this type of large impact from closed units and ended outsourcing contracts?

Yes. So I think we were pretty much at the peak in Q1. It will now gradually become lower over the next 3 to 4 quarters, and then it will be very little after that is our expectation at the moment.

And when we move into 2027, would you say that you have closed most units that you want and have reached low enough level for outsourcing contracts so that we will see growth picking up from new openings?

Yes, that's the overall plan. But we continue to, of course, evaluate our contracts. But that is the overall...

And just the final question, if I look at the financial net adjusted for leases, it seems to be some other factors here impacting then the net interest. Is that FX or something else?

Well, that's a great question, and that's correct. FX has a -- it's called an accounting effect on our euro-based loan. So when the euro versus SEK goes either up or down, that has a one-time effect on the total financial net.

[Operator Instructions] The next question comes from Filip Wetterqvist from SB1 Markets.

I have 2 questions. First on Finland. You mentioned in the report that you plan to take over a number of homes currently operated in the public sector during 2026. Are those homes already on full occupancy? Or do you have to fill beds yourself and taking over? And what is the margin profile of those homes compared to homes in own operations?

That's a great question. We plan to at least take over one home in Q2 or we have taken over one home in Q2, and we plan to take over another one in Q4 at least. They are generally operating at our target occupancy or better, and we believe we can run them in the same way we run our current operations.

And then my second question, if I'm not mistaken, the contract with Linkoping Municipality rolled off here in April. How much did that impact sales in Q1? And what impact will have in Q2? And did it have any effect on earnings as well here Q1, Q2?

Yes, that's correct. The Linkoping contract rolled off now. We have previously stated it's approximately SEK 100 million revenue. So it has about SEK 25 million impact in net sales. We don't discuss or disclose on a contract level EBITDA.

There are no more phone questions at this time. So I hand the conference back to the speakers for any written questions and closing comments.

Well, thank you all for listening in for very good questions and comments. And that's all for us then. If there's anything else, then just please contact us directly. Thank you for listening in.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, and welcome to the Attendo Capital Markets Day 2026. We will spend the upcoming 2.5 hours together, and there has been a great interest in participating today. So before we start, thank you for your great interest and for your support, both in Attendo and for a growing Nordic care sector where Attendo really makes a difference. My name is Josefine Uppling, and I am the Communications and Sustainability Director at Attendo, and I will do my very best to guide us through the agenda of the day.

Today's speakers are our President and CEO, Martin Tiveus; our Managing Directors for Finland and Scandinavia, Virpi Holmqvist and Malin Fredgardh Huber; and our CFO, Mikael Malmgren. Let's just have a brief look at the agenda before we kick things off. Martin will start with an introduction of Attendo, walking us through our journey, our achievements so far, our strategy going forward and also invite you to understand our markets and its dynamics a bit better.

Then you will meet our business area directors, and the focus will be on further key insights from across the business, led by Virpi and Malin in the session called Operations and Quality. After a short break, Mikael will dig into our financial performance and growth. And we will end the presentation with a Q&A session. You can, during the full broadcast, post your questions by the chat function. We will come back to that, but you can keep the questions coming, and we will try to, of course, answer as many as possible in the end of this Digital Capital Markets Day. Our presentation will also be recorded, and you will find it afterwards at attendo.com.

Well, without further ado, please join me in welcoming Martin Tiveus on stage.

Good afternoon. Thank you for joining us today. My name is Martin Tiveus. I've been the CEO for Attendo Group since 2018. Today, we'd like to give you a clear picture of a few things: the long-term opportunity in Nordic social care, how Attendo delivers quality care at scale and finally, how that translates into sustainable earnings growth for shareholders. We operate in an industry that is fundamentally about people, but it's also an industry where demographics, economies of scale and innovation are creating a structural growth opportunity for well-run care providers, and that is exactly where Attendo is positioned. Attendo is today a leading social care provider in the Nordics, but more importantly, we're a company built around a simple idea, providing better care to more people. And that idea captures both our purpose and our business model.

Across Europe, societies face a growing challenge connected to demographics. More people need care, while public systems are under increasing financial and workforce pressure. Our role is twofold: to provide quality care to each individual, but also to help solve that societal challenge. And we do that by delivering more individualized and appreciated care in modern care facilities, places that feel more like home rather than institutions and where the everyday life of our residents comes first. We combine this care philosophy with a strong operational model that allows us to deliver appreciated and individually centered care at a lower cost to society compared to most publicly run alternatives.

And that combination is powerful. If we can deliver better care at a lower cost while also investing in new capacity, then society can create more care for every tax you were spent. And that summarizes our vision, better care for individuals, more care for society and sustainable growth for shareholders. Our focus today is on the future for Attendo. But to understand our thinking, let's look briefly at our history as a reminder of our journey and what we have accomplished so far. Since the company was founded, it was more than 40 years ago, Attendo has been an innovation leader in social care. Over the years, we've introduced new ways of improving both quality and efficiency.

And I'll just give you a few examples from this slide. In 2005, we introduced the first structured quality system in the industry, AQ05. We also introduced the first public quality report in the sector in 2011. The year after in 2012, we introduced lifestyle-based nursing homes, differentiating facilities and activities in our units based on residents' preferences. About 5 years ago, we introduced digital communication tools connecting staff with residents and relatives.

And we also introduced a new holistic quality framework, emphasizing quality of life measurements as a third quality dimension. And most recently, AI tools to reduce administrative time for caregivers and free up more time for care. What's important here is that innovation in our industry, it's not about technology for its own sake. It's about improving the quality of care. give our care staff more time with residents, improving care outcomes and making care work more attractive as a profession.

And this mindset continues to shape how we develop the company going forward. Another dimension, of course, of history is growth. From a small startup in the 1980s, Attendo has grown into a Nordic market leader. The revenue development on this slide reflects that journey, but equally important is how the company has evolved. When I joined 8 years ago, Attendo had been on a long growth journey, but we had also suffered from too fast expansion, especially in Finland and the years that followed, the company managed both the regulatory reset in Finland and a pandemic. Since then, we have fundamentally reshaped the company.

We worked through a significant turnaround in Finland. We exited Norway. We have partly exited Denmark and gradually exited the low-priced outsourcing segment and refocused on own operated units, which is now more than 90% of our business. We have concentrated on segments where we can better manage quality, risk and returns. The acquisition of Team Olivia 2 years ago, strengthened our Disabled and Individual & Family Care business in Sweden without changing our strategic focus. And the result is a more focused care business based on return-driven growth with a clear market leadership in social care, a focus on Finland and Sweden, high share of own operated units and reduced operational complexity. This shift is visible in the numbers. After having managed the new regulatory landscape in Finland and the pandemic during 2018 to '21, we introduced a new model for sustainable, balanced growth.

Since then, we have come a long way in rebuilding profitability, but also rebuilding operational strength. We lifted adjusted earnings per share from less than SEK 1 per share in 2022 to SEK 3 per share in 2023. We continue then to improve to SEK 6 per share last year, clearly above our previous financial target for 2026. So we have achieved what we set out to do. And as we presented when we released our Q4 report, we are now raising our ambitions further. Our target for 2028 is to reach an adjusted earnings per share of more than SEK 9. During this Capital Markets Day, we will explain how we plan to deliver that growth. Before discussing our strategy, I think it's important to understand the structural drivers behind our industry.

And there are a few powerful forces shaping the future of social care. Across Europe, especially in the Nordics, number of people over 85 is increasing rapidly, and this creates a structural need for more care capacity. And while demand for elderly care in the coming 15 years will continue to grow steeply, supply of qualified care staff will not grow at the same pace. To address this, innovation and new ways of working are essential. And as Swedish municipalities and Finnish welfare regions are obliged to provide citizens with high-quality care services while managing limited resources, need for cost-efficient care solutions will continue to grow. This means that public-private collaboration that's not going to be optional. It's going to be a necessity. And as one of the few large care operators in the Nordics, Attendo is part of that solution.

To summarize, we believe that we have a very strong position. It's built on a few foundations, being the leading social care provider in attractive Nordic markets, being a trusted partner to public authorities, providing both high-quality and cost-effective care and having a clear value creation plan forward with ambitious but achievable financial targets for the coming years. This combination of structural demand growth, operational capability and financial discipline, that's what underpins our growth strategy. So with that introduction, let's now take a closer look at the markets we operate in. I'll walk you through the key characteristics of the Nordic social care market, the growth outlook and why we believe that these markets remain very attractive for long-term investments.

So we operate in 2 of the most developed social care markets in Europe, being Finland and Sweden. Together, this market represents around EUR 30 billion in annual social care spending. Both markets are growing steadily, around 5%, 6% annual growth in recent years. And in both markets, we see a strong demographic tailwind up until 2033, driven by aging population. And looking further ahead, even towards 2050, the demographic trend continues. Across our core markets, we hold a leading market position that gives us scale advantage, strong relationship with public payers and the ability to continue expanding. In both our core markets, private providers already play a very well-established role.

Both systems are tax funded and decentralized, but the political and regulatory landscape differs a bit. In Sweden, the around 300 municipalities are responsible for social care. So we work with many counterparties through a combination of freedom of choice systems, framework agreements and public tenders. But only about half of these 300 municipalities use private care operators. So while the average private share capacity is only around 20%, the private share is higher in municipalities that use private care operators. In Sweden, requirements are also more diverse. Every municipality, every local political steering decides their own requirements on elderly care, both in terms of staffing density but also with other requirements. That could be share of organic food, daily activities, specific competencies needed to run a care home in that municipality and so forth. If we move to Finland, it looks a bit differently.

Responsibility for social care was lifted in 2022 from the around 300 municipalities to the newly formed welfare regions. There's 22 welfare regions, including Helsinki. We operate in all welfare regions, thanks to 3 establishment rules. The Finnish market is also a bit more predictable and less complex than Sweden. But instead of local requirements on staffing in other areas of social care, there is national rules and regulations. That means that the larger and more harmonized market conditions in Finland also enables us to operate with the same model across the country, and that allows for slightly better economies of scale than in Sweden. Therefore, the Finnish care market structurally allows for slightly higher margins than in Sweden, something that is also visible in the numbers.

We received some questions later from the investor community regarding the political risk given the upcoming Swedish election. So I thought we'll add a slide on that topic here. If we look backwards ahead of the previous elections in Sweden, we've become used to the relatively high tone on national level, mainly from the left regarding private welfare companies. But despite the high tone on national level, it rarely matters on the local political level where the responsibility for care lies and where all decisions about care is actually made. Around half of the municipalities in Sweden chose to partner with private providers for the nursing home capacity.

Among these, you'll find most of the larger cities such as Stockholm, Gothenburg, Malmo,, Uppsala and so forth. And if we double-click on these 130 municipalities, around 75% of their populations are governed by left leaning or coalition governments, and that illustrates an important point. The need for care capacity tends to override political cycles. And municipalities and their local governments need reliable partners who can deliver cost-efficient quality care regardless of political color. And that creates a stable long-term operative environment. So back to market growth. If you look at the historic development of the market, growth has been very consistent. Growth is broad-based across segments that includes nursing homes, home care, disabled care, individual and family care and social psychiatry. And importantly, this growth is not cyclical. It's driven by structural factors such as demographics and health care policy.

In Sweden, social care market has grown around 5% annually and in Finland, slightly higher, around 6%. But having said that, in Finland, there was a clear shift during '22 to '23 when elderly care in Finland was transitioned to welfare regions and price levels were adjusted in line with the new staffing ratio requirements. If we look ahead, the outlook remains strong. Both Sweden and Finland are expected to see continued expansion in social care spending over the next decade. Market growth is projected at roughly 4% to 5% annually. And the same -- it's the same drivers, aging populations that reinforces the need for more capacity, labor market dynamics underscore the need for innovation and public finance constraints that increases the need for cost efficiency. So for providers that can deliver quality care efficiently at scale, this creates a very attractive environment.

So we have talked about aging population being the strongest driver of demand growth in our largest care segment, which is elderly care. So let's dig a bit deeper into that. Today, a number of individuals in need of a nursing home is relatively evenly distributed between the 2 age groups, which is 65 to 84 in this picture, that's the light blue on the slide and 85 plus, which is the dark blue. Looking ahead, most of the growth will occur in the 85-plus group. People are healthier for longer, that means that they will be able to stay home with home care services for longer.

Life expectancy continues to increase and public finances are under pressure, meaning fewer will likely be granted access to nursing homes unless you really need it. That means that we expect prevalence to go slightly down over the years. By 2023, taking this into account, number of people needing nursing home care is still expected to increase by around 35% to 37% in Finland and Sweden. That's a major structural shift. Given the demographics, that demand will also continue to increase until 2050. Finally, worth emphasizing is that private providers deliver strong outcomes compared to public providers and that across several measures.

That includes quality indicators, work environment for employees, cost efficiency. To give you an example, private providers typically operate nursing homes at a lower cost per care day, close to 20% lower in Finland, close to 10% lower in Finland, while maintaining stronger quality outcomes than public providers. And this reinforces the case for public-private collaboration. To simplify, partnering with private care operators enables public payers and municipalities to offer their citizens a better care at a lower cost for society, better care for more. And that is exactly within that framework that Attendo operates and continue to grow.

Now I hand over to Josefine for the next part of the presentation. So please go ahead.

Thank you, Martin. Well, now it's time for me to invite our Managing Directors to the stage. Please join me in welcoming Virpi and Malin. Okay. Welcome to the stage, Virpi and Malin. Great to have you here. I think before we start, let's have you properly introduced. Virpi, you have been the Managing Director for Attendo Finland now since 2020. This is actually your second career at Attendo, one can say because you first joined the company in [ 2008 ] as Financial Director in Attendo Finland. And later, you also served as a segment Director until 2014. Then you walked away for a couple of years between your 2 Attendo tenures, you were the CEO of Touhula Group, which is a private provider with more than 100 kindergartens units in Finland. You also worked at Pihlajalinna, a listed Finnish health care company, where you served as Senior Vice President for Primary and Social Care and you were also the Chief Financial Officer.

So obviously, Virpi brings broad and extensive experience from both social care and health care services in Finland. There you get the right slide also. Malin, you have been the Managing Director of Scandinavia for a year now. You have a background as a registered nurse and you joined Attendo 23 years ago. In conclusion, there is no leadership role in Scandinavia that you hasn't been in basically. This makes you one of the most experienced business area directors in Scandinavian Care. And together, Virpi and Malin have a deep understanding for the very core of care services, combined with a strong business acumen. Malin and Virpi will now together take you through the Attendo way of delivering high-quality, cost-efficient care. The floor is yours.

Thank you.

Thank you. So I'm really excited to be here today and talk about my favorite subject, welfare and Attendo in particular. Our operating model is called Attendo Way, and it is designed to help us ensure that we run our business in an efficient and long-term sustainable manner for the benefit of our care recipients, relatives, payers, employees and ultimately, of course, the society. Attendo Way covers people and organization, including how we secure our common culture and the integration of our values in the everyday work.

Attendo Way also covers how we use technology in our operations and what key financial and nonfinancial KPIs that we use to track quality and financial performance, and it also help us enable early risk identification. So our people are the heart of what we do. Employees are the foundation for delivering care services. We need the right conditions to perform in a good working environment. And we measure employee satisfaction to ensure that our employees have the right conditions and feel satisfied at work by focusing on 3 main areas. And first, strong unit leadership. And what does that mean? Yes, giving all employees the right conditions for doing a really good job, a culture of full accountability and continuous leadership development.

Quite recently, -- in 2024, we introduced group managers at each department in our nursing homes. Second, continuous development of competencies, clear responsibilities starting with a structure onboarding according to Attendo Way, keeping our employees engaged through continuous development, different career pathways and encourage them to influence. Third, innovation of ways of working. We simplify tasks to free up more time to spend with our recipients. We have a mobile-first way of working with many of our systems accessible in a smartphone. So in conclusion, to deliver high-quality care, we need employees that enjoy working at Attendo. We need strong leadership and stability, constant learning and innovation.

And if we look at the right-hand side, we have had a positive development of employee satisfaction, stable high levels since the recovery after the pandemic. And our aim is to be the best employer in the sector. Care recipients want the right care at the right time. They want to be met by people who understand their individual needs and to live a meaningful everyday life. And to assure and improve their experience of Attendo, we measure customer satisfaction, meaning the care recipient's own satisfaction. When we launched our holistic quality framework in 2022, we started with a simple question, what truly makes care recipients satisfied? Traditionally, quality in our sector has focused on processes and structure, compliance, regulations and routines. But to us, they are the fundamentals. What generates true satisfaction is so much more.

And this is why our framework also covers quality of life, health outcomes and customer experience. I'm proud to say that we are leading in process and structure quality. As an example, Attendo outperforms public providers in Swedish National Board of Health and Welfare's annual unit survey. In existence of care routines, Attendo measures 81% compared to public providers at 46%. Quality of life and health outcomes are about providing care that is adapted to individual needs.

And this is supported by clear working methods and KPIs to make sure they are applied in practice. To create meaning, we offer activities that encourage movement, social interaction and outdoor time. We actively work with the living environment and food experience to ensure that our home truly feels like homes. We also plan the weeks to keep weekdays and weekends different. In that way, we give our care recipients something to look forward to, and we keep life as familiar and normal as possible. Since launching Attendo's quality framework, we have had a clear positive trend in customer satisfaction. We see this as a testament that we are focusing on what really matters. And what matters to our care recipients is important for their relatives. Isn't that so?

Yes, it is indeed, Malin. It is important for us to recognize that no one chooses to need our services. The people we care for are with us because life has taken a churn due to illness, age, disability or other difficult circumstances. For relatives, the decision to move a loved one into a care home can be one of the hardest they face. We measure relative satisfaction to ensure good dialogue and to develop the relationship with the caretakers family. We have learned what matters most to relatives is to feel that they can trust their loved ones are safe, that their loved ones receive the care they need. We build trust through respectful interactions and open communication. Each resident has a dedicated contact person who stays close to both the resident and the relatives and who understands their individual needs.

Creating a shared understanding is also important to set the right expectations. Through introductory meetings with the residents and their relatives, we align on needs, wishes and daily routines. This allows us to adapt to care from day 1. With introductory meeting as a start, we need to continue involving the relatives. We do this with our relative app Nara and direct contacts, monthly newsletters and a regular unit level relative meetings.

As shown in the graph, our relative satisfaction is now at all-time high. Another key stakeholder group is, of course, our payers with Finnish welfare regions and the Swedish and Danish municipalities. As a private provider in the markets with strong welfare system, our reason to exist is built on providing high-quality and cost-effective care, delivering care for more people at a lower cost to society.

Quality starts with contract compliance and a strong customer safety culture. We build credibility by transparent quality monitoring and reporting. We build trust through structured ways of identifying and acting quickly on potential risks. By delivering cost effectiveness, we help payers make the best possible use of strained resources. Thanks to Attendo's size and 40 years of knowledge, we can invest in specialized care and leverage economies of scale. This goes for IT, procurement, quality management and more. With sustainable profitability, we can continue to invest in innovation, quality improvement and new capacity to meet the future demands. Beyond quality and efficiency, we become true partners to payers when we help them solve complex care needs and show flexibility in adapting to changing requirements and market conditions.

As a key KPI, we measure payer satisfaction, which remains stable 4 out of 5. Let me briefly walk you through how we have developed our technological capabilities over the past years. Our starting point is simple. The future care will be digitally enabled, data-driven and operated in collaboration between humans and machines. For us, technology is not about replacing people. Its purpose is to make everyday work smoother for our employees, reduce routine tasks and administrative work and free up more time for face-to-face interaction with residents. At the same time, technology helps us improve quality. By using data more systematically, we can better understand residents' needs, support decision-making and continuously develop the quality of care. Over the past years, we have built the digital foundation, moved our system to the cloud, strengthened data and information management and tested even new technologies such as sensors, robotics and generative AI.

Looking ahead, we believe voice interfaces and AI assistant will play an important role in care environment by helping staff handle routine tasks while allowing them to focus on residents. Our ambition is to remain a forerunner in using technology and social care, always with the same goal, better care and more meaningful time with residents. We have now walked you through how we, at group level, work to ensure consistent value to our key stakeholders. But as we operate in different markets that have different regulations, steering and local traditions, we do adaptations to that in the way. I will introduce you to some of the specifics for Finland, and Malin will do the same for Scandinavia. But let me briefly introduce you first to Attendo Finland.

We are a leading provider of social care services across several key segments and today, the fifth largest private employer in Finland with around 18,800 employees. Our largest segment is residential care for older people, where we provide homes for residents with dementia and somatic conditions, focusing on safe and meaningful everyday living. We are also a leading provider of services for people with disabilities and with mental health and substance abuse rehabilitation, offering housing, rehabilitation and supported living services. In home care, the private sector still represents only about 10% of publicly funded services in Finland, which illustrates the long-term growth potential of this segment. In addition, we provide meal services, so-called social meals, supplying meals to welfare regions units in social services and hospital wards.

Together, this broad service portfolio allows us to support welfare regions across several parts of the care system. In our sector, provider services look and feel quite similar. True differentiation remains limited. Our ambition in Attendo Finland is to change that. We are building competitive advantage based on our dream about all we are home. Our goal is to make our homes feel and look like real homes, places where people can live meaningful lives, not institution organized around routines. Our competitive advantage will be built around 5 elements that shape everyday life in our homes. One of these elements is what we call Meaningful moments, the key moments that matter most to residents and their relatives.

These range from the first contact and moving in to everyday moments such as meals, daily activities, celebrations and ultimately, to end-of-life care and how we support families with when our [ path ] separates. We are identifying and conceptualizing these moments and integrating them into our Attendo Way operating model, turning our dream into concrete and scalable everyday practice across our homes. In social care, quality and effectiveness of care is often discussed but really systematically measured. In Finland, the RAI assessment tool allows us to change that. RAI is an internationally used and standardized assessment tool, and its use is mandated by law in elder care in Finland. Each assessment includes some 400 indicators and is typically based on a 3-day observation period together with the residents and even often involving relatives.

This generates high-quality resident-specific data. At Attendo, we use this data to tailor care to each individual resident, supporting decisions on care plans, nutritions, medication, therapy services and also the suitability of the digital care solutions. At the same time, aggregated right data enables us to monitor and continuously improve the quality of care across our homes. Together with Nordic Healthcare Group, we have also developed quality of life and health outcome metrics based on right data. And we are also currently working on rate-based effectiveness of care metrics for social psychiatry. In short, RAI turns care quality into something that can be measured, managed and continuously improved. Most social care providers still use manual processes for planning and documentation and communication.

The care sector is also highly regulated, which has caused the level of digitalization to lack from other industries. Through our economies of scale, we are able both to invest in and implement new ways of working and tools that increase efficiency and improve the quality of care. We strive to have the best technological solutions for employees, residents, relatives and payers as well. The core of care work is, of course, human contact. Yet those who work in care spent a great deal of time in front of the computer documenting their work. In 2024 and 2025, an AI solution was developed and tested in nursing home in Attendo Finland that enabled employees to spend more time with the residents and less time at the keyboard.

The technology works through voice recognition, converting free form speech into text in structured documentation that meets current requirements. Documentation time was reduced from 45 minutes to 20 minutes per every shift. This 25-minute gain means that we can now spend 6% more of working time with the residents. The Finnish Institute of Occupational Health carried out a development study on the pilot. Employees reported time savings and lower stress levels. The speech to text is now in use in 3 units in Finland, and we plan to roll it even broader.

With that, back to you, Malin, and the Scandinavian perspective.

Thank you, Virpi. So 98% of Scandinavian operations are in Sweden, 2% in Denmark. Our largest segment is nursing homes, where we offer homes for elderly under the Attendo brand. Residents live in their own apartment with their own kitchen and bathroom, and they have access to shared spaces. Under Attendo brand, we also offer home care. Home care span from social care to meals, cleaning, laundry and home health care. When we acquired Team Olivia in 2024, we significantly increased our size in disabled and individual care as well in social psychiatry. And this presented a good opportunity to launch the brands Unika and Viljan. Unika is our disabled care brand. We provide housing services, daily activities, respite care and short-term accommodation. Services are provided to individuals with different types of disabilities and of different ages from children to adults.

Under Viljan, we offer rehab, addiction treatment, schools and various forms of supported housing. And the aim of Viljan services is for individuals to get the right help to later be able to move on into independence, the next positive step in life. Most of our units today are our own operations, and we have a strong project pipeline to continue expanding our capacity. A key benefit of own operation is that we are in full control. We are able to maximize the quality control, recruit, manager and staff, and we can implement a Attendo Way from start. When we build the facilities ourselves, we can also tailor them to fit the needs of care. In 2012, we launched our nursing home lifestyle concepts, and we continue to leverage this as a competitive advantage.

They are all designed to feel like a home. Research shows that physical activity, social interaction and time outdoors contribute to quality of life. Within disabled care, several of our homes focus in rare and complex conditions. By bringing together individuals with similar needs, we can tailor each home's environment and build highly specialized teams. Prader-Willi Syndrome is one example of a rare condition where individuals have a compulsive relationship to food. For them, living in a standard disabled care home can be very challenging.

Sign language is another example. Without staff without a staff team that can communicate fluently in sign language, it is impossible to provide the same quality of life. Ultimately, purpose-built and specialized homes is a key contributor to quality of life. When we developed our new quality framework in 2022, we searched extensively and internationally for established working methods and KPIs to measure quality of life and health outcomes. And we found the framework called Quality of life conversations. The conversations mean that an employee sit down with each resident and have a structured conversation. The purpose is to truly understand how the individual specific needs and wishes are.

Sometimes it is simple. For example, we had one resident that felt confused at night when staff entered her room to check on her. By adjusting how the night staff approached her, we were able to reduce her stress and improve her experience. For residents living with dementia, a traditional conversation is not always possible. In those cases, the method instead focus on structured observation during the day. Specifically for dementia care, we have also developed our own method where we combine quality of life observations with national guidelines. The aim is to prevent and ease symptoms in a systematic way. Quality of life conversations and our dementia care method are examples of how we continue to drive quality development when we see opportunities to do things even better.

Many relatives are in a difficult situation when the loved one needs to move into one of our care homes. And sometimes they even need to move far away to get access to the specialized care. And with the relative app, Nara, that we launched in 2021, it became easier for relatives to stay updated on their loved ones everyday life even from a distance. In the app, relatives can easily access unit contact details, view activity schedules and meal plans. They can get photo updates.

And by knowing what the loved one has been doing or having for lunch, conversation between them becomes more natural and meaningful. Today, 75% of relatives use the app in the nursing home segment and adoption continues to increase as also the relatives become more digitally confident. And we see a clear impact. The satisfaction is significantly higher among relatives that use the app compared to those that don't.

And with that said, I hand over to you, Josefine.

Thank you, Malin and Virpi. And we can also see that you have started to post your questions in the chat function. So please keep the questions coming, and we will sum it up in the end of this presentation. It's actually time for a 5-minute break, but I think we can be a bit more generous. We can actually give you 11 at least 10 minutes break. And I also want to mention that if you hear strange sounds in the recording, it's because it is strange sounds in recording because when you do this kind of live broadcast, everything can happen, and we have actually a construction site who has started to make sounds even if they promised not to.

So if there is a strange sound or 2, you know why that is. Well, should we see each other again in 10 minutes. So please be back at 1:30. And next up after the break is our CFO, Mikael Malmgren. Stay tuned and see you soon.

[Break]

So welcome back to the Attendo Capital Markets Day 2026. The next part of our program will be about our financial performance and our growth journey going forward. And here to lead us through the session is our CFO, Mikael Malmgren. Please join me in welcoming him to the stage.

Mikael, please. The floor is yours.

Yes. Hello, and good afternoon, everyone. I hope you've had a nice break and you're as ready and excited for the next part of the presentation as I am. So let's kick things off. I'm happy to share that since 2022, we have delivered 12 consecutive quarters of steady earnings per share growth, which has resulted in, over time, a significantly improved adjusted earnings per share. In 2023, having reached SEK 3 per share, we concluded our first phase of the transformation. As a result, we announced a new financial plan in the beginning of '24. The financial plan set out to deliver more than 80% earnings per share growth, we would go from SEK 3 to at least SEK 5.50 per share in 2026.

As you can see on the chart, we exceeded the target ahead of time, delivering 100% earnings per share growth over 2 years. Having achieved our target ahead of time, we now enter our next phase for Attendo with new financial targets for the next 3 years. To begin with, we will continue to execute on our previous year strategy with a clear focus on combining healthy financial performance and balanced profitable growth with high-quality care operations and a strong stakeholder satisfaction.

Our priority remains long-term sustainable and balanced asset-light organic growth in our existing markets, supported by selective and margin-accretive bolt-on acquisitions in our core markets. Supported by demographic trends and the broader societal developments, we see solid underlying demand growth for elderly care in the Nordic region, alongside a steady demand for specialized functional care over the next 15 years. As such, we are introducing a new financial target for the period 2026 to 2028 to reach a lease adjusted earnings per share of at least SEK 9 per share.

As I just mentioned, our target is to deliver an adjusted EPS growth of at least 50%, equal to at least SEK 9 per share in 2028. And in the following pages, I'll provide a more detailed explanation of the different growth building blocks as outlined on the page. The first building block you see is Scandinavia. Here, we expect continued margin improvement, driven by improved staffing versus sales development, the exit of unprofitable contracts and adjustments to overhead and support and central functions. The middle bar in the graph represents the annual EBITDA improvement generated by our set growth model, which combines organic growth with capacity, bolt-on acquisitions, higher occupancy and operational efficiency as well as scale benefits.

And the third building block is active capital allocation. This is supported by our strong free cash flow and our asset-light growth model, where we see continued opportunities to enhance shareholder value. So our first building block is restoring margins in Scandinavia. What you see here at the bottom of this page is the reported net sales and EBITDA that we have in our reports. And at the top, we have the Attendo core operations, which excludes the ended and ending contracts. And the ambition here is to show you both the impact of the exits, but also how the underlying and remaining core operations are doing. In Q4, the ongoing margin recovery showed promise with the team working to improve ways of working, responding faster to changing in manning and sales while also exiting nonstrategic outsourcing and nonsustainable home care contracts.

So what's worth noting is that the Attendo core operations, excluding the ended and ending contracts, showed a net sales growth of 8.3% and a margin of 5.1% in the quarter. At the same time, the contracts which have ended or will end has a large impact on net sales, down SEK 163 million versus last year, but very limited impact on our EBITDA and a testament to our chosen strategy to focus on our core operations. To further illustrate our balanced sustainable growth strategy, let me take you through the second building block, where we show the EBITDA growth components embedded in our growth model and which is something we have been following for the last few years and will continue to follow. We start with adding new capacity through greenfield developments. Here, we see ample opportunities across both geographies and care segments.

On average, we expect to add at least 2% to more than 3% in net new capacity per year with a corresponding contribution to EBITDA growth, a slight increase versus our development in the last years and the target we've had of adding about 2% new capacity. Bolt-on acquisitions, a core skill for us, are expected to provide an additional contribution of at least 2% to annual EBITDA growth, also a target we have been able to deliver on in the past few years. The next lever is occupancy, a key driver of profitability improvement. Our assumption is that we can continue to increase occupancy by an average per year of 1 percentage point. This improvement is expected to contribute at least the same amount of EBITDA growth. While average occupancy has improved over the past years to 88%, we still see clear potential towards 92%, which is also more in line with historical levels.

On unit level, higher occupancy also improves productivity and combined with new digital tools as we have introduced and shown before during this presentation as well as more standardized ways of working across the group should further support margin expansion and earnings growth. Growth also enables scale benefits in overhead and support functions, which is expected to be EBITDA accretive over time. Finally, we assume annual inflation compensation through price increases, which is in line with what we've seen in the past and which will also have a positive drop-through to EBITDA. Taken together, these levers support an EBITDA growth of at least 10% per year.

So Attendo's free cash flow. Attendo runs an asset-light model, a model which we don't aim to change. In practice, this means that we generally do not own the facilities we operate. Instead, we lease them over a long time horizon, which allows for a lower initial CapEx investment for new homes as well as natural ongoing maintenance for wear and tear. In addition, we have a solid and predictable payment process with financially strong payers and payment terms in line with public sector practice. As a result, we have a high free cash flow conversion, which provides confidence that we can sustain our growth model of both investing in a high pace of new openings while also adding value-accretive M&As and at the same time, sustain a high pace of continued share buybacks and active capital allocation.

So on the back of the expected gradual demographic shift towards more people in need of care, we are starting to scale up our investments in pipeline as we foresee more elderly will be need of care over the next 15 years. Our pipeline of projects, as shown on the slide, consists of both sites under construction, i.e. the shovel is in the ground, as well as signed lease agreements for projects to be built and where we expect to commence construction during the next 12 months. In total, after Q4, we had 1,250 in new capacity in pipeline with more than 85% to 90% expected to open during the next 2 years, and we are now starting to add projects for both 2028 and 2029.

Important to note is that the new projects follow our sustainable growth strategy, we target to open in attractive locations where we forecast a strong need for demand, where there's a good payer relationship and the buying mechanism in place. Also important is that the location provides good commute options for both staff and relatives and that there is an overall growing population. A growing population, we believe, is important to ensure availability over staff over time. Another key component is M&A, which we believe is a core skill of our company, and we have a dedicated central team with local presence across our markets. And over the last few years, we have acquired 28 companies, of which majority has been smaller bolt-ons.

Looking ahead, we still see good opportunities to deliver on our strategy of acquiring at least 2% EBITDA growth per year in our markets, where we see Finland providing the best opportunities due to a more fragmented market and targets available in all segments. That said, Scandinavia also provides many opportunities in our segments, while the nursing home segment, well there, the targets are very limited. As mentioned earlier, a key lever to drive our adjusted EPS is active capital allocation and continued share buybacks. Since we initiated our continued share buybacks, we have bought more than 10% of shares equal to 5% per annum.

Going forward, we continue with the same ambition of continued share buybacks over the financial plan period 2026 to 2028, of course, subject to AGM and Board approval. To summarize, these are our updated financial targets for the period 2026 to 2028. We're updating the EPS target while leaving our other financial targets unchanged. Our leverage target measured as adjusted net debt to adjusted EBITDA remains at between 1.5 to 2.5x. We may temporarily exceed 2.5x, for example, in connection with the larger acquisition, while maintaining a disciplined approach to capital allocation.

We also maintain our dividend policy with the aim to distribute 30% of adjusted net profit. Our intention is to combine the dividend with a recurring share buyback program, supported by our free and strong free cash flow. Overall, we believe that our solid financial position, strong customer focus and ability to provide local authorities with cost-effective and high-quality care, while at the same time, addressing increasingly complex care needs. This, we believe, positions Attendo well for the future. Thank you.

Thank you, Mikael. Well, before we wrap this up with our Q&A session, I am happy to welcome back on stage, Martin Tiveus for his final remarks. Please, Martin.

Many thanks, and thank you, Josefine. I will end the presentation with some closing remarks before we move into the Q&A. As you all know, we recently presented the updated financial targets for 2028. And after 12 consecutive quarters of earnings growth, I believe we're still uniquely positioned for continued profitable growth. Attendo is a market leader in structurally growing politically stable markets where we provide proven value to both individuals and public payers. The margin recovery from the pandemic and the regulatory reset in Finland is largely complete with occupancy still improving. We have strong cash flow, allowing for both organic and acquisition-driven growth, and we combine growth with active capital allocation and strong earnings distribution. To summarize, we operate in essential services for society with structural demand tailwinds. We have restored profitability, and we have built a proven model for repeatable growth, and we do return capital to shareholders while we grow. Thank you for listening.

And by that, we open up for Q&A.

Yes. Let's open up for some Q&A, and you have been very, very active in posting questions. You can still post your questions, and we will try to manage as many as possible. Before we start, I would like Virpi, Malin and Mikael to join the stage, so everyone is here to answer questions. And yes, with everybody on stage, let's start with the first question, and then we just go ahead. I think I start from the bottom. Possibly some of the questions might have been answered during the presentation, but we'll see. Yes, the first one here is from Kristofer Liljeberg. If you were to look at the 130 municipalities using private care, how many are left versus right weighing government when you're not weighted by population?

Totally, we have about -- if you look at the share of care, it's about 45% -- that -- in the municipalities that we are in. And if you look at the share of left winter coalition-driven municipalities, it's also about 45%.

Okay. Thank you. So -- and any follow-ups, if you don't really feel like we are answering your question, feel free to post an e-mail afterwards. But I think that was pretty much spot on answering the question. Well, continuing with Julia Angeli Strand, a question from her. How much are ended ending contracts weighing on the Scandinavian margin? When do you expect to be fully exited from them? And what is a fair margin for the Scandinavian operations once margins are restored? Maybe for you, Mikael.

Yes. Thank you, Julia. So unfortunately, we will not comment on the margins per se, as you know. But as we could also see in the graph, the ending contracts are not really any -- we were adding value. So as you can see, the margin was basically flat and a couple of 0.3 to 0.4 percentage points difference there if we exclude them. as shown in the graph. We believe that the majority of the exits will be concluded during 2026 with some small remnants also in 2027.

Thank you, Mikael. Let's post another one from Julia while we have the speed up. She's wondering, are you seeing any encouraging signs in Denmark following the new elderly care legislation that would make you interested in expanding there? If not, where do you expect clear signs to emerge? When do you expect clear signs to emerge? Maybe, Martin, you can start and Mikael, fill up.

Yes, it's still a bit too early. The latest amendment to the legislation in Denmark came last summer. We are now decided to try that out to see how it works in practice and to do that during the course of 2026, we are actually currently sort of testing the regulation, and we'll see how that plays out. But I think we'll take at least during the course of 2026.

Okay. Thank you. And we had another question on Denmark in Norway. And that question was basically, one, why did you exit Norway? And two, didn't you say that you partly exited Denmark? How should we understand that this.

Yes, we did partly exit Denmark. If we start with Norway, we decided to exit Norway in 2021 for reasons of political stability in the market. And that was sort of the -- we only had nursing homes in elderly care nursing homes in Norway. So we thought it was not viable to continue to grow and operate in Norway given the political landscape at that point. If we look at Denmark, -- we have been in Denmark for 20 years, something like that. And it's been a challenging market to be in.

And we've been in a couple of different subsegments. We've been running home care in Denmark. We've been running joint ventures with local municipalities in Denmark and so forth. When the new legislation came, it was a legislation that all of a sudden looked a bit more promising, but it was only valid for elderly care nursing homes owned operated, built after 2019. So we decided to keep and expand that little segment and divest everything else that was also loss-making. So to summarize, now we have a much more cleaner but very much smaller Danish business, but also with good potential given how we see legislation playing out.

Thank you, Martin. A question to you, Virpi. Do we have the lifestyle building concepts in Finland as well? Yes, do we have the lifestyle building concept in Finland as well?

So a very short answer, no. And perhaps the reason for that is that we don't have freedom of choice. So that's why we don't have.

Okay. Thank you very much. And how large proportion of the new homes in Sweden is lifestyle concepts? Do we have that number, Malin?

All nursing homes built after 2012 has a lifestyle concept and around 75% of our own operations.

Okay. Thank you very much. Well, another question connected to our strategy. I think it's mainly for Martin and Mikael. What are the key changes compared to your previous growth strategy when you refer to a more balanced and asset-light approach, referring to the Slide 38. Yes, I guess it depends on what you think is the previous growth strategy.

Well, the current growth strategy, which we call internally for the balanced growth strategy we've had for the past 4 years, which has served us well. The idea with that is to have a less risky growth focused on own operations only in well for regions and municipalities where we have a buying mechanism ready, where there is an existing contracts and where the demographics are right, not only for elderly care, but also for working population. And fourthly, that we open in a balanced manner, meaning that we have an even opening pace year-over-year that allows us to retain margin levels as we grow. So that is essentially what we call the balanced growth model. I must say that the previous growth was more -- was a bit more aggressive than that.

Yes. Thank you very much, Martin. We're moving on. I mean you're on fire, especially our analysts, but keep the questions coming. We have plenty of time to answer them. Let's see what's coming next. A question from Bjorn Olsson also directed to Martin and Mikael. Given that public finances is forecasted to be under continued pressure while demographic trends increase the need for elderly care, how do you, number one, estimate the risk that compensation per user will be lower in the future, perhaps by not increasing the price with inflation? And number two, plan to mitigate should price cost put pressure on margins through a lower compensation.

Well, first of all, we have price compensation mechanisms in most of the contracts, all in all contracts in Finland and most of the contracts in Sweden, except for the freedom of choice areas, where we get -- there's an index clause based basically on what's called care price index clause based on seller agreements and KPI. So that is safeguarding the continuous increase of price versus cost. And that has served pretty well if you look over time. Then -- but I think that one of our best umbrellas for that kind of range is that we provide a better care at a lower cost to society. And if they would undercompensate us, then private operators will stop investing in new capacity. And it will be even more expensive for local politics for local municipalities or welfare regions to produce themselves. And I think that is something that the public payers realize.

Yes. Thank you very much. Another question from Julia Angeli Strand. You have a fairly concentrated portfolio, which has proven to perform well. But do you wait being more focused in Finland and elderly care versus being more diverse across geographies and services, including expanding social services in Sweden and Finland. Very specific question.

Very specific question. We are trying to maintain diversity within the countries. And we think that Finland and Sweden are the most attractive markets in the Nordics to start with. Having said that, of course, elderly care is growing with such a sort of demographic pressure. So that means also that we have to open and acquire within other segments to keep pace, you might say, and keep the shares. The acquisition of Team Olivia was one of those, but we are continually looking for both organic and inorganic opportunities to grow the other segments to try to keep that balance.

Okay. Thank you very much. Then we have 4 questions from Philip [ Ekengren ], I think we'll take them. I will not read all 4. I will start with the first one. Where do you see the greatest potential for future M&A, Sweden or Finland and which segment, elderly care or social care?

Well, what do you Finland is a bit more fragmented in all segments. It's also that the building bureaucracy in Finland is much better than the Swedish one, meaning that it's actually cheaper to build in Finland. Also, units are typically a bit smaller. That means also that there are more companies that can afford to open new units and also within nursing home segments. So we have a more fragmented landscape in Finland, also that you can build actually anywhere. That means also that there's more opportunities within M&A. Having said that, there are also a lot of opportunities in Sweden, just not within the nursing home segment. Do you want to complement?

Yes, do you want to add anything. Everyone is happy, at least we are happy with the answer. If you are not, please post us afterwards in an e-mail. Well, given that occupancy levels are back at pre-Finland expansion levels seen in 2017, do you still see opportunities to drive earnings growth through higher utilization? Or do you expect it to mainly be driven through opening of new units going forward?

Well, I think I mean we are -- we have a history of been operating at around 92% occupancy previously. So we expect us to at least go back to that point. We think -- so that means that we have another 45% occupancy to gain. So there is still runway still. And as Mikael presented our growth model, we have assumed at least 1% occupancy growth per annum, which we think is probably on the conservative side rather than aggressive. But there is still opportunities. Then having said that, when we reach 92%, there is still a lot of room to grow in terms of both organic and M&A-driven growth in all our segments.

Okay. Thank you. Question number 3 from Philip [ Ekengren ]. It's a question about the staffing requirements in Finland. So perhaps maybe you want to start and Martin fill in. Given the lower staffing requirements in Finland and constrained Finnish finances, do you see risk that it will be challenging to raise prices at the same pace as salary costs going forward?

As Martin said, we have the price mechanism in our current contracts. So that gives us a little bit kind of confidence that we get the salary increases in our prices. And what about the staff ratio? What was the question was there?

It was basically given the lower staffing requirements and constrained Finnish finances, do you see a risk that it will be challenging to raise prices given that it will match.

Of course, always it's a challenge to get the inflation and salary increases in the price part that's why the contracts are plays such an important role that we have good contracts in place.

Yes. Maybe we could mention something about we have in our pre-calls approaching the Q4, there were some questions about the salary levels in Finland. But now the contracts are negotiated and done, right?

Yes. Yes. Yes. And all in all, this year, the salary increases are to -- at end of 3.5% and next year, 2.7% -- and the salary increases are coming in valid in September this year and the following year September, which is good for us because it's at the end of the year. So we get the price increases kind of faster to effect against the salary increases.

And we get the price increases in January based on last year's.

Last year's salary increases. So this works better for us actually than the previous contract.

Crystal clear. Thank you very much. First question, that's about cost savings. And the question is, what year-over-year cost savings do you expect from the new speech-to-text documentation app once it's fully rolled up. I guess Virpi can maybe start and then Mikael will in.

There is a legislation ongoing regarding the technology in Finland. At the moment, it's stuck. But in the legislation, you are allowed to count technology in staff ratio, but you can't go below 0.6. All our contracts are based on 0.6. So at this point, we don't get directly benefits in our -- directly to our last line, so to say, with speech to tech. But that said, it has much other benefits. It has better recording. -- document recording will -- quality will be improved. Also the staffing -- staff will be more satisfied because they tend to spend more time with the customers.

And also as the studies showed, they feel less stress. And we know that the shortage of staff will come in the future. So we also need to invest in technology and operating models that makes our staff more satisfied. So -- but we don't see what happens in coming years. So we don't know what happens with technology and will it be accounted to station in the future? We don't know. But we see so many other benefits with this technology that we will take it broader in use.

So just add on that. I think there's also a difference between Finland and Sweden, for example. So Malin all these speech-to-text pilots that you're running in Sweden as well, there -- we have a slightly different business case on or potential business case rolling out, right? -- as the nurses can -- that uses it, if they save 45 minutes an hour every day, they can actually use that time to visit more customers.

May I also add that with this technology, we can have other user cases, but we need this technology first in order to say other user cases. So that's also one reason why we want to invest in this technology or this user case.

Yes. I just add, I mean, it's still a pilot.

It's...

But obviously, the benefits would be in the indirect side. I mean we are a people-driven company. So less attrition, more satisfied employees will mean that more people will actually want to work with us. More satisfied customers likely will lead to better payer relationships as well. So there are many and more customers in the end. So there are many indirect effects as well, which we look forward to continuing to follow as we roll it out.

Then the more -- of course, the more immediate effects of working with AI to save time for administrative work is being seen at headquarter functions and support functions where we can scale a lot faster. We can save hundreds of thousands of hours on support functions and headquarter functions just working with these tools. So that's a more immediate effect that enables us to further scale and save support costs as we grow.

Okay. Anything more to add? That was a question that we really sort of topic indeed. Another question on the balanced growth approach. Should we assume that more balanced growth approach imply that you will be able to deliver annual sales growth in line with the market growth of around 5%, looking at you, Mikael.

If we exclude the acquisition side, that's the levels that we're targeting, yes, correct.

Thank you. Also, let's see a question on the margin improvements in Scandinavia was the bullet #1 in the EPS plan. First, the 3 questions in that topic. And the first one is, can you describe the support function overhead adjustments? And I guess, Martin, you were touching upon it.

Yes, I was touching pointed. So it's about working smarter, using digitalization and AI tools and so forth, but also making sure that we automize processes continuously to scale better. And that is something we do in basically all support functions, not to be too specific. But it's definitely visible in the numbers, both if you look at the last year's -- last 12 months performance, but also what we expect forward in 2026.

I guess we also -- we focus a lot on simplification. So I mean, any organization over time that I've been at least starts to add things and sometimes you forget to take away things. So we try to take away as much clutter as we can that doesn't add value to the operations, which also then frees up time and with frees up time, allows us to focus on more value-adding activities.

Yes. And going -- looking into the future as part of the plan, there is economies of scale also as we grow, right? Martin, you tend to talk about that as well.

Yes. I mean we -- and we certainly don't need more of us if we add more units. I think during my 8 years here, we have about double the size of the company, but -- and I think we're -- we're not any more people on headquarter functions, the same amount of people for double the size. I think that's a sort of very visible sign of scalability.

Yes. Then we have 2 pretty specific questions. I'll try to post them and see if we get an answer. Also on the support function and overhead adjustment topic. The first one is how can we expect the efficiency initiatives to improve margins? And secondly, are effects to be seen already 2026 or later in the plan?

So I think we already saw effects of that in Q4 in Scandinavia, and we expect those to have full effect during 2026, potentially some additional in 2027.

Okay. Thank you. Perfectly. Crystal clear. Kristofer Liljeberg posted another question here about the building block for 10% EBITA growth per year. Does this come on top of restoring the Scandinavian margins? Or is it included?

As I think we saw in the graph, there is 2 different building blocks. So one is for the Scandinavian margin recovery and one is for the EBITA growth of 10%. Again, how much is what that we will allow time to show.

Very good. Thank you, Mikael. Another question to Mikael and Martin. How can we expect the increasing pipeline of projects to impact margins in each segment in 2026?

As I think I mentioned with the balanced growth model, the idea of that is to have a steady state of openings. Balance also means that we also want to balance margin as we grow. So open in a way that is slightly behind the demand growth curve to fill up new units fast or within a year, meaning that they will if we open also in a steady pace, not have any tangible margin effect. or margin pressure. So that's the idea of it. Then, of course, it's difficult to exactly time when we open. For example, now in 2026, we will have the majority of the openings in Sweden towards the end of the year, while it's more evenly spread in Sweden, and that also depends on how the building projects are going. So -- but over time, that's the case.

Okay. Anyone want to add or take away something? Hopefully not. Very good. Let's continue then to -- let's see. Well, a valid question given the time about the political sensitivity connected to our kind of operations. Is there a limit to margins you can achieve relative to political sensitivity and risk of changes in revenue models in Sweden and Finland in risk of revenue -- changes in revenue models?

I don't think that we set the bar actually because there are many operators out there. I think most important is that we save money, including our -- I mean, if you look at the around 20% lower cost versus public players that we have in Finland and close to 10% in Sweden on average, that includes our profit, right? Furthermore, it's -- we need that profit part also to keep reinvesting in new capacity. So I think that in essence, it's good for society that we are profitable. We need a certain profitability level to keep investing. And we will keep investing and build that new capacity, that saves even more money for the municipalities and welfare regions. So in a sense, that's good. Then, of course, there might always be a margin level that might stick in die. But we don't guide on margins, as we said. And I don't know if you want to add anything there.

Thank you. Another question on technology, someone who is thinking a bit longer into the future. Do you think Humanoid -- is that how you pronounce it? Humanoids will be a part of private care? Or is that too difficult versus politics and patient preferences? Any other thoughts on this at all?

It's robots.

Yes.

I think that humans will be focused on doing...

Face-to-face.

Care stuff face-to-face, exactly because we're dealing with a lot of sensitive people that really need care. While automation and robotics and so forth will probably be used for everything around it. And that could be everything from medical dispensers to knife surveillance or security or and so forth. But preparing food.

Exactly, cleaning. A lot of things that robots can do, but not the care, not the face-to-face care. I think the hands are quite important still.

Okay. That was actually the final question that was posted in the chat function. As you can see, we're actually magically enough ahead of time. So if you have one more or 2 more questions, we're happy to answer them. So we'll give you just a few seconds to type them in the chat function. No, don't see any more questions coming in. So hence, there are no more questions.

I need this one. Let's see. hence, don't seem to be more questions. We'll see. No, no more questions. We're about to end the Digital Capital Markets Day very soon. This presentation has been recorded, as you know, and you will find it afterwards at attendo.com. And as you can see on the slide, we are more than happy to invite you to our upcoming events. Please keep on joining us. And what's -- the only thing left now is for me to thank you so much for being with us this afternoon, and I know it's a really sincere thank you on behalf of Attendo and the full team. It's been a great pleasure meeting you all today. Thank you, and goodbye.

Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you.

Welcome to Attendo Q4 report 2025. [Operator Instructions]

Now I will hand the conference over to CEO, Martin Tiveus; and CFO, Mikael Malmgren. Please go ahead.

Thank you, and good morning, everyone. Today we present Attendo's results for the fourth quarter and for full year 2025. In short, I'm happy with how we ended the year in both our key markets with a continued positive trajectory in Finland and the expected margin uplift in Scandinavia.

The result is mainly driven by increased occupancy, more accurate staffing planning and a continued clear focus on quality and stability in operations. Overall, I believe we're well positioned to continue investing in both our people, quality, and capacity to meet the growing need for care in society.

I will start by giving a general update of the development in the quarter, then our CFO, Mikael Malmgren, will take you through the financials in more detail.

Next slide, please. So let me start with the key highlights from the quarter. We delivered a strong quarter with continued improvements across both financial performance and quality. Satisfaction was maintained or increased in all stakeholder groups and reached an all-time high in relative satisfaction. This confirms that our operational improvements are translating into both higher quality and stronger financial outcomes.

Net sales amounted to SEK 4.8 billion, down 2% year-on-year. However, underlying performance remained solid. Adjusted for ended contracts, divestments and currency effects, net sales grew by a healthy 5%, reflecting improved volumes and operational momentum.

Occupancy continue to improve and remains a key value driver. It increased by 1 percentage point sequentially and 3 percentage points year-on-year, supporting both revenue growth and margin expansion.

Lease adjusted EBITA increased by 53% to SEK 343 million compared to SEK 225 million last year. The improvement was driven by continued progress in both business areas. In Finland, we sustained our positive trajectory, supported by higher occupancy, solid operational efficiency, and a gradually improving geographical footprint. In Scandinavia, we delivered the expected margin uplift in the fourth quarter, primarily driven by increased occupancy in our own operated nursing homes, combined with efficiency improvements in support and central functions.

Overall, we delivered an adjusted EPS of SEK 6 per share for the period and ended the year with a strong cash flow exceeding SEK 1 billion. This provides financial flexibility and supports continued investments in new capacity. Currently, we have around 800 new care places under construction.

Finally, during the fourth quarter, we surpassed next year's EPS target. And as a result, we will today present an updated financial target, which I will return to later in the presentation.

Next slide, please. So we'll start by looking at the development of some of our nonfinancial KPIs. I cannot stress enough the importance of pairing strong financial performance with high, consistent, and stable satisfaction across all our stakeholder groups.

I am particularly happy to see relative satisfaction reaching its highest level ever this quarter, 51 compared to 44 in Q4 last year as a result of an increased focus on relatives in 2025.

In Finland, open meetings for relatives have been arranged all over the country. And in Sweden, more and more people are using a relative app, Nara. In the relative app, family members can follow the everyday life of loved one in a nursing home, connect with staff, and stay in tune with activities and health plans.

Next slide, please. Occupancy increased in both business areas during the quarter, main drivers being more sold beds in combination with closed capacity. In Finland, the work to strengthen relations with the welfare regions lead the results in terms of higher occupancy.

Furthermore, we opened 1 new nursing home in Finland during the quarter and started construction of another 7 new homes. In Scandinavia, we started construction of 2 new homes during the quarter, bringing the total number of beds under construction to above 800.

Next slide, please. So let's turn to the development of our rolling 12-month lease adjusted EBITA margin. During the quarter, we managed to improve margins in both business areas, delivering a rolling 12-month lease adjusted EBITA margin of 6.7% by the end of the year, a clear improvement from 5.4% last year.

While we have seen a steadily improving margin trajectory in Finland for many consecutive quarters, I am pleased to show that we delivered the expected margin uplift in Scandinavia in Q4. In Scandinavia, we have exited several outsourcing and home care contracts with poor terms over the past year, and we can now look forward to a stronger focus on own operations in our key segments. From this point onwards, we expect Scandinavia to continue to improve, driven by increasing occupancy and improving operational efficiency.

With that, I hand over to our CFO, Mikael Malmgren. Please go ahead, Mikael.

Thank you, Martin, and good morning, everyone. In the quarter, we saw underlying growth in both business areas, approximately plus 3% in Finland and plus 8% in Sweden. However, growth was offset by ended and ending contracts in Sweden and FX headwinds, which resulted in reported net sales decreasing 2% to SEK 4.8 million.

In Scandinavia, the growth was down 1% reported or minus SEK 53 million, while underlying growth, excluding ended and ending contracts was 8.3% when also including the recent Framja acquisition. Ending and ended contracts will continue to weigh on sales throughout 2026. In Finland, growth was plus 2.5% or SEK 65 million in local currency and plus 3.6% excluding divestments. Improvement largely driven by an increase in net new customers compared to same quarter last year with a good development in own nursing homes.

Acquisitions and divestments done during the year in both Sweden and Finland added a net SEK 44 million in growth. Currency had, as expected, a larger negative net sales effect of close to 3%. And based on our current euro-SEK trading, we expect to see a similar effect in the coming quarter.

Next slide, please. The reported result improved to SEK 494 million. Correspondingly, the lease adjusted EBITA increased from SEK 225 million to SEK 343 million, up 53% versus same period last year and our strongest Q4 result to date.

Lease adjusted EBITA in Scandinavia was SEK 40 million higher than last year. Last year, Scandinavia's result was impacted by SEK 13 million integration costs. At the same time this year, ending home care contracts had a nonrecurring negative impact on results of approximately SEK 5 million, which equals to SEK 10 million lower result compared to same period last year. Finland lease adjusted EBITA improved SEK 97 million, excluding FX effects. Currency had a SEK 17 million reported and a SEK 12 million negative effect on lease adjusted EBITA.

Next slide, please. Growth to Attendo Finland was plus 3.6% excluding divestments and FX effects and minus 2% reported due to a weaker euro. Lease adjusted EBITA was SEK 270 million, an improvement of SEK 85 million or plus SEK 97 million, excluding currency effect compared to last year.

The quarter improved by more sold beds in primarily owned nursing homes, but also continued improved manning on the back of continued investments in staff development, working conditions, and support systems. The result was further improved by a better geographical footprint.

The quarter also had approximately SEK 50 million positive seasonality effect due to the timing of Liberation Day versus last year. At the end of the quarter, we opened 1 new nursing home unit with 89 beds. And during 2026, we plan to exit a few more low or no occupancy units, which will lead to further improved occupancy and productivity. At the same time, we're now scaling up our investments with confirmed plans to add 580 in additional capacity during 2026.

Next slide, please. In Scandinavia, underlying net sales growth was plus 8.3%, driven by growth in own nursing homes as well as our recent acquisition. However, total net sales growth was offset by ended and ending contracts.

Lease adjusted EBITA was SEK 96 million, an improvement of SEK 40 million versus last year, driven by own operations and improved central costs. Ended and ending outsourcing contracts had no material impact on the result.

However, the result was slightly negatively affected by home care exits, where these contracts generated approximately SEK 5 million in losses. At the same time, previous period was impacted negatively by integration costs of SEK 13 million. Going forward, we still foresee some minor negative effects in Q1 next year from the home care contract exits.

As stated in the last Q3 report, we were not fully satisfied with the results and that Scandinavia has more to give. As such, we are pleased to see that the improvements of set actions show in the results in the quarter.

Finally, in Scandinavia, which has had a higher rate of openings in the last 18 months, has a further 220 places under construction and more planned, which I will come back to later in the presentation.

Next slide, please. This is a new slide, which breaks out the ended and ending contracts within outsourcing as well as home care exits. At the bottom, we have the reported numbers in terms of net sales and EBITA, while at the top, we have the Attendo business, which we call our core operations, where the ended and ending contracts have been excluded. The ambition with this is to show you both the impact of the exits as well as better showcase how the underlying and remaining core operations is doing.

As we mentioned before, Attendo Scandinavia margin uplift showed promise in Q4, where the team is working to further improve our ways of working, faster responding to changes in manning and sales, while simultaneously exiting nonstrategic outsourcing contracts and exiting non-sustainable home care contracts.

As you can see on the slide, Attendo operations, our core, which excludes ended and ending contracts, show a net sales growth of 8.3% and a margin of 5.1% in the quarter. At the same time, the contracts which have ended or will end has significant impact on overall net sales, down SEK 163 million, but limited impact on our EBITA and a testament to our chosen strategy.

Next slide, please. On the back of an expected gradual demographic shift towards more people in need of care, we are starting to scale up our investments. This is on the back, as I mentioned, of an expected gradual and sequential demographic shift with more elderly in need of care over the next 10 to 15 years.

Our pipeline of projects, as shown on the slides, consists of both sites under construction, i.e., what we call shovel in the ground as well as signed lease agreements for projects to be built and where we expect to commence construction during the next 12 months. In total, we now have 1,250 added capacity in pipeline with more than 85% to 90% expected to open during the next 2 years, but we are also now starting to add projects for 2028.

Important to note is that the pipeline follow our strategy to open in locations where we forecast a strong need for our services, a good payer relationship, and a buying mechanism in place. Also importantly, that it provides good commute options for both staff and relatives as well as an overall growing population. A growing population, we believe, is important to ensure availability of staff.

Next slide, please. Today, I'm happy to introduce an updated table on our cash flow generation. With this, we aim to both better show our actual rent payments that flow out, which sometimes are somewhat difficult to capture under the IFRS 16 standard and also show the cash flow we have available to us as a firm, i.e., free cash flow to firm.

As you will note, the rent payments under IFRS 16 have been moved up to show that they in reality impact the operating cash flow. While under the IFRS standard, the lease agreements are treated as debt where you have to pay an interest on the lease liability as well as a principal, i.e., amortization of the lease liability, which lowers the debt on the balance sheet, while in reality, when you add these together, they equal the actual rent paid.

With that, let's dive into the numbers. Overall, our free cash flow to firm showed strong resilience and improved to SEK 1,179 million on a rolling 12-month basis and SEK 560 million in Q4 compared to SEK 462 million same period last year.

During the quarter, we repurchased SEK 150 million worth of shares. And today, we can report that we reached our target mandate from last report of buying back SEK 200 million worth of shares by the time of this Q4 report.

As a result of the last 2 years, since the initiation of our continued share buyback program back in February 2024, we have repurchased approximately 10% of outstanding shares. And in line with our financial plan of continued buybacks, we're happy to announce our next repurchase program. Program aims to repurchase an additional SEK 200 million worth of shares until next quarterly report in May, ahead of the AGM.

Next slide, please. Over the last 12 months, we have continued to deliver on our set 2024 to 2026 financial plan and a more active capital allocation. As a result, we have utilized close to 60% of our free cash flow for dividend and more importantly, continued share buybacks.

In addition, we have continued to add high-quality value-accretive bolt-ons, firstly, in Finland in Q1 this year and in Sweden during Q3. And at the same time, we divested our nonstrategic child welfare business in Finland. And finally, we continue to improve our net debt.

Looking ahead, we aim to continue with our strategy of adding further value-accretive bolt-ons of at least 2% to 3% of additional EBITA growth on average per year and subject to AGM and Board approval to continue our quarterly buyback programs.

Next slide, please. Let's have a look at our key financial metrics. If we start at the top left, the adjusted earnings per share improved by SEK 0.68 per share, up 69% versus last year. Improvement primarily due to higher lease adjusted EBITA and further supported by both reduced financing costs and continued share buybacks.

If we turn to the top right figure and our lease adjusted margin in percent, adjusted for nonrecurring items in 2024, we continue to improve our lease adjusted EBITA margin. In Q4, the rolling 12-month margin was 6.7%, up 1.3 percentage points compared to Q4 last year. If we look at the bottom left figure, our lease adjusted net debt-to-EBITA ratio was 1.1x, and down 0.6x compared to same quarter last year.

And finally, if we look at the figure on the bottom right, net interest expenses in the quarter was SEK 26 million, SEK 10 million better than same period last year and SEK 28 million lower on a rolling 12-month basis.

With that, I hand over to you, Martin.

Thank you, Mikael. As we enter 2026, we do so from a position of strength. Strong financial performance is paired with high and stable quality across our operations. Customer satisfaction remains high in our care services and relative satisfaction is at all-time high. This confirms the resilience and sustainability of our operating model.

During the year, we have exited and continue to exit several noncore care contracts. At the same time, we have further strengthened our geographical footprint by gradually leaving less attractive areas and opening new units in locations with stronger long-term demand and better economics.

In Finland, we continue to see positive margin trajectory. And in Scandinavia, we initiated expected margin uplift in the fourth quarter, making an important step in the turnaround of the region.

For 2025, we delivered an adjusted EPS of SEK 6 per share, well above next year's adjusted EPS target and represents an increase of approximately 50% compared to the previous year. Our strong financial results enables increased investments in new capacity to meet the growing demands for care in society. Currently, we have around 800 new care beds under construction. Based on this strong performance and financial position, the Board intends to propose a dividend of SEK 1.80 per share alongside continued share buybacks.

Next slide, please. With that, we conclude Q4 in 2025 and move forward into new financial targets for 2026 and beyond. Since the end of 2022, we have improved our adjusted earnings per share significantly. After having concluded the first phase of our turnaround plan in 2023, we announced a new financial plan in the beginning of 2024 with a target to deliver more than 80% earnings per share growth by 2026.

As you can see in the graph, we exceeded the target during the fourth quarter, delivering 100% EPS growth over the past 2 years. Hence, we now enter the next phase for Attendo with updated financial targets for 2026 to 2028.

Next slide, please. To begin with, we will continue to execute on our strategy with a clear focus on combining healthy financial performance and balanced growth with high-quality care operations and strong stakeholder satisfaction.

Our priority remains balanced asset-light organic growth in our existing markets, complemented by selective and margin-accretive bolt-on acquisitions in both Scandinavia and Finland. Supported by demographic trends and broader societal developments, we see strong underlying demand growth for elderly care in the Nordic region, alongside a steadily increasing demand for specialized functional care over the next 15 to 20 years. Against this backdrop, we're introducing a new financial target for the period 2026 to 2028 to reach a lease adjusted EPS of at least SEK 9 per share.

Next slide, please. To further illustrate our balanced growth strategy, let me walk you through the EBITA growth opportunities embedded in our growth model. We start with adding new capacity through greenfield developments. Here, we see ample opportunities across both geographies and care segments. And on average, we expect to add around 2% to 3% net new capacity per year with a corresponding contribution to EBITA growth. Bolt-on acquisitions are expected to provide an additional contribution of approximately 2% to annual EBITA growth.

Next lever is occupancy, which is a key driver of profitability improvement. Our assumption is that we can increase occupancy by, on average, at least 1 percentage point per year. This improvement is expected to contribute at least the same amount to EBITA growth. And while average occupancy has improved significantly over the past year to around 88%, we see clear potential to reach at least 92%, in line with historical levels.

On unit level, higher occupancy also improves productivity. Combined with new digital tools and more standardized ways of working across the group, this will further support margin expansion and earnings growth. Growth also enables scale benefits in overhead and support functions, which is expected to be EBITA accretive over time.

Finally, we assume annual inflation compensation through price increases, which should also have a positive drop-through to EBITA. Taken together, these levers supports an EBITA growth of at least 10% per year.

Next slide, please. From our current earnings level, we see several clear building blocks that support our ambition to reach at least SEK 9 per share in lease adjusted EPS by 2028. The first building block is Scandinavia. Here, we expect continued margin restoration driven by improved staffing efficiency, exit of unprofitable contracts and adjustment to overhead in support and central functions.

The middle bar represents the annual EBITA improvement generated by our growth model, as outlined earlier, combining organic capacity growth, bolt-on acquisitions, higher occupancy, operational efficiency, and scale benefits.

The third building block is active capital allocation. Supported by strong free cash flow and our asset-light growth model, we see continued opportunities to enhance shareholder value through share buybacks. Over the past 2 years, we have on average repurchased close to 5% of outstanding shares per year, further supporting EPS growth. We intend to continue the share buybacks in the coming years.

Next slide, please. So to summarize, these are our updated financial targets for the period 2026 to 2028. We are updating the EPS target while leaving our other financial targets largely unchanged. Our leverage target measured at adjusted net debt to adjusted EBITA remains at between 1.5x and 2.5x. We may temporarily exceed 2.5x, for example, in connection with a larger acquisition while maintaining a disciplined approach to capital allocation.

We also maintained our dividend policy of distributing or aiming to distribute 30% of adjusted net profit. Our intention is to combine the dividend with a recurring share buyback program supported by strong free cash flow generation.

Overall, we believe that our solid financial position, strong customer focus and ability to provide local authorities with cost-effective care, while at the same time addressing increasingly complex care needs, position Attendo well for the future.

Finally, earlier today, we sent out an invitation to our Digital Capital Markets Day, which will take place on March 17.

With that, we open up for Q&A. So operator, please go ahead.

[Operator Instructions] The next question comes from Julia Angeli Strand from Handelsbanken.

And firstly, congratulations to a strong report. I'll stick to 3 questions. So firstly, can you quantify what you said on rightsizing central functions in Scandinavia? And are your efforts there done? Or will they continue throughout 2026?

Yes. Thank you, Julia. We did not quantify the exact amount, and we don't have an aim to do that either. However, we do see these effects having a positive effect also in the first 3 quarters of 2026.

Okay. Understood. And then I can see that you have ended or divested beds in both Scandinavia and Finland. Do you have more assets that you want to divest?

Not currently. We only, as we mentioned, have some plans to close down some lower no occupancy units, but no divestments as such.

Okay. And building on that one, how should we look at the pace of occupancy improvements? It feels like occupancy improvements of 1 percentage point quarter-over-quarter seems a lot given that Q4 has a lot of holidays. Is that durable pace? Or is that just an effect that you closed beds during this quarter?

I think occupancy development, I mean, it has, I think, few things to bear in mind. I mean, in Finland, the lower staffing ratio that was introduced in 2025 should also mean a reduced pressure on public finances, which we anticipated could lead to better occupancy situation, and it also -- has also materialized during 2025. But we also, in Scandinavia have been opening new units in attractive location. And of course, also that helps out also to build up occupancy.

As I said, I mean, with the growth model, we have simulated sort of the importance of 1% occupancy growth per annum and the effect that will have on EBITA growth and also productivity. And we still believe that we should be able to long term go up to at least 92% on average. So it's another 4 percentage points to go. Then how fast this will go, we'll have to see.

The next question comes from Kristofer Liljeberg from Carnegie.

Starting on your comments, it seems you wanted to open a bit more beds. And just to clarify what you said, you have total now beds in project of 1,250 or so. Did you say that you expect to open 85% to 90% of these within 2 years? And if you could comment on expected number of openings in 2026?

Yes, that's correct, what you said, we expect 85% to 90% in next 2 years, and they are fairly evenly split between the years.

Okay. Great. And if we look a little bit further ahead, what do you think is a good number of openings? Would you like to expand that even further? Or is that a good level for the years after 2026 as well?

I mean we have a sort of rolling 3-year planning horizon in terms of our building up openings. But then we have a very long-term plan, of course, as well. But if we look at the demographic growth and the expected demand growth and capacity needs in both Finland and Sweden, you can see that we have somewhat raised our openings target. If you look at our growth model, we used to have 2% organic growth. Now we have 2% to 3% net openings after closures, meaning that likely sort of closer to 3% over the next 2 to 3 years, which is also reflecting a higher demand growth in the market. And that higher demand growth will go on for the next 15 years, if you look at demographics. So it's in plan to increase building pace and capacity growth a bit more than we have done over the past 5 to 10 years.

But still there's --it's early phase, Kristofer, so we don't -- so we follow our model.

Yes. That's good. Then on the margin improvement in Scandinavia, pretty sharp improvement end of the year. Is it possible to quantify in any way what this should mean as a run rate when we start 2026 and then the potential to further improve this in 2026?

Yes. We don't comment on margins, as you know, Kristofer. However, the effects that we have seen in Q4, we expect to continue into 2026 with the improvements from ending contracts, the support staff improvement of cost base as well as some operational efficiency and acquisitions.

And finally on the margin when it comes to Finland, you didn't mention margin improvement in Finland as a driver for EPS. So you have done a great job, of course, in the last couple of years there. But do you expect Finnish margin to be more flattish now going forward? Or do you see further potential there?

If you look at the largest segment in Finland, which is the nursing home segment, which is more than 70% of business, we believe that we are a bit more sort of -- we are through the turnaround phase and reach a more stable phase in terms of margin development in Finland. Then of course, I mean, continued occupancy improvement from this level will, of course, also have an effect. We also have a drop-through on margins, of course.

The next question comes from Bjorn Olsson from SEB.

Just a follow-up on the expansion question then. So let's assume that you open roughly 1,200 new beds in the next 2 years. That equals roughly 3% of new capacity each year. How much of a margin pressure will that add, do you expect in the short run?

Yes. Again, thank you, Bjorn. It could have a slight margin pressure in 2027, of course. But overall, we see a slightly higher opening in Finland, where the fill up is generally a bit faster as we open slightly smaller homes. This is also a level, if you look at it, around 600 per annum in terms of net new beds that we believe that we can fill in a quite quick pace and then have a very limited effect on margin. So that's the idea with our -- what we call the balanced growth strategy is to grow in a balanced way, meaning overall with sustained margins.

Okay. Clear. And then just on your debt side, I mean, you clearly have a debt that's way below your targeted level. And you mentioned potential for larger acquisitions. Could you give any flavor on sort of if it's in any particular area you're looking at or sort of what would be accretive in your mind?

We are continuously doing accretive acquisitions. I think we made around 70 acquisitions since I started in the company 7 years ago. In Finland, the market is still somewhat fragmented in all segments. So we do acquisitions in Finland across the board, across all our 3 major segments. In Sweden, there are no nursing homes to buy because it's largely only us and [ Ambea ] building nursing homes in Sweden. But there are still a very vivid M&A market on both disabled care and individual and family care in Sweden.

The next question comes from Philip Ekengren from ABGSC.

I just have a couple of follow-ups, and you might have answered this, and I apologize if that's the case. But just on Finland, obviously, strong margins here, and you highlighted some more accurate staffing procedures. Do you see further room for improvement on that part of the margin improvement?

I think we've managed to reach a very high efficiency in terms of staffing and planning. We have done a lot of improvements, both in digital tools and procedures in Finland, adapting to the -- we've been practicing a lot with changing staffing requirements basically every year over the past 4, 5 years in Finland. So I think we're getting better and better on it. And I think that now we reach an efficiency level that is on a good level in Finland. I don't expect any more drastic improvements from this level on in terms of efficiency.

Make sense. Good answer. And then on occupancy, there were some questions earlier on this. But I mean, obviously, clear improvements here. What is a good occupancy level? Do you have a sort of occupancy target in mature units? Can you say anything on that, give any flavor on it?

Yes. The occupancy focus, if you look inside, we will open the lid, you'll see that this is a very regional and local business. In capital areas, both in Finland and Stockholm, occupancy levels are typically 98%, 99% because of -- you have high density of elderly people. You have higher demand growth in larger cities and it's more difficult to find land plots to build capacity. So it's typically more common with undercapacity or over demand in larger cities in capital regions, whereas on smaller cities and country side, it's a bit of the opposite.

So when we -- what we're seeing is when we're gradually optimizing a geographical footprint, it also means that we are -- have been over the past 5, 6 years, gradually every year as leasing contract goes out, exiting selected units in rural areas and then rebuilding new units in larger cities or regional hubs. That also helps improve long term the average occupancy level. So when we say that we're at 88%, and we should target at least 92%, it's because we've been at 92% historically, we know that that's at least where we should come back to. It doesn't mean that that's a roof, but that's our sort of our first occupancy target is to reach 92%.

[Operator Instructions]

Yes. So thank you. We also have a question from the chat to elaborate on the calendar effect referenced in the report, profit was also affected by a positive way by calendar effect. That relates to the timing of Liberation Day in Finland, where if it occurs on a weekday, the staff is also getting 1 day off. However, if it occurs on a weekend, there is no additional vacation day. This year, it on a Saturday. And next year, it will happen on a Sunday.

Yes. there's also a question on elaborating on improved planning, which has benefited margins in Finland and Scandinavia during the quarter. Improved planning, what that means is ability to as quickly as possible, adapt to changes in occupancy on a single unit and how we can use a mix of full-time, part-time and hourly staff and also work more efficiently with staffing post to manage sick leave and so forth. So there, of course, we have a lot of help with our digitalization initiatives that is constantly ongoing to help improve both competence and training of our planning functions, but also the digital tools to help planning.

That seems to be...

There are no more questions at this time. So I hand the conference back to the speakers for closing comments.

Well, with that, I think we conclude the call. Thank you all for listening in and for good questions. And looking forward to see you soon again. Thank you.

Thank you.

Welcome to Attendo Q3 Report 2025. [Operator Instructions] Now I will hand the conference over to CEO, Martin Tivéus; and CFO, Mikael Malmgren. Please go ahead.

Thank you, and good morning, everyone. Today, we present Attendo's results for the third quarter, Attendo's strongest quarter to date. I'll start by giving a general update on the development in the quarter, then our CFO, Mikael Malmgren, will take you through the financials in more detail.

Next slide, please. So let's start with the highlights from the quarter. Again, this is our strongest quarter to date. The development continues to be positive, mainly driven by strong momentum in our Finnish operations and by increased occupancy in nursing homes in both Finland and Scandinavia. Our strong results enables continued investments in quality, technology and method development to further improve our ability to solve complex care needs in a society where more and more people are living longer. Attendo plays an important part of the solution to both current and future care challenges, and we are a close partner to municipalities and welfare regions in the Nordics. Net sales in the quarter was SEK 4.8 billion, a decrease of 2%, while underlying growth, excluding currency effects and ended and exited contracts was positive with 3.5%.

During the quarter, we increased our occupancy by more than 1 percentage point in both business areas, mainly due to more sold beds in the Nursing Home segment. Furthermore, we increased our lease adjusted EBITA by 20% to SEK 482 million, mainly driven by Finland. As earlier communicated, we expect margins to gradually pick up in Scandinavia, supported by ongoing actions to improve performance. Free cash flow in the quarter was very strong, SEK 981 million on a rolling 12-month basis, up SEK 267 million compared to last year. With a 12-month rolling earnings per share of SEK 5.34 after Q3, we are well on track to beat our current 2026 EPS target of at least SEK 5.50 already this year. Hence, we will present new financial targets in conjunction with our year-end report in February.

Next slide, please. If we move to occupancy, we see an upward trend in both business areas. And after Q3, we're at 87%, which is the highest average occupancy level in 8 years. The increase is mainly due to more sold beds in nursing homes in both Finland and Scandinavia. Key drivers being rising demand in Elderly Care and a good cooperation with municipalities and welfare regions. During the quarter, we opened 1 new Nursing Home and 2 new units with -- in Disabled Care.

Next slide, please. During the quarter, we managed to accelerate margin improvement led by strong development in Finland. Total average lease adjusted EBITA margin came in at 6.2% for the quarter. Finland has a very strong momentum, and we expect margins to gradually pick up in Scandinavia from Q4, supported by ongoing actions to improve performance.

And with that, I hand over to Mikael Malmgren, CFO. Please go ahead, Mikael.

Thank you, Martin, and good morning, everyone. In the quarter, we saw underlying growth in both business areas of around 3% to 4%. However, growth was offset by ended outsourcing contracts, home care exits and FX headwind, which resulted in reported net sales decreasing 2% to SEK 4.8 billion. In Scandinavia, the growth was down 4.9% reported, while underlying growth, excluding exiting home care contracts and ending contracts in outsourcing was plus 3.1%. We see continued growth in own nursing homes with more sold beds at the end of the quarter. However, growth was offset by ending outsourcing and exiting home care contracts. Ending and exiting contracts will continue to weigh on sales with a similar impact as this quarter for the subsequent quarters and then gradually weigh less and less throughout the remainder of '26.

In Finland, excluding the divested rehab business December last year and currency, underlying growth was plus 3.7%, improvement largely driven by an increase in net new customers with an especially strong development in our own nursing homes during the quarter. Currency had, as expected, a negative net sales effect of close to 2%. Based on current trading, we should expect similar to slightly higher effect in the coming quarter.

Next slide, please. The reported result improved to SEK 648 million. Correspondingly, the lease adjusted EBITA increased from SEK 402 million to SEK 482 million, up 20% versus same period last year and our strongest Q3 result to date. Lease adjusted EBITA in Scandinavia was slightly higher than last year. Result was negatively impacted by home care exits, which had a SEK 15 million year-over-year effect, equaling to approximately SEK 10 million in nonrecurring losses. Finland lease adjusted EBITA improved SEK 85 million year-over-year. Currency had a SEK 13 million reported and a SEK 10 million negative effect on lease adjusted EBITA.

Next slide, please. Growth for Attendo Finland was plus 3% in local currency and adjusting for the exited rehab business in December last year, the underlying growth was close to 4%. Lease adjusted EBITA was SEK 351 million, an improvement of SEK 74 million or SEK million excluding currency effect compared to last year. The quarter improved by more sold beds in primarily owned nursing homes due to strong collaboration with welfare regions as well as continued improved manning with investments in staff development, working conditions and support systems.

In the quarter, we opened 2 new units and exited 2 no or low occupancy units. In Q4, we expect to exit a few more no or low occupancy units, which will lead to further improved occupancy and productivity. Finally, we see a strong possibility to continue our growth with more than 400 new beds under construction.

Next slide, please. In Scandinavia, underlying net sales growth was plus 3.1%, driven by growth in own nursing homes. However, growth was offset by ended outsourcing and exiting home care contracts. Lease adjusted EBITA was SEK 150 million, a slight improvement versus last year's, with both periods impacted by nonrecurring one-off effects. Ending outsourcing contracts had no material impact on results. However, as mentioned, the result was negatively affected by home care exits, which had a SEK 15 million year-over-year negative effect equal to approximately SEK 10 million of nonrecurring losses.

Going forward, we still foresee less but still some negative effect in Q4 and Q1 next year from the home care exits. We also expect the Q4 result to be slightly impacted by onetime integration costs linked to the recent Främja acquisition. While we delivered a result in line with last year when adjusting for one-offs, we are not fully satisfied with the result. Scandinavia has more to give and ongoing actions, which includes central support function adjustments are expected to improve performance gradually going forward. Finally, in Scandinavia, which has had a higher rate of openings in the last 12 months, has a further 130 beds under construction. And worth noting is that our total pipeline of both units under construction and signed lease agreements for both business areas combined amounts to close to 1,050 beds and which are expected to open during 2026 and 2027.

Next slide, please. Our free cash flow was strong and improved to SEK 981 million on a rolling 12-month basis, equal to 37% increase versus last year. Our free cash flow to firm, i.e. free cash flow, excluding interest paid on bank debt of SEK 144 million was SEK 1.125 billion on a rolling 12-month basis, supported by a strong Q3 free cash flow versus same period last year. During the quarter, we finalized the Främja acquisition and repurchased SEK 101 million worth of shares. And today, we can report that we reached our target mandate of buying back SEK 150 million worth of shares at the time of this report. Finally, we're happy to announce our next repurchase program, which aims to repurchase an additional SEK 200 million worth of shares until next quarterly report in February.

Next slide, please. Over the last 12 months, we continued to deliver on our '24 to '26 financial plan and a more active capital allocation. As a result, we have utilized about 60% of our free cash flow for dividend and continued share buybacks. In addition, we have continued to add high-quality value-accretive bolt-ons, firstly in Finland in Q1 this year and in Sweden during Q3. We aim to continue adding further value-accretive bolt-ons going forward, in line with our financial plan of at least 2% to 3% of additional EBITA growth per year from M&A. Also worth mentioning is that with our agreed and increased revolving credit facility of additional SEK 600 million and our strong free cash flow generation, we have the financial flexibility to continue to deliver on both strategic initiatives and share buybacks.

Next slide, please. So let's have a look at our key financial metrics, which continue to move in the right direction. If we start at the top left, the adjusted earnings per share improved by SEK 0.51, up 28% versus last year, improvement primarily due to higher lease adjusted EBITA and further supported by both reduced financing costs and continued share buybacks. If we turn to the top right figure and our lease adjusted margin in percent adjusted for nonrecurring items in 2024, we continue to improve our lease adjusted EBITA margin.

In Q3, the rolling 12-month margin was 6.2%, up 1.3 percentage points compared to Q3 last year. If we instead look at the figure at the bottom left, our lease adjusted net debt-to-EBITDA ratio was 1.5x and down 0.6x compared to same quarter last year. And finally, if we look at the figure on the bottom right, net interest expenses in the quarter was SEK 30 million, an improvement of SEK 12 million versus same period last year and in line with last quarters, where we see the effects of improved market interest rates.

With that, I hand over to you, Martin.

Thank you, Mikael. Next slide, please. Since the end of 2022, we have improved our adjusted earnings per share significantly. After our first phase of our turnaround plan, which was 2021 to 2023, we announced a new financial plan at the beginning of 2024 with an ambitious target to deliver more than 80% of earnings per share growth by 2026. As you can see in the graph, we're currently at SEK 5.34 per share, and if we divide adjusted earnings last 12 months with number of shares outstanding end of Q3, we are at SEK 5.43, well on track towards beating our 2026 adjusted EPS target of at least SEK 5.50.

Next slide, please. To summarize, we delivered our strongest quarter to date, mainly driven by our operations in Finland, supported by increased occupancy in all markets. Our strong results enables continued investments in quality, technology and method development to further improve our ability to solve complex care needs in a society where more and more people are living longer. In Finland, we continued the positive development over the past couple of quarters with strong operational efficiency, improved occupancy and a well-planned summer period.

In Scandinavia, the strong development in own operated nursing homes were offset by exited home care and outsourcing contracts and margin pressure in the Home Care segment. With the current initiatives, we expect to gradually improve performance and margins in Scandinavia from Q4 and onwards. Looking ahead, we have a strong pipeline of new projects to support our organic growth targets for the upcoming next 3 years. Cash flow was very strong during the quarter, and we will continue with share buybacks entering Q4.

All in all, we're well on track to beat our 2026 adjusted EPS target already this year. Hence, we're looking forward to presenting updated financial targets in conjunction with our year-end report in February. With that, we open up for Q&A. Operator, please go ahead.

[Operator Instructions] The next question comes from Jakob Lembke from SEB.

My first question is on Scandinavia, where I believe you in Q2 said you expected to improve profitability in the second half of the year. Do you still think that is possible?

Yes.

Okay. And then on Finland, you seem to have quite good customer inflow here in Q3. So I'm wondering a bit sort of what drove the shift here from Q2 and also if it's mainly in existing units or newly opened units?

Mainly in existing units. We have seen a strong inflow of new customers during Q3, actually mainly in the -- better in the end of Q3. And that is something that we've seen both in Finland and Scandinavia. And I mean the underlying reason is we are in a period with a growing demographic demand.

But do you know why -- or do you have any sense of why there was a sudden uptick then sort of later in the quarter? What's changed?

I mean normally, we -- the inflow is fairly slow during the summer months, mainly based on that welfare regions are on vacation. So what we've seen is a stronger inflow after summer. But we've seen waiting lists for residential Elderly Care increasing in many welfare regions gradually over the past year. So this is also a sign that public sector capacity is getting fuller in several regions and then they buy more seats at private operators.

Okay. And then another question on occupancy and sort of customer inflow. I'm wondering if you can give us sort of a general update on the occupancy environment or sort of demand environment you see for 2026 across the 2 business areas.

Jakob, can you please repeat the last part of that question?

Yes, the sort of demand situation you see or potential for customer inflow across the 2 business areas for 2026?

We foresee a continued demand growth. If we look at the demographic situation in both Finland and Sweden, it's been coming a bit earlier in Sweden. I mean the demand -- if you look at number of people above 8 years old in Sweden has been growing quite a lot over the past 5 years and will continue over the next 5 years. If you look at Finland, we are just in a period of rising demographic needs. So we foresee that the demographic push will continue into 2026 actually over the next 5 years.

And that the sort of willingness to place clients will also be high?

Yes, we still have an advantage that we can deliver a stronger quality of care with higher customer satisfaction in general than public sector at a lower cost than public sector capacity. So of course, we think that we have a strong value proposition towards municipalities and welfare regions.

Okay. And then just a final more technical question. The lease effects on reported figures seems to be higher in this quarter in both segments. I'm wondering if these are sort of one-offs or the new sort of normal level.

Yes, we had a positive lease effect in Scandinavia, not impacting lease adjusted but reported due to -- we were able to exit one empty house.

Okay. So that will go back then to a lower level?

Yes. I think it was around SEK 6 million or so in impact.

But it seems to also be a bigger impact than normal in Finland.

I think it's just an accounting effect. There's no big reserves or anything like that, that has been...

The next question comes from Kristofer Liljeberg from Carnegie.

First, I just wanted to have a clarification what you said about the impact on earnings from Home Care. So is it correct that you said ending home care contracts had a negative SEK 15 million effect year-over-year in the third quarter?

That's correct. And equal to SEK 10 million in...

What do you mean with equals...

Because we had plus SEK 5 million last year, and now it was minus SEK 10 million.

Okay. And then given this favorable occupancy rate you show in Swedish or Scandinavian Elderly Care, I guess there must be other segments than Home Care that also underperforms. So could you comment how the Social and Disabled Care are doing? And are you still making losses in Denmark? Or has that become a profitable segment for you?

Yes. I think Disabled Care is delivering the same as we've discussed previously. Individual & Family, we had a slight lower occupancy during the summer, partly due to also schools being closed. And Denmark, we are slightly negative due to the opening of a new house that we did in June this year, which has start-up cost as it's filling up to its occupancy.

So the margin improvement you expect in Scandinavia, is that going to be driven by continued strong margin in Elderly Care residential living and lower losses than for Home Care? Or do you also expect to see better earnings in Individual & Family in Denmark?

It's 3 parts. One is that our residential Elderly Care part is -- we expect that to continue to operate very strongly. Secondly, we are rightsizing central functions, considering the number of home care and outsourcing contracts that we have been exiting. And thirdly, we expect gradual improvement, both in Home Care and Individual & Family care.

Okay. And in Finland, is it possible to kind of what the run rate margin is there right now on an annual level?

We don't comment on margins, as you know, Kristofer.

Okay. Okay. Another question about Finland is how you judge the opportunity to gain new contracts when the health care or software regions will be allowed to move volumes from the smaller municipalities, i-e, public contracts to private providers from next year?

I think that is something that would overall be positive. If you look at Finland, I mean, we've been in a changing regulatory environment for quite some time for the past 4 years, both in terms of changing staffing density requirements, which we believe now is stable from this point on going forward. But secondly, also the software reform, which has led to us doing business with 300 municipalities and now that has changed into 22 regions. We believe that, that is the fact that the new larger regional buyers, they are more professional than previous.

They were -- as you're mentioning, Kristofer, they had to continue to buy their -- the old municipalities capacity for a grace period of a number of years, which goes out starting 2026, meaning that they are more free to if -- should they want to shift more capacity to private operators. We don't expect a massive shift, but we expect this to be -- to improve the environment in Finland in terms of driving occupancy gradually from 2026 and onwards, mainly due to that we -- our capacity is more modern. They are -- have a higher quality and customer satisfaction. But foremost, we run them on average at about 20% lower cost versus public operations. So we hope that this will continue to enable us to drive occupancy growth in Finland.

And what would be the rationale for the health care regions to continue to buy from municipalities? Because I guess that's more expensive for them. Is there political things we have to consider here and different views about whether to use price versus anything similar to Sweden.

It's a bit different also region by region. It is [indiscernible] to think that Finland is one country, but in fact, it's a lot of micro locations depending also where people are actually living. So -- and people living in residential care home, you're unlikely to want to move them. It's rather placing new customers in new places. So it's a gradual process.

The next question comes from Johan Unnérus from SB1 Markets.

Congratulations to a strong quarter. Some follow-up and some new questions as well, perhaps Finland to start off with. As I understand it, there is some pressure on price, but also more flexibility on staffing relating to new regulations partly. The end result seems to be positive by Q2 and Q3. What to expect going forward? Can we see more support from this?

Thank you. I mean, as I just stated, I think we're now in a more stable regulatory environment in Finland after 4 years of changing staffing density requirements. We expect the 0.6 staffing density regulation to continue. And I mean we're -- after a year of adoption, we're now at a very strong operational efficiency level. I think we've adapted very well to the 0.6% level, which is deemed to continue. So from this point and onwards, I think we will see the continued development in Finland based on our long-term strategy for sustainable growth, which is based on a combination of gradual occupancy improvement from this point and onwards, paired with gradual productivity improvements that comes also with high occupancy.

Secondly, opening phase. As Mikael stated earlier, we have a strong pipeline of openings in Finland, and we expect to open at least 2% of new capacity per year, par with at least 2% continued bolt-on acquisitions in Finland on an annual basis. So we will also continue to optimize footprint and exit some of the geographic locations where we think it's -- that are less positive for occupancy development. So there are still a lot of things to do in Finland. But the big turnaround that we've done over the past couple of years in Finland, that is done. Now it's about continuing to develop in the Finnish market according to our long-term plan.

That's useful. And so there is some more leverage in terms of occupancy improvement and also presumably staff intensity. Is there any risk in stretching the staff, both these drivers put some more pressure on the staffing and care satisfaction?

We don't see that. We have -- I mean, given also the strong demographic growth and the availability long term of qualified care staff, we have, of course, identified that being the star employer in the industry is one of our core strategic pillars to make sure that we can secure ample supply of qualified care staff. Hence, we have worked a lot over the past couple of years in working long term with increasing leadership density, working with leadership development, working with culture and value program, career path for staff, but also digitalization.

We have a number of initiatives going on, both in Finland and Sweden on reducing administrative time for the staff to be able to focus on what they do best. And the -- what we see the long-term trend is that we are continuously improving staff satisfaction and also decreasing staff turnover and staff sick leave. That's also actually part of our strong margin development in Finland over the past couple of years is a better operational efficiency, but also relatively lower staff costs as we don't have to hire as many staff. We tend to stay longer onboard and lower sick leave. So this is important.

Great. And also the year-on-year change in terms of elderly home care in Scandinavian operation is quite a marked shift and you said during the call that you should expect more of that Q4 and Q1. Can we look more into sort of mid-term forward? Should we expect sort of phasing dynamics there? It's a rather big change.

I think we are in a transition period in terms of Swedish home care services. As I mentioned, if you look at the demographic boom, it started earlier in Sweden than in Finland. Over the past 5 years, we've seen a 20% increase of demand needs in Elderly Care in Sweden. That has not been reflected so far in public sector municipality budgets. So what we've seen is the effect has been strained budgets in municipalities as they're not meeting increasing demographic demands with increasing budgeting, they have been -- they're forced to look at the terms. And what we can see that this has come to Home Care first because that's where the demographic boom is hitting the elderly care services first. It's in Home Care and then later on [indiscernible] in Nursing Homes, is that we've seen that they haven't been adapted terms accordingly.

Consequence of that is that I think we are in a transition where we have been also taking examples by actually exiting a number of home care contracts in Sweden where we don't think that the terms are sustainable any longer. We believe that we can do a lot of good difference in the Home Care segment as a large player with the large home care player still in Sweden. We think that -- I mean, we can see that we can deliver a better home care at a clearly lower cost than public sector. So we think that we need to work with the municipalities over the next few years to understand how home care should be delivered and procured over the next couple of years. So even though we're in a pressure situation and now we also believe that we are in a transition with lower margins, while figuring it out, but we think it has a good future long term.

And finally, there are some regulatory changes to the LOV and also sort of increased [indiscernible] in terms of ownership and so for some of these operations. Will that create some opportunities for you? And could it also create some risk?

We see it's seldom but it happens that public buyers made the change from framework contracts to [ Feed More ] choice or from [ Feed More ] choice to framework contracts, we haven't seen that it has had any material impact. We see basically a similar number of municipalities that tend to use private operators to solve their care challenges. Currently, it's about half of the market in Sweden is using private operators where the market share for private operators is close to 40%. Then how they choose to -- under what contract they choose to do that, that might differ a bit or change a bit from time to time, but we can work under any contract.

[Operator Instructions] There are no more phone questions at this time. So I hand the conference back to the speakers for any written questions and closing comments.

Well, in that case, we thank you for your participation in this call. If there's anything else that you want to ask about, then just please reach out to me, Mikael or Josefine, we will answer your questions accordingly. Thank you for listening in.

Thank you very much.