Norwegan Air Shuttle Aktie

Good morning, and welcome to the second quarter presentation for the Norwegian Group. My name is Jesper Hatletveit, and I am the VP of Investor Relations here at Norwegian. Today's presentation will be held by our CEO, Geir Karlsen; and our CFO, Hans-Joergen Wibstad. The presentation will be followed by a Q&A from the audience and the web.

Please go ahead, Geir.

Thank you very much, Jesper. Good morning to everyone. Also, good morning to the ones listening in from the web and online. I would like to start with saying that this quarter was coming out a little bit weaker than what we expected, and I will come back to the details on it. But excluding other losses, we delivered NOK 213 million in EBIT. The traffic numbers, number of passengers is growing, especially with Widerøe, where Widerøe had a record month historically with more than 400,000 passengers in a month. We had the Easter effect, as we all know.

We also had the Iran situation, where we saw a peak in the oil prices, and the oil prices are up 33% year-on-year. And we also lost a so-called EU ETS case, and we are booking a loss of NOK 733 million in the quarter. That was a disappointment, and we don't really understand the conclusion. Part of that is -- the whole thing is nonrecurring, obviously, and only part of it is cash as well. On the positive side, we are reducing the CASK with 5% year-over-year.

Operational excellence is important. Norwegian punctuality, 86.4%; Widerøe, impressive, 94.2%. We are canceling very few flights, as always, and we were rated as the most punctual airline in May in Norwegian. Close to 500 routes. Why connect when you can fly direct is still the case. We are the airline with most direct routes from the Nordics to Europe. NPS score, I will come back to in more detail, but very high figures. Very happy to see that REMA came into the Spenn platform in June, and I will also come back to details on that. Also live with a new sales platform, distribution platform, and we can now offer interlining sales between the 2 airlines, Widerøe and Norwegian, and it's already starting to give results.

Even if we had a softer quarter, the liquidity position in the company is very comfortable, NOK 13.7 billion. And the balance sheet is something that we are continuing to work with. We have taken delivery of our first owned 737 MAX 8. We have, in total, taken delivery of 2 aircraft from the order that we have with Boeing. We are extremely attractive when it comes to the financial community and financing sources. And we also spent a little bit of time purchasing 1 leased aircraft back into Norwegian, and we have booked a gain of NOK 95 million.

Huge transaction done in the quarter, where we are acquiring NLTG, Nordic Leisure Travel Group. This is a complementary acquisition, where we are now able to offer an additional product to our dear passengers, including hotels, attractions, activities and so on. We are buying NLTG for SEK 3.5 billion in addition to 300 million shares, and we have a bonus portion of 30 million shares depending on the share price development in Norwegian in the fourth quarter. We are targeting to close this transaction in the fourth quarter of 2026, where Strawberry, Altor and TDR are the owners of NLTG today will be significant shareholders then in Norwegian.

Traffic figures, 7.8 million passengers in the quarter. That's up 3%. On capacity, we are 5% up in the quarter in Norwegian, divided in 3% in April, 5% in May and 8% in June. Widerøe is up 3%. But as you can see, the load factors in both companies are slightly down, and that is a result of the slight softening that we saw during the quarter in the market. Operationally, I think we are doing very well, I would say, especially Widerøe with high figures, both on punctuality, regularity, up from last year, while Norwegian is more flat, but with high figures as well. So very pleased with the operational performance in both companies.

So what did really happen in the second quarter? As you can see, we are into the peak season now flying more and more passengers month by month, 2.4 million in June. Yields are up, loads are up. But at the same time, the unit revenue came in lower than what we expected. So what happened is that first, we had the Iran situation, where we saw a peak in the fuel price. Unfortunately, we had to increase the ticket prices. It didn't stick really in the market demand-wise, as we had hoped for, but it partly compensated for the increased fuel prices.

Then, we had a lot of media speculations on the availability of fuel due to the Iran situation, which also had an effect on the booking. Then, even if Norwegian (sic) [ Norway ] did quite well in the World Cup in football, that World Cup period did also have an effect on the bookings. So all in all, a slightly weaker unit revenue compared to what we expected.

Widerøe, the same -- or not the same actually. Widerøe is not seeing the same as we are -- didn't see the same as we saw in the second quarter, a nice step-up in the number of passengers, increased to 1.1 million passengers in the month, 2% up. And then again, the historical record monthly passenger figures of 404,000 passengers a month. Very high performance operationally, both on punctuality and regularity. And we are also seeing a very strong interlining traffic between the 2 airlines with a 33% growth year-on-year compared to the same quarter last year. And even if Widerøe is probably not 100% happy with how they delivered on EBIT, I'm quite happy with NOK 193 million for the quarter, looking at the market and how it developed.

So how does it really look going forward? As you can see on the top left side, you can then see the softening we saw into the second half of April through May and into June. That is a softening of the market. But you can also see that in the third quarter, we are up 5% on capacity, 6% in July alone. You can see a kind of shift in the middle of June, where the line -- the red line is picking up. And that's where we saw the bookings coming back to a more normal level. And as such, you can say that in, let's say, mid-June, it bottomed out the market, and now, we are back on track again to some extent.

So you can see that in the last couple of weeks, the bookings are coming down. That's very normal. That's what we see every year in July when people are actually going on holidays, but you're coming off from a higher level. So then we hope that bookings into the fall is becoming stronger, and that is actually what we are seeing as well.

Looking at the right side there, you can see that on booked revenue, we are above 2025. And we have sold more tickets for all these months from July to October as per today compared to last year. And I'm happy to see that especially September and October is looking quite solid. On the yield side, we are selling tickets on a flat yield more or less for the months to come. So it seems like we have been catching up a little bit on what we lost in the second quarter into the third quarter. And I think the third quarter for the 2 airlines will be relatively good. Happy to see that it has turned around to some extent.

Corporate offerings. Looking at the Avinor figures that just came out, the corporate market is actually not back compared to the pre-pandemic. Domestically, it's 12% below. Internationally, it's actually 20% below what it was in 2019. But as you can see on the right-hand side, our corporate revenues are up 6%. That is a combination of number of passengers, but it's also including a higher yield. But we are quite happy with it. It means that we are definitely not losing market share. We are still grabbing market share in this market. And that is a push we will also try to focus on going forward.

When we are talking with the large corporates, more and more of them are saying that they are now flying more than 50% with Norwegian, and that's very happy to see. We are continuing to sign up state contracts this quarter with DFØ [indiscernible] here in Norway and Kammarkollegiet in Sweden. This is another 2 contracts in addition to all the contracts that we have signed up during the last 12 to 18 months. Widerøe is delivering a strong, solid corporate offering with a very high portion of business travelers, and that will continue as well going forward.

Spenn is really moving these days, 3.1 million Spenn earners so far, NOK 7.6 billion Spenn earned. The brand awareness is moving in the right direction now at 59% in Norway. And very happy to finally welcome REMA 1000 into the Spenn community. Reitan Retail in total had 2 million daily customer transactions on an ongoing basis, and this is bringing a volume into the Spenn community that is very different to what it was before they joined.

We're also seeing on weekly sign-ups into the Spenn community, has increased 10x since Reitan came into the platform. Very promising and very exciting to see how this is developing. The main aim for actually developing this Spenn platform is to create what I call real loyalty. And that's why it's extremely nice to see that the frequent flyers flying with Norwegian today, they are, to a larger extent, also now choosing Strawberry as their hotel partner. And this is a clear trend we are seeing and also an evidence that we are actually now starting to create real loyalty. Very exciting to see development, how this develops over the next months.

NPS, Net Promoter Score is also having a very nice development since 2023 from 38.5 to 52.4. This is a very high focus in both airlines, Widerøe and Norwegian. We are doing well. 52.4 is a really strong result. We do know what matters the most for our customers, and you can see it on the slide, punctuality, arrive on time. We are very punctual in Norwegian, and we are very punctual in Widerøe, and we have been punctual for quite a while, and we aim to continue that.

The second most important is our ability to help when things go wrong. Unfortunately, sometimes things go wrong, and we're also progressing there in a very nice way. And then, as I've said many times, we have the best crew, the best both in the air and on the ground in the industry, and they are performing very well in general and especially now in the peak season that we are in the middle of. So NPS is moving definitely in the right direction.

Hans-Joergen?

Thank you, Geir. Good morning, everyone. I will go through the financial results for the second quarter of 2026 in more detail. It's a quarter which is strongly impacted by 2 main factors. One is the ETS loss that we had to take and the other one is the elevated fuel prices. And those 2 factors alone impact the result versus last year by nearly NOK 1.6 billion. I'll do a little bit of a more deep dive.

As Geir said, the revenue is up 1% with Widerøe contributing a nice NOK 2.1 billion. We see a capacity ramp-up where we have the ASK up 5% versus last year. And we have, as mentioned earlier, a negative impact of the Easter being in the second quarter versus -- sorry, in the first quarter versus last year, where it was in the second quarter, thus impacting the unit revenue by about minus 6% in April alone. So that has quite a big impact on top of the softening of the market that Geir just went through that we saw through the second quarter.

Group EBIT, excluding other losses, NOK 213 million. Results strongly impacted by NOK 817 million in total in other losses relating to the EU ETS case, which we -- I'll come back to in a minute. And then the FX translation losses due to the sudden weakening of the Norwegian kroner in June. The Norwegian kroner weakened by 7% -- approximately 7% in June, and that has a direct translation effect on our balance sheet item.

Then, Widerøe, nice EBIT of NOK 193 million, and the group -- net profit for the group at NOK 555 million (sic) [ negative NOK 555 million ] after tax. We -- again, we saw this extremely high increase in the jet fuel that was as expected, but we're seeing that going up by 33% year-over-year. So that is a key contributing factor to the relatively poor results compared with the same quarter last year. We have seen the fuel -- jet fuel prices coming down during the quarter towards the end of the quarter. But with the recent turmoil in the Middle East and recent events there, it's still come back up a little bit again. So we'll just have to see and wait. We are hedged about 50%, a little bit more than 50% for the remainder of the year. So we have a cushion. But it is -- of course, jet fuel is a factor for us.

Again, very strong cost performance with the CASK or unit cost, excluding fuel going down 5% versus the same period last year. Some tailwind on the FX part with the Norwegian kroner strengthening compared with last year. But even without taking that into account, we have an improvement in our CASK of a significant level. So very happy to see the overall strong cost performance, partially driven by Program X and a strong effort by the whole organization. Strong robust financial position also after dividend for the year, and we're coming out of the quarter with NOK 13.7 million (sic) [ NOK 13.7 billion] of total liquidity.

A few words on the unexpected loss of the EU ETS obligation. We had a strong win in the Oslo City Court, then the matter was appealed by the government to the Borgarting Court of Appeal, where we lost surprisingly, and then, we appealed to the Supreme Court and the whole case was actually rejected by the Supreme Court surprisingly to us, but also to our strong team of legal advisers. And then, we unfortunately will have to record a loss of NOK 733 million. We've already paid the fine earlier a couple of years ago, NOK 400 million.

So in terms of cash impact, it's only or it's relative to the total size, it's a negative NOK 330 million, which is payable later this year. So that's highly manageable, but we are very, very surprised and -- of this loss. And in our view, in the view of Norwegian, in the view of our legal team, a strong team of legal advisers, there were more than one, we -- Norwegian was unable to fulfill its ETS obligation during the reconstruction, and that's the whole background. So a surprising event for Norwegian, but it has quite a big one-off nonrecurring impact of the -- for the results for the second quarter.

A few more words on the revenue side. Stable revenues, up 1%. We have a volume increase, ASK increase of 5.4% yield decrease, load factor decrease of 2.7%, total unit revenue down 5% for the quarter-over-quarter, ending up with a revenue of NOK 8.4 billion in the second quarter of 2026. Adding NOK 2 billion of revenues from Widerøe leaves us with a total revenue of NOK 10.4 billion.

I think this one is a really good one. It sort of strongly illustrates the point this is an exceptional quarter in terms of, let's say, one-offs, and it's with the fuel, and compared with last quarter, with the fuel driving an increased fuel price of fuel cost of NOK 837 million and then with a change to other losses, including the EU ETS loss of NOK 733 million and negative translation effects due to the sudden weakening of the Norwegian kroner in June, a total of NOK 1.7 billion. So those 2 combined is NOK 1.8 billion, which is largely the total difference, the weakening from quarter -- second quarter 2025 to second quarter 2026.

Operating expenses is up basically following the increase in ASK capacity level. So that's as expected. And then, we have a slight improvement in the depreciation and amortization lease. That's due to our acquisition of 1 aircraft, which we have a gain of NOK 95 million. And then, the weakening of the U.S. dollar has also an impact on the cost for our depreciation, which is denominated in U.S. dollars. Widerøe then adding to -- with a nice profit EBIT of NOK 193 million, which leaves us with a group EBIT for the quarter of minus NOK 603 million.

A little bit more on the details on the top line and the P&L. Ancillary revenues having a nice increase. Total increased 1%. We're seeing that the cost level, as mentioned, is we have a good cost performance. Personnel expenses going up at a level as expected. Strong increase, as we talked about several times in the fuel cost, more than NOK 800 million or 33%. Then, we're seeing actually airport and ATC charges at the same level as they are last year despite an ASK increase of 5%.

Handling charges at the same level as last year, technical maintenance cost at the same level as last year, kind of underlying our strong cost performance for the quarter. Other operating expenses slightly up. Then, we have the big ticket item that we talked about many times now, other losses, one, with a delta or change from last year of NOK 1.011 billion.

Aircraft lease and depreciation improved by NOK 203 million, NOK 95 million from the aircraft acquisition gain and then the impact of the stronger Norwegian kroner on our U.S. dollar cost there, which leaves us with, again, a profit before tax of minus -- weak, low, minus NOK 761 million, meaning a quarter which is not financially on a P&L basis, a strong quarter. And then, we have a tax income of NOK 206 million, which leaves a net profit of minus NOK 555 million for the quarter.

Robust balance sheet. We're -- despite kind of having a relatively poor quarter in terms of our P&L, we're coming out of the quarter with a robust balance sheet. We're seeing that total assets is actually down from NOK 47.5 billion in Q1 to NOK 46.9 billion or NOK 47 billion at the end of the second quarter. Aircraft assets slightly up because we acquired 1 aircraft, and we took delivery of another aircraft. The cash is coming down a little bit, NOK 548 million. That is after dividend payment of NOK 841 million. So a good cash flow performance for the quarter, which is also seasonal due to the ramp-up of the activity level in the second quarter.

Happy to see that the air traffic settlement liabilities is -- it's up 1% from last year. That is prebooked or prebooked tickets, kind of evidencing that we have sold more tickets than we had at the same time earlier in -- or last year. And then just one word on the equity side. The book equity is down NOK 2.4 billion. It's slightly higher than the results, and that's due to the mark-to-market development on our fuel hedges and with the fuel price coming down versus the end of Q1, then the market value of the hedges also has a reduced value. But we're still coming out with an equity ratio at a good level and a robust balance sheet.

Net interest-bearing debt, only slightly up, driven by, again, cash and equivalents going down largely because of the dividend payment of NOK 841 million and the aircraft financing going up with the acquisition of taking delivery of 1 aircraft and actually buying out the leased 1 aircraft.

Finally, a couple of words on the total on the cash flow, as mentioned, going down by -- the cash balance going down by NOK 548 million Ticket prepayments at a stable level, operating activities contributing NOK 1.5 billion. Investing activities slightly higher than it has been in the previous quarter with the acquisition of 1 owned aircraft and then a purchase of another aircraft out of the lease.

Financing activities, minus NOK 1 billion, including the dividend payment, and then, ending up with a closing cash balance of NOK 11.0 billion, a very healthy level for the business and happy to see that this is going just as expected. The excess liquidity receiving a good return, that's also an important thing. And we have also NOK 1.1 billion on fixed income fund, and NOK 1.5 billion deposited against the outstanding bond, which is due and payable in September. So by the end of September, we are essentially a debt-free company with the exception of the aircraft financing. So that's going just as expected.

And we're also having a good position when it comes to our delivery, our initial 80 order delivery from Boeing, where we have already paid in NOK 3.6 billion of prepayments and which leaves a net expected remaining payments before 2028 of less than NOK 500 million. So overall, we are in a healthy financial situation. We -- as Geir mentioned, we're receiving very, very attractive financing offers for the fleet, and we're coming out of the quarter and into the remaining part of 2026 and '27 in a very strong financial position.

Thank you.

Okay. So the way forward, I think when you are talking about bookings, as mentioned, we feel that the booking momentum was turning around to some extent in middle of June and now looking more promising from July and into the fall. Again, very happy to see that September, October is also looking relatively strong compared -- also compared to last year. The holiday market, as I call it, is a market that we have been looking at for quite a while, actually the last 1.5 to 2 years.

And this company, Nordic Leisure Travel Group, is a company we have been studying in depth during the last 6 months, I would say. And we did acquire the company, as you know, in June. And this is what is said a leading Nordic hotels and leisure travel company. And this is us buying ourselves into this market. This is a market that has been growing over the last years. This is also a market that we expect to continue to grow.

We are running some -- a part of Norwegian called Norwegian Holiday. This is us buying us into that capacity, and we will be the leading tour operator, travel company in the Nordics overnight, the day we take over this company. They have approximately 1.3 million hotel guests a year converted into passengers and the number of flights that is 2.6 million, the way we count it on a round-trip basis. It is a company with SEK 17 billion in revenue. It's a company with 26 concept hotels, and it is also including an airline called Sunclass with 12 aircraft on both narrowbodies and widebodies. And they have a market-leading digital platform where they have invested massively over the last years.

Award-winning brands included Spies in Denmark. You have Ving in Norway and Sweden. You have Tjäreborg in Finland. You have Globetrotter, and you have the airline Sunclass. They are offering more than 4,500 third-party hotels. They are the largest purchaser of hotel accommodation in Europe to Nordic travelers. But what we feel particularly interesting is the 26 unique concept hotels. These concepts are -- it's Sunprime, it's Sunwing, it's Ocean Beach Club and it's Levi's. And looking at the profit engine in this company, it's 25% volume from these concept hotels, 25% of the volume, but it is 60% of the profit. And we feel this particularly interested when we are going to develop this together with NLTG in the years to come.

The way we look at this is that we think this is a growing market. We think that this is a product offering that -- where we can now offer our customers that were already flying an additional product, a better product, and we would like to take part of this segment as well. NLTG is now getting access to European Nordic network, Norwegian network in addition to 50 aircraft flying for Widerøe, and that gives them the access to a much broader offering on the airline side to their customers.

We are also, by doing this, able to offer a package where you can fly and you can live. And we can also, in the strategy long term, develop these concept hotels on destinations where Norwegian is already flying a lot. Just take Spain as an example, we are flying close to 5 million passengers to Spain every year. NLTG doesn't have any concept hotels on the mainland Spain. That's a huge opportunity, and we're also able to take out not only the synergies, but also adding value to the passengers, adding value to the profitability on both companies, and we are going to make sure that 1 plus 1 is more than 2.

Looking at the synergies. And just to say a few words on NLTG. This is a company with a very long history. This is a well-run company. We have spent a lot of time studying this company, both the short-term strategy, the long-term strategy. We have got to know the management team, extremely experienced and deep knowledge into the hotel market, which we don't have in Norwegian. So that's what we are buying. I'm very excited about it, very excited, and impatient, when it comes to the competition authorities, but we hope to be able to close the transaction then by the end of this year.

On the synergies, first, a little bit on the deal itself. We are buying the company for SEK 3.5 billion in cash plus 300 million in issued Norwegian shares. There's 30 million potential bonus shares, and that depends on the development of the stock price in Norwegian in the fourth quarter. These shares will be -- we start to issue them at NOK 17 a share up to NOK 20 a share.

Altor, Strawberry and TDR, which is the owners of NLTG today, will be significant shareholders in Norwegian. They will have a 180-day lockup from when we close the transaction. And then, Altor and Strawberry will also be proposed for a Board representation in Norwegian.

The SEK 3.5 billion will be financed with available funds. We have a quite comfortable cash position, a potential new bond issues if we can do that at the right terms and other potential sources. And again, the EGM is already held. The shareholders approved it by -- I think it was 98.6% in favor. And then, we are working with EU.

Synergies, obviously, we will be able to optimize the 2 networks, Sunclass and Norwegian, and there is a lot of positioning flights in Sunclass today. We are able to help out reducing that. I think we can have the fleet and crew utilization massively up in combination. Then, you have the normal synergies when it comes to procurement, support functions and so on. That's more or less the same process we have been through with Widerøe when we acquired Widerøe. But then first of all, this is on the commercial side, a massive synergies when it comes to integrated flight and hotel holiday packaging and then also developing the concept hotels on destinations where we are already flying a lot.

So this is not about us having to get more passengers and having to create a new market. This is passengers we are already flying. Now, we're going to offer them a better product and added product as such. That was NLTG.

The fleet, not much to report this quarter on the fleet. As mentioned earlier, we have taken the first owned aircraft out of 2 and delivering -- and Boeing is delivering in accordance to schedule, and they are definitely back on track. We are now in a process where we are considering what to do after 2032. Both Boeing and Airbus are more or less sold out for the next 5 years. So then -- so that is something we will have to consider. We're also working with a fleet plan in Widerøe that will be finalized, I guess, during the year. And then that applies, first of all, to the commercial part of Widerøe.

Program X is also delivering in accordance to schedule. Not so much new this quarter other than the fact that the program has delivered NOK 321 million during the quarter. We have listed up a few of the items that is included. We are sticking to the guiding of more than NOK 1.25 billion out of 2026. And then, we will see by the end of this year when this program in reality is coming to an end, whether we should renew it and then just continue in a different way or whether we will then build this program into the synergy project with NLTG and with Widerøe, but it is on schedule. And this is also part of the reason we are doing quite well on the cost side of the business, and that is also the plan to continue with for the next quarters to come.

On guiding, we have -- on capacity, we have -- it's more or less the same as we saw last quarter. I think it's a percentage down in Q4 from 5% to 4%. But very happy to say that we are taking the CASK guiding ex fuel down a step from low single digit to a flat CASK compared to last year. So that shows that we are in control over the costs in Norwegian. But of course, we can always do better, and that is also the aim, but very happy that we can take the guiding a step down.

And then, just to finalize this presentation, this is a part of Norwegian, the communication department that has come up with a good idea during the World Cup. This is how we can be extremely creative, and you can create an activity level out there free of charge, that is absolutely amazing. So we took British Airways to a small little challenge saying that on the game between Norway and England, the one who wins or the one that loses will have to change the logo to the other airline's on our own Instagram account.

Unfortunately, Norwegian -- sorry, Norway lost, and we had to use the BA logo for a day. That hurts. But I think it was definitely worth it. The results, 1.5 million likes and reactions. We have reached more than 150 million people with this. More than 500 media articles have been written on this story. So it's absolutely fantastic. We have to continue to do these things, and that is what Norwegian is all about when it comes to being creative. I love it, I have to say.

Thank you very much.

Thank you. If I can have Hans-Joergen up to here as well, and then, we'll continue to do some questions. We'll start with asking if there's any questions from the audience. Hans Jørgen?

Hans Elnæs of WINAIR. A few questions for me since we have a few here today. On Norwegian (sic) [ Nordic ] Leisure Travel Group, are you considering also the opportunity to become like an asset for growing their production during like the winter season when you usually take down your own production and use some of your aircraft to fly into their program to utilize your fleet? And the same also in the summertime, if you have -- if there is more need for that and the better payoff that we can use your fleet into NLTG.

Secondly, on -- I see that Sweden now is very close on becoming your second biggest market. It surpassed Denmark and is very close to surpassing Spain and then just behind Norway on your revenue side. There's been some talk in the media about expanding Widerøe operation into Sweden. Can you tell us a little bit more what you're thinking about that? Is that to complement your own production or to take out some of your production and use Widerøe smaller aircraft like SAS are doing to turboprops in domestic Sweden? And then last is on...

Let's do the 2 first ones first, and then, you can take the last one again. When you look at NLTG, they have seasonality as well, so do we. But there is less seasonality in NLTG than it is in Norwegian. So I think the answer on your question is yes. I think we have an opportunity maybe especially on the shoulder seasons, both -- on both sides. And that applies also to -- when it comes to these concept hotels and whether we can develop destinations where it's more natural to fly more in the shoulder seasons.

When it comes to synergies between the 2 airlines, Sunclass and Norwegian, it is no doubt about the fact that there is a massive number of synergies there. Sunclass is having because that's how -- it's not necessarily something wrong with it, but it's a lot of positioning flights and the crew and fleet utilization can be much better, and we can help out with that. So I think, yes, there are definitely rooms.

Winter season, yes, but maybe first of all, in the shoulder seasons, where we have an opportunity. Sweden, that is a different question. The fact is that the Swedish domestic market is definitely not back. It's maybe only 60% back compared to the pre-pandemic. There are a lot of activities in Sweden today on the regulatory side, on the government side, where they are going to stimulate connectivity, and they are incentivizing now the population to start to fly more because it starts to hurt the value creation in Sweden in general.

And there's also a discussion in Sweden today where they are actually looking at what we have been doing here in Norway, which is absolutely fantastic in my opinion, namely you are incentivizing, subsidizing Widerøe in order to create a flight offering in the way that we have in Norway today. A little bit of the problem -- this is a long answer, a little bit of a problem in Sweden today that you have approximately the same number of airports, 40, 42, while in Sweden, only 10 of them are government owned and all the others are not doing well.

So I think there is a discussion in Sweden now where they could potentially -- I'm not saying they are, but potentially move in the same direction as us. Even if they are doing all the right things in Sweden, in my opinion, south of Sweden has turned into a monopoly where BRA is now flying for SAS. Is that an opportunity for Widerøe potentially? Absolutely. But it could also be a potential in north of Sweden if Sweden in general is going in the same direction as what we have been doing here in Norway. I don't know if that was an answer.

Yes. And then you're talking about PSO route?

Yes, partly.

And then last question is -- and you talked about report, is there any plan in the P&L to resolve fuel costs and ETS emission costs as an on line in the P&L?

Yes, that's the question you have asked before. Right now, we're happy with the way it's presented. There's no specific plans to do that. But it's something we can consider because the -- especially the ETS cost now is becoming a significant portion. Previously, it was not such a large portion, but it is becoming a more significant part of the fuel line. So it's something that we can -- that we will consider over the next reporting periods, maybe from 2027 if we decide to go that route.

Okay. We'll then move on to some questions from the web. We'll start with Petter Nyström, ABG. How do you see yield and load factor trends in July and August versus September, October? Are there any material differences?

Well, I think we just have to repeat what we said then that we have sold more tickets for all these months than what we have done -- what we did on the same day last year.

Okay. On the months prior, can you share any insights on what is slightly softer demand than expected? Is there any differences if we look by regions, type of travel?

I think we look over the network. It's kind of spread all over the network, I would say, than the softening. But as we mentioned here today, it is the speculation in the media on the availability of fuel. It is the World Cup, it is the war that certainly have an effect. We have had quite nice weather here in Scandinavia in June. That normally also have an effect on the bookings. So I think that's -- in combination, that's probably the reasons.

Okay. Let's move on to some questions from Andrew Lobbenberg, Barclays. Unit cost, how much of your improved guidance is currency, so the NOK effect, lease buyback gains? And what is new from Program X? Hans-Joergen?

So on the -- so we've taken down the CASK guidance or cost guidance by 1 notch to flat, and we're very happy to report that. That -- first of all, we've taken out the one-offs, the nonrecurring issues both in 2025 and 2026. So it's kind of comparing apples and apples.

So the buyback gains are gone from those, yes.

Yes. Exactly. So -- and then there is obviously an element of FX in that because of the strengthening of the Norwegian kroner. Maybe that's something like a 2% to 3% impact at the most.

But that's the Q2 effect, not the full year effect.

Exactly. In the Q2, the impact of the FX is around 2% to 3% on that improvement going of 5% on CASK, about 2% to 3% of that can be explained by FX.

Okay.

And then Program X is...

And Program X obviously, it's also another factor. So -- yes.

Another question from Andrew. There was slightly tense moment with the technicians negotiations back in July. Second year that we've had issues with this working group. Any way we can avoid the tensions?

Well, this is tough negotiations every time, both with the technicians and -- but also with other parts of the company. And so we don't have any other negotiations now during the summer months, but we have a couple during the fall.

Okay. Final question from Andrew. How are we thinking in terms of long-term fuel hedging? Are we -- do we want to evolve more towards the hedge ratios that we see on the European peer level?

I think we don't want to speculate on our own portfolio. We've had great benefit of our fuel hedges during this year, impacting the Q2 numbers by more than NOK 500 million positive in isolation. And then, we will continue to monitor that very closely. We are at -- above 50% at the moment, and we will continue to monitor that as the fuel moves as we move forward. Obviously, very volatile at the moment. We're seeing fuel prices going a little bit up recently. And then, we're just doing our best to maneuver in that environment, but we will always aim to have a sensible and balanced fuel portfolio.

You could say that -- if you look at the forward curve today compared to 1, 2, 3 months ago, it's almost like the forward curve, which is in backwardation, by the way. It's kind of just moving to the right. I think, Hans-Joergen, it's fair to say that we will most likely put on more hedges for 2027 shortly.

Okay. A final question from the web from Tomas Helgo. Coming plans for Spenn? Are we expecting to see a Spenn bank or financial partner there anytime soon? Geir?

What we can say on that, we are working on how we should develop financial services into either Norwegian or Spenn or both.

Okay. That's the final question I had from the web. Any more questions from the audience? There are none. So then we conclude the session.

Thank you very much for attending.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Good morning, and welcome to the first quarter 2026 presentation for the Norwegian Group. My name is Jesper Hatletveit, and I'm the VP of Investor Relations here at Norwegian. Today's presentation will be held by our CEO, Geir Karlsen; and our CFO, Hans-Joergen Wibstad. The presentation will be followed by a Q&A from the audience and the web.

Please go ahead, Geir.

Thank you Jesper. Good morning to everyone. Also good morning to the ones listening in online. It's a beautiful morning in Oslo. The sun is shining. The low season is behind us, and we are looking forward to a summer season that is going to be hectic, and we are going to fly a lot and the demand is looking very promising. But let's start by having a look at the first quarter of this year.

EBIT negative of NOK 220 million. This is a significant improvement from the same quarter last year. Very happy to see that Program X is really starting to deliver NOK 196 million in this quarter. And I will come back to a little bit more details on Program X a little bit later. Very strong traffic growth in the quarter. It's a record first quarter load factor in Norwegian at 87.6%. We have a volatile macro situation, not at least on the fuel side. But at the same time, in Norwegian, we are 45% hedged. And we have seen tailwinds on the FX, meaning that the Norwegian krona on the relative has gotten stronger.

Also very helpful that the ETS quota prices has come down from the low EUR 90 a tonne to down at the EUR 60 for the quarter, which is obviously helping. So the underlying cost, excluding fuel, is 2% up. I will come back to the guiding for the full year a little bit later. Widerøe, talking about operational excellence is delivering a great quarter when it comes to the daily operation on both functionality, on-time performance improved to 87%, which is impressive in a very difficult part of the year. Also regularity at 97% with all the weather we are experiencing in the markets where Widerøe is flying. I can see that I have both the CFO and the CEO in Widerøe in the room here today, and I have to say that great job to you and all your colleagues in Widerøe.

Also, reg in Norwegian, 99.4%. We have always said that we are going to fly the network we have for sale, meaning we have very few cancellations. This is another example of that. Cirium, we are still top 10 in Europe when it comes to punctuality. I would like to be on top 5, but that is difficult, especially in the low season with all the weather we are experiencing up here in the north. Close to 500 routes in combination between the 2 airlines. Net Promoter Score, that is the feedback from our customers is at very high levels at more than 50. Also very good to see that Widerøe is really moving up the ladder when it comes to the NPS score.

And as we say, why connect when you can fly direct, meaning that we are the airline in the Nordics with most direct routes from the Nordics to Europe. We are continuing to push on the corporate market as we have been doing for quite a while. And we are very much looking forward to bringing and welcoming Reitan on board coming live during June this year, so in another -- during the next couple of months.

And finally, I have been talking about the new distribution platform now for almost 2 years. Finally, we are live. And we can now offer interlining with Widerøe, for example, where you can now actually book a combination of Norwegian and Widerøe on Norwegian's website. You cannot do it on the app yet, but that will come.

Balance sheet. We are continuing to work on the balance sheet. Cash position increased during the quarter to NOK 14.2 billion. Net debt reduced to NOK 4.4 billion. And we are seeing when we are seeking financing, these days, we are seeking financing for the spare engines that we bought, 11 engines. And looking at the terms and conditions that we received from 20 to 30 banks, it is at levels terms-wise that we have never seen in Norwegian before. So the credit Norwegian is performing well, and we are finally getting extremely attractive terms when it comes to financing our assets.

We are planning to pay dividend, NOK 0.8 per share based on an approval from the upcoming AGM. We do expect that, that will be approved, and then we will pay out the dividend. We are having a very volatile situation when it comes to the fuel side due to the situation in the Middle East. But we have, as I will go through a little bit later, hedged 45%. And we have also seen an uptick in demand, especially into the Western and Southern part of Europe. And we think that, that demand has shifted from the Middle East to these destinations. We have filed an appeal to the Supreme Court in Norway on the ETS case. And we do expect that we will have an outcome -- final outcome of that case during the year.

A little bit on numbers. 5.2 million passengers in the quarter. That's 2% up compared to the same quarter last year, and that is on a capacity reduction actually on both airlines, 6% down in Norwegian, 2% down in Widerøe. Very happy to see the high load factor in Norwegian, up 5 percentage points to 87.6%. It's a record, as mentioned. And I have to say, again, when it comes to on-time performance and regularity in Widerøe, very impressive, very impressive.

Punctuality in Norwegian is actually down 3 percentage points, mostly due to weather conditions in the markets we were flying during the quarter. But on regularity, still at very high levels and very close to our target. A little bit on the winter traffic. This is a graph that we show every quarter. And as you can see, we have a lot of seasonality in Norwegian, a little bit flatter curve in Widerøe. But this shows how we flex between the different seasons.

And by that, we are keeping a relatively stable load factor, which is very important. But we are 6% down on capacity in this quarter compared to the same quarter last year, but we are flying 2% more passengers. And again, a historic high Q1 load factor. So -- and not at least a very nice development on the yield, up 5% compared to last year. So with a 6% capacity reduction, we are quite happy with the results. And it seems like we hit where we wanted pretty well. And we are now moving into the peak season, where we expect to carry much more passengers. And hopefully, then also we will see a nice development, both in load and on yield.

Looking at the same for Widerøe, very good to see the load factors coming up over the last couple of months, 70.2% load, 930,000 passengers, up 2% as well. And then as mentioned a couple of times now, the performance operationally has been absolutely fantastic in Widerøe during the quarter. And normally, this is also then giving good results on the bottom line. I'm very happy to see that Widerøe is actually is delivering an EBIT positive of NOK 38 million, which is NOK 81 million improvement from the same period last year. Widerøe had the record year in 2025. I think we have a great chance of actually beating that in 2026. Keep up in Widerøe.

Looking at the bookings going forward. To the left on the top there, it shows 7-day rolling sales figures on numbers of passengers. That's all markets, all destinations and travel when you want. Normally, these curves will show that we had a peak in sales in the New Year sales that we had every year. Special thing this year is that we have actually a peak in March, and that this is after or post the Iran situation, very interesting to see. And then it flattens out, come downs and then you see the typical Easter effect. Easter is earlier this year than last year. That's why you see the dip in the red line there. And you see the comparable one is the blue coming a few weeks later.

Also good to see that the curve as per today is higher than last year. We saw a decline in bookings after the situation in Iran, especially in Turkey and in Cyprus, but we also saw an increase in demand, as mentioned, in the Southwest and South of Europe when this happened. So all in all, I think we could say that it looks promising for the months to come. I'll come back a little bit to details on it.

We are ready for the summer season. We have all the crew we need. We have all the aircraft we need. Everybody is ready for a busy summer season. Capacity-wise, we are up 5% compared to last year for the second quarter as a whole, but we have increased the capacity, especially in June with 8% to 9%.

If you look at the book revenue, this is travel from May to August. On load, we are marginally behind in April. That is mostly due to the Easter effect. And we are flat to marginally below on load in June as well. But have in mind, we had 8% to 9% capacity growth. On the other months, we are ahead of last year. We have, as per today, sold 300,000 tickets more than the same date last year. So I would say it looks very comfortable when it comes to the load.

On yield, we are ahead of last year on most months. The exception is again June, where we are marginally behind, but hopefully, we can catch up and get in front of the line when we end June. So I think all in all, very happy with the bookings going forward. We have a capacity increase compared to last year. And it seems like the increases in fares that we have put in place, and we have increased the fares due to the situation, not at least on the fuel side, it seems like this is sticking with the customers. They are actually willing to pay more for a ticket today, probably because they understand the situation that we are in with fuel prices that has increased a lot.

A little bit about the macro situation. The production that Norwegian has had to the Middle East has been kind of limited. Yes, we have been flying to Dubai from the 3 capitals in Norway, Sweden and Denmark. That is obviously now canceled. Normally, we just fly it in -- during the winter time, and that is canceled. We had a plan to start up to fly to Tel Aviv and to Beirut. That is also postponed and canceled for the time being. And this is the capacity that we have been moving over to high-demand routes in Europe, flying typically down to the Mediterranean, where you are seeing a very strong demand these days.

45% hedged for the remainder of the year. This is in combination, let's say, combined for the 2 airlines, Norwegian and Widerøe. We are hedged against the jet fuel, not against the crude oil. And we are doing it by doing swaps where the counterparts typically are banks. So then that is out there. When it comes to availability of fuel, I've been reading a lot in the media lately about how big of a problem this is going to be. Looking at the situation today from Norwegian, we are quite confident that we will get the fuel we need as long as we can have visibility today.

We are talking to our suppliers all the time. And as per today, there is no signs from at least them that there will be a lack of fuel during -- in the short term. What we are seeing is that we are actually sourcing our fuel mostly from Scandinavia and some part of Europe. We are seeing that the European producers of jet fuel is increasing their capacity. We are also seeing that the import of fuel into Europe is increasing, both from the U.S. and also increasing from Africa. It's also more crude oil coming into the market, giving the refineries the optionality to actually produce more fuel.

So for the time being, we are quite comfortable on the fuel situation. And we haven't canceled anything. We are not planning to cancel anything either. And then we will just follow the situation very closely, obviously, and to have a look at the fuel situation. But again, we are seeing a very strong demand, very healthy bookings, and we have increased the fares. And to some extent, this is compensating for the fact that we have seen higher fuel prices.

Hans-Joergen?

Thank you, Geir. Good morning, everyone. Nice to see you here. I will, as usual, go through the Q1 results in some more detail, starting with revenues, which is -- which are up 6%, as Geir said, to NOK 5.8 billion. And that's pretty strong on the basis of an ASK, which is down 6%, and that's reflecting the unit cost increase that I will talk about a little bit later. Widerøe coming in with a nice NOK 1.9 billion.

As Geir also mentioned, there is traffic improving across the group. We see that the -- we have been able to optimize the winter production in a very nice way, taking down the capacity, the ASK by 6% with the impact of that partially being that the unit revenue is up and quite a big increase by 13% year-over-year, both on higher load factor and yield. Of course, there is a small or there is an Easter impact in March of that. But overall, also looking at March -- February and January in combination, it is a strong figure. And again, Widerøe delivering a nice 2% increase.

Looking at the operating result, a negative NOK 220 million is not nice to report a negative figure. But seasonally, this is a very strong figure, and it's a very significant improvement from last year, nearly NOK 400 million. And that's without taking into account the non-recurring impact of the acquisition of 10 aircraft in 2025, which had an impact of nearly NOK 590 million. So the underlying improvement is bigger than it looks at the EBIT -- the direct EBIT comparison.

So looking at the Norwegian EBIT, negative NOK 259 million and then with Widerøe coming in with a nice profit, and that's really good. And as we've talked about several times, it's smoothen out. It's less -- Widerøe's operational and business model, it's less seasonal than it is with Norwegian. So that's a good combination. As also mentioned before, we have some macro tailwind or advantages from a strengthening Norwegian kroner versus the U.S. dollar. We have attractive hedges that have helped us in this quarter and also the ETS price coming down. So there is some tailwind on the kind of macro elements and then which also has an impact on this OGL, other gains and losses of NOK 284 million.

I think the important thing, though, and I will come back to that, is the underlying improvement, which is significant, which also results in unit cost, which is up only 2% on the basis of an ASK, which is down 6%. And that's kind of a number which is better than we have seen historically and really gives a strong signal that there is good cost control in Norwegian, partially due to Program X, but also hard work, of course, across the whole group. So that's really good to see.

And also the financial strength has improved during the quarter. We came out of the year with a strong balance sheet, but it has further improved during the quarter with NOK 14.2 billion of gross cash at the end of the quarter. Some of that is linked to the short-term investments and also deposit for the outstanding bond, which is due for repayment in the third quarter, NOK 2.6 billion.

And thus, having then the net interest-bearing debt, which is an important KPI for us, is down to NOK 4.4 billion at the end of the quarter and equity ratio going up. So also from a balance sheet point of view, coming out of the quarter with a strengthened -- further strengthened balance sheet compared with where we were 1 quarter ago. So a further deep dive into the revenue side.

We see that the Norwegian part is up 6% on revenues, and this can explain by, first of all, there is a volume impact, reduced ASK, but that again has the positive impact on yield development, which has a significant positive that's 5% on load factor, 5.2%, which then brings us to a revenue of Norwegian of NOK 5.1 billion. On top of that, obviously, a nice number from Widerøe at NOK 1.8 billion, bringing the total revenue to NOK 6.9 billion.

Then on the -- maybe even more interesting is to look at the EBIT bridge, how we go from a loss in first quarter of last year of NOK 568 million to a loss in Norwegian that is of NOK 259 million. And again, taking into account that the NOK 569 million is including a non-recurring gain of NOK 589 million, which is represented on the red bar there.

Obviously, we talked about, both Geir and myself have talked about the macro gains -- sorry, benefit from lower ETS, strength in Norwegian kroner and also the hedges, representing NOK 415 million. But the most important thing is to focus on the underlying improvement, NOK 432 million, which is the result of all the initiatives from Program X across the group, bringing this kind of underlying benefit to our results. And this is as we had expected, but it's really good to see it coming through in the numbers.

Part of that, just as an example, are the recurring gains from the acquisition of 13 aircraft out of leases last year, but there are also a number of other initiatives across the group that actually that adds up to the NOK 432 million, obviously, including also the top line increases that we talked about on the revenue side.

And then also, as mentioned before, Widerøe with a very nice increase, NOK 38 million from last year, and then we're ending up with a group EBIT of NOK 220 million as a loss, again, a significant improvement from previous quarter, especially taking into account the non-recurring impact last quarter.

So I think we talked a lot about the P&L so far, but just to summarize, operating revenues up by 5%. Personnel expenses naturally up, as always, 5% controlled. Aviation fuel, we have the impact of the macro benefits, the hedges and also slightly lower ASK. Impacting that figure, we're seeing that the airport charges and ATC charges is down more than 10%. That's because of good negotiations, good results from the airports. We're seeing handling charges down, partially due to lower ASK, but also good deals on the handling, good control of the cost, technical expenses also maintenance expenses also down. So overall, a good control of the cost, and it's really good to see that this is kind of our ambitions to have a really good cost control is -- we see that in the numbers.

Aircraft depreciation, obviously up a bit, and that's again because of the non-recurring element in Q1 last year. So it's not comparable figures. And then net financial items, a little bit up. That's mostly to do with unrealized losses on currencies relating to our cash balances in U.S. dollars. So overall, a good performance and a profit before tax then of NOK 459 million minus versus NOK 756 million last -- in the same quarter last year.

A few final words on the balance sheet in some more detail. We can see that the balance sheet is -- the total size of the balance sheet is increasing. That's mostly to do with the cash, which is building, NOK 4.1 billion of cash build during the quarter. That's seasonal, but it's really good to see that number, and it's driven largely by ticket sales, but also strong cash flow from operations. We see the equity going up by NOK 1.4 billion. Why is that? Yes, because it's -- we have a mark-to-market value of our hedges of more than NOK 2 billion, and you will see that in the other comprehensive income, which for some of you is interesting, but it's a technicality, but that is booked directly towards equity, which then increased our equity ratio from the end of the year from 18.2% to 19.1%.

And this is the net interest-bearing debt that we have talked about a few times, NOK 4.4 billion, down from NOK 9.5 billion, driven by lower lease debt liabilities, somewhat nearly NOK 1 billion and then, of course, the buildup of cash during the quarter. No aircraft deliveries in Q1 as planned. But as Geir said, we are -- we have a fleet ready for the summer season. So we're well positioned for that important season for us as we move forward. And again, we will pay dividend in May, subject to AGM approval. We think that will go through. So we are very happy to be able to distribute some cash to our dear shareholders.

Just finally on the cash flow, I think we talked a lot about that. Starting -- this is the pure cash going up by NOK 4.1 billion, and that's excluding the fixed income fund of NOK 1.1 billion nearly and deposit against the outstanding bond, which is due in the third quarter next year of NOK 1.5 billion. Ticket prepayment, NOK 3.6 billion seasonally, strong ticket sales, other operating activities, investment activities largely in Widerøe, but just on -- at a normalized level, about NOK 400 million, repayment of debt, regular debt on the aircraft, NOK 857 million and then finally, then ending up with a pure -- on a cash balance of NOK 11.6 billion. So a strong performance on the balance sheet, good cash flow as expected. So we are well placed going into the summer season. Thank you. Geir?

Okay. Let's look at the fleet for a little while. I look at the beautiful aircraft to the left with the new logo on. So that is how these aircrafts will look when we start -- when we have really started to take delivery of the brand new 737-MAX 8 aircraft. We have 80 aircraft on order, as you all know, 2 of them have been delivered. So 78 remains.

The fleet schedule will be, as you can see here on the bars, where we have 95 aircraft during this summer and it is increasing to 104 during the next couple of years. That is 4% to 5% growth, which is not aggressive at all, but we have the optionality where we can grow more than this if we want to, by then extending the leased aircraft that are scheduled to be redelivered to their owners. And thereby, we have a fantastic optionality. I love it, where we can grow in line with the market. So -- and then we will see how the market develops.

Boeing as such, is delivering on schedule, and that is great. The visibility towards Boeing is much better today than during the last couple of years. We have the aircraft we need, as Hans-Joergen also said, for the summer. The next deliveries post the coming summer. And we are now also considering the mix on how we're going to finance these aircrafts, how many should be owned and how many should be leased. As it looks today, we will probably own more than 50% of the fleet because that is more effective capital cost-wise. So that's the fleet. Not much news this quarter on this side.

A few words on Widerøe. Operational excellence, we have been through. Looking at the bookings in Widerøe for the current quarter, the second quarter, is well ahead. That's what we can say, year-over-year. We have been working since we became the best friends of Widerøe to work on the cost synergies. We have taken out a lot of cost synergies already. This is an ongoing work and will be for the next year or 2.

We are also looking into how we can optimize the fleet utilization between and across the 2 airlines. We have done and taken some steps. We will probably take more steps to make sure that we are as efficient as absolutely possible, also giving our customers a better product than what we are doing today. We are seeing the interlining traffic between Norwegian and Widerøe. It has been growing since the day we took over Widerøe, and it continues to grow. And we are taking kind of market share on that transfer traffic.

Also, again, very happy that we are finally live with the new booking platform in Norwegian. And as you can see on the right-hand side, you can now book a combination of Widerøe and Norwegian on our website, not yet on the app, but that will come very soon. Norwegian has the Program X. Widerøe has something similar. They call Focus 500. 500 means that they are targeting a NOK 500 million improvement -- underlying improvement in profitability out of 2027, and that is compared to a baseline in 2024. Looking at what they have been delivering so far, I'm very confident that the team and the colleagues in Widerøe will be able to deliver this over the next year or 2. That is on top of what we are doing in Norwegian when it comes to Program X.

Talking about Program X, not much news to share this quarter. As mentioned last time, we had NOK 900 million non-recurring. That's when we bought all these aircrafts, and we have NOK 400 million recurring in 2025. We have said that we are going to file another NOK 600 million effect in 2026. I have also said that we delivered close to NOK 200 million in the first quarter of 2026. NOK 100 million of those NOK 200 million is coming from the NOK 400 million from last year and NOK 100 million is coming from the NOK 600 million we will find in 2026.

I would say that Program X is on target. We are delivering, that is already shown in the figures in the fourth quarter. And then let's see down the road if we can up the target of NOK 1.25 billion out of 2027. The split on the areas we are working on is shown on the right-hand side here. It is more or less the same as we showed in the last quarter. Program X has a very high focus internally and it is now implemented throughout the whole organization, and it's also linked up to the overall strategy for the company, and it's really, really starting to deliver.

When it comes to capacity, 3% for the year. And then you can see the second, third and fourth quarter. If you remember last guiding we gave on capacity, I think Q4 was 2%. We have increased the capacity in the fourth quarter, partly because of the contract we have with the Norwegian Defense and that's the changes we have done on capacity. We have decided to keep the guiding on CASK, meaning that we are saying low single-digit percent increase versus prior year. That is adjusted then for the fact for the one-off effect we had last year where we acquired all these aircrafts and it's listed down here. So it's adjusted by NOK 858 million as such. So that's what you have to compare it to.

So to summarize, I think we are in a good place. Yes, we are struggling with high fuel prices. We have increased the fares. It seems like this is sticking with the customers. They are willing to pay slightly more for a travel. We have seen a peak demand actually post the Iran situation. It seems like the Southern and Southwest of Europe is very attractive. I have guided and said something about both load and yield. I think as an aggregate, this summer as per today is actually looking better than last year. So there is no signs of demand coming up. And then we will all have to follow how the situation in Iran evolves and how that will affect the fuel prices.

We have also used this quarter to increase the hedges on currency. So we are now 50% hedged approximately on U.S. dollars. And have in mind that Widerøe is also having a quite high hedge percentage, both on fuel and on currencies. So we are both airlines somewhat protected about -- against what we are seeing in the market.

I think that ends the presentation, Jesper.

Yes. We can also get Joergen out there. We'll then start with some questions from the audience.

Axel Jacobsen, Arctic. Several of your competitors have closed on capacity during --due to high fuel prices. Is this impacting you in any way?

Probably. Probably. We have seen at least -- I think at least 3 airlines canceling. One is SAS, 1,000 routes or flights, Lufthansa, 20,000. We are seeing lot in Poland canceling. So obviously, it's probably having an effect. Difficult to say how much. Yes.

Hans Elnæs, WINAIR. If we look beyond the summer months into the autumn and into the winter season '26, '27 in a continuous situation with a high jet fuel price. And then on top of that, a falling demand. Can you give some top line ideas on how you plan on mitigate this in terms of production cost, revenue and [indiscernible]?

Well, looking into, let's say, the summer is kind of taken care of, if you can say that, into the fall, based on what we are seeing in the booking curves, it's actually quite promising what we are seeing today. And internally, we have actually upgraded our forecast for the second half just very recently.

If you look at the forward curve on fuel, as you know, Hans Jørgen, it's a massive backwardation. So if you would like to today, let's say, from August or September to the end of the year to hedge the fuel, you can probably do that maybe even below $1,000 a tonne compared to a spot price today, I'm guessing is somewhere between $1,300 and $1,400 a tonne. So that is what we are up against, and we are thinking about should we just put on some hedges for the fourth quarter.

As you saw, we have actually increased the capacity in the fourth quarter compared to what we said a quarter ago. So that should tell you that it's looking quite promising. But we will probably put on more hedges for the second half this year, at least to take down the risk if this Iran situation should continue. But the demand side is -- there is nothing wrong with the demand as it looks today. But obviously, the booking curve is relatively short, visibility into the fall is not very high.

Okay. We'll then move on to some questions from the web. We'll start with one from Ole Martin Westgaard, DNB Carnegie. Are you able to compensate for the rising fuel cost and higher ticket prices? How do you see your competitors responding?

It seems like the closest competitors are more or less in the same situation as us. Some of them might even be lower on hedge than us. It seems like most of these closest competitors have increased their fares. And as mentioned here today, it seems like the passenger is actually accepting that the fares are higher and because the demand is still very strong.

Okay. We'll then move on to a couple of questions from Andrew Lobbenberg, Barclays. Strong underlying performance in the quarter. Was there anything unusual in the Q1 numbers, would you say? And just a question on how the PSO contracts work. Is there any trigger that we get compensated for higher fuel price?

Lot many questions in one. Something unusual, no.

Strong underlying performance.

This is pure a strong -- very strong performance. As mentioned, Widerøe is also quite high hedged, both on fuel and on currency. And other than that, if the fuel should stay at very high levels in a very long time, yes, there are clauses in the PSO contracts where you can renegotiate it, but that has not been done so far. It's, I would say, a relatively clean quarter for Widerøe.

Final question from him. What are the next steps on labor negotiations? Any big upcoming negotiations on the new baseline?

We have the negotiations with our pilots, both in Norway and in Denmark this coming forward.

Okay. Okay. Then we'll move on to some questions from Petter Nyström, ABG. On Page -- on Slide 15, you show a prepayment of NOK 3.6 billion versus NOK 3.8 billion last year, so lower prepayment this year. Any key insights to this, Hans-Joergen, effect and so on?

No, not really. It's just according just as planned. There is no particular reason for that variation. So I think things are just as we have planned it for. Okay. Yeah.

Okay. I'll then ask if there's any more questions from the audience. No. Okay. That will conclude the session. Thank you very much.

Thank you very much.

Good morning, and welcome to the Fourth Quarter 2025 presentation for the Norwegian Group. My name is Jesper Hatletveit and I'm the VP of Investor Relations here at Norwegian. Today's presentation will be held by our CEO, Geir Karlsen; and our CFO, Hans-Joergen Wibstad. The presentation will be followed by Q&A from the audience and the web. Please go ahead, Geir.

Thank you, Jesper. Good morning. Good morning to all of you following this also online. It is a beautiful morning in Oslo. It's the winter holiday coming up. I heard on the news on the way in here that 80,000 people is leaving Oslo today. And I know that quite a few of them are flying with Norwegian. So, it's a good day.

Going to the highlights for the quarter and also a little bit on the full year of 2025. EBIT of NOK 21 million. That is an improvement from last year. We have seen passenger growth in both airlines in the quarter. And we are continuing to do well on what we call operational excellence, where we are seeing an improved regularity and punctuality for both airlines compared to the same quarter last year.

On unit costs, as many of you know and remember, we have been guiding a flat CASK for 2025 as a whole, and that's also where we ended up. That means that the Q4 CASK is slightly up, but for the year, we are sticking to what we have been guiding over the last couple of quarters. 2025 as a whole, a very good year with an EBIT of NOK 3 billion in combination between the 2 airlines, EBIT of NOK 3.159 billion in Norwegian and NOK 585 million in Widerøe. That converts into an EBIT margin of 9.9%, which is historically strong for this company.

We are continuing to grow our network. In 2026, we will fly close to 500 routes between the 2 airlines. We are continuing to be among the best airlines in Europe when it comes to punctuality and we have very few cancellations, thereby the regularity is absolutely top notch regardless of who you compare us to. I'm going to share a little bit of information on the NPS score where we're also doing fine. And we are, after all, the airline with most direct routes from the Nordics to Europe. We are continuing to do well on the corporate side of the market. I will share some details on that as well. Spenn is starting to show results, and we are looking very much forward to bringing the Reitan Retail group into Spenn during the next weeks and a few months.

Also nice to have taken delivery of the first of 80 aircraft that we have on direct order with Boeing. We took delivery of the first one in October. That means that we have 79 remaining deliveries that will take place from now until 2031. This is aircraft that is brand new. They burn quite less fuel than the 737 NGs, 14% to 15%. And we are seeing a huge appetite from the leasing and financing community in order to finance these aircraft at terms that we look upon as very attractive. We are, as mentioned many times, planning to own a significant share of this fleet ourselves because it reduces the ownership cost for the years to come.

Dividend is had news I can see this morning. We started to pay dividend, as you know, in 2025. The liquidity position at the end of the year, NOK 10 billion. The liquidity position today is higher. We ended the year with an equity ratio of 18.2%. And we also spent quite a lot of time in 2025 to work on the balance sheet. As you remember, we acquired 13 aircraft that were currently leased to Norwegian. And by that, we booked the profit, and we also are looking forward to having a recurring reduced ownership costs on these aircraft as long as we keep them.

We also repaid the corporate debt in 2025, and we distributed our first dividend. For 2025 with a payout in 2026, we would like to pay NOK 0.8 per share in dividend. That converts into a payout ratio of 31%. And this is, of course, subject to an approval by the upcoming AGM taking place in May. I'm sure Hans-Joergen will share a little bit more on that. A little bit statistics, 6.2 million passengers in the quarter, 0.4% up year-on-year. Very happy to see the load factor especially in Norwegian, 86%, 2% up. And also, very happy to see the punctuality and regularity in both airlines, I would say, massively up compared to the same quarter last year. And this shows that the efforts that we are putting in place on this area is starting really to have an effect. So now it's all about making sure that we can continue this strong performance in the quarters to come. Very happy about that.

This is a chart that we have been showing you for quite a few quarters. This shows the seasonality that we are exposed to in Norwegian. It also shows that we are adjusting capacity between the seasons. And we did actually in the fourth quarter of 2025, reduce the capacity with 3%. That is because we thought that we were then more aligned with the demand, with the market as we saw it. And I think we did quite well. We saw a load factor, as mentioned, coming up to 86%, and we also saw the yield coming up with 4%.

This trend has also continued into January, where we have seen a load up 4% and with a significant higher unit revenue. So, all in all, we are happy with the last months, including January. I'll come back to the period in front of us. Also, for Widerøe, again, very happy with the operational performance, a very strong quarter, more than 1 million passengers, up 2%. I'm very happy to see that Widerøe in the fourth quarter is definitely contributing to the result for the fourth quarter, delivering an EBIT of NOK 124 million. Also worth mentioning that Widerøe had a great, fantastic 2025 with the best results ever.

Looking forward to the left, 7 days rolling sales figures on passengers. As you can see on the red line, we are ahead of the curve compared to 2024. That said, you know that we have reduced the capacity in the first quarter compared to the first quarter last year. And then we are going to ramp up into the second quarter, increasing the capacity with 6%. So have that in mind when you're looking at the curves, but we are very happy with the New Year's sales campaign and the bookings are continuing to look promising into the rest of the low season and into the second quarter.

Looking at the revenue on the right-hand side, this is travel from February to June. And as you can see there as well, we are ahead on the red curve there, we are ahead compared to the previous years. And if you look at March and April as one because of the Easter effect, we could say that during the next months in total, we are up both on load and on yield. And that looks very promising also heading into the last portion of the low season and into the spring and the summer season. So as per today, we have sold 250,000 tickets more than the same period last year. Yes, I know that we have a 6% capacity increase in Q2, but the load is up more than 6% heading into the second quarter. So, it's looking promising for the months to come and into high season.

A little bit on the NPS score. As you can see, the NPS score has moved from 38.5 to 50.1 in 2025. NPS of 50 is a really strong factor. NPS is really a tool we use to measure loyalty, customer loyalty. And this shows that we have a strong, loyal and engaged customer base. We are spending a lot of time communicating with our customers. We know exactly what matters the most for our customers. On top of the list is punctuality, as I have mentioned, we are doing well in both airlines, I would say. Another one that is extremely important is our ability to help our customers when things go wrong. And unfortunately, sometimes things go wrong, and we have done massively improvements on that area as well during the last couple of years. Now it starts to have an effect on the NPS score.

And of course, helpful staff, service-minded, friendly. We have a fantastic staff in Norwegian that applies both to our great colleagues flying in the air and as well as our colleagues on ground. Customer initiatives, obviously, punctuality, where we are doing great. And we have, as mentioned many, many times, very high regularity. We had close to 0 cancellations. On the rewards side, we are also performing well. Spenn is starting to show results. And I think you should anticipate that we will come with news on the rewards side during the next weeks and months that I think will be attractive to our dear customers. And as well on customer care, we are doing quite much better today than last year and the year before, and that is also starting to show results, not at least into the NPS.

Corporate. Corporate is actually a little bit interesting because it shows, if you look at the Avinor figures, it shows that the corporate market is definitely not back compared to the pre-pandemic levels, 60% below still. And a little bit interesting as well is that 2025 is actually showing a reduction in corporate travels according to Avinor by 2%. However, if we look at the Norwegian figures, we are up in 2025, both on number of passengers and the revenue. That shows that we are continuing to take market share.

The chart on the right-hand side shows that we are up 8% on revenue, and that includes both an increase in yield towards these passengers as well as an increase in number of passengers, so it includes both. When we are talking to the big corporates, more and more of these corporates are now saying that they are flying more than 50% of their travels with Norwegian. And they're also mentioning the importance of, as mentioned many times today, punctuality and regularity.

We are also doing a bet in Sweden. The Swedish market is moving, I would say, in the right direction. Also happy to share that we signed a 4-year contract with Swedish government through Kammarkollegiet that started up in September 2025. And looking at the performance on that contract as per today, it looks promising.

Initiatives ahead that we haven't taken out any effects of yet is the new -- the so-called new distribution platform that we are launching these days. This will also give us the ability to do interlining, proper interlining. And the first airline coming up is obviously Widerøe, but it gives us also the ability to interline with others if we should wish so. So hopefully, we can get live with that as soon as absolutely possible.

So, the corporate market is showing progress. We are continuing to take market share, and this is a focus area for this -- for both airlines in the months and quarters ahead because we think it is an attractive part of the market. It's high yielding, and it can also take down the variations between the different seasons.

Thank you, Geir. Good morning, everyone. Nice to see you here and also the ones on the web. So, I will go through the financial results for the fourth quarter '25 in some more detail as well as addressing some of the full year results. As mentioned, revenues came in at NOK 8.5 billion for the quarter, which is up 4% compared with the same period last year and Widerøe contributing a nice NOK 2 billion to that number. What's driving that is really a robust traffic figures across the group. We're seeing that the unit revenue is up 6% year-over-year, both on the back of higher loads as well as higher yields and then also Widerøe having a good quarter.

So, meaning that the quarterly operating result for the group ended at NOK 21 million plus, which is up from a negative figure last year. And with -- of course, as mentioned by Geir, Widerøe contributing very nicely and with Norwegian just marginally negative with NOK 91 million and then with Widerøe with NOK 124 million.

Full year result, a great result for Norwegian earnings before tax of NOK 3.016 billion. Very happy to see that figure, EBIT margin of 9.9%. And then going back to Widerøe, a great result from Widerøe, significant improvement from last year. Last year, 2024, that is, was a good year, 2025, even better. And there actually bottom-line result is NOK 528 million before tax, so it's a good combination between the 2 airlines.

Unit revenue, full year unit revenue as guided previously at NOK 0.5. Happy to see that figure. I think we've been quite predictable in our guidance. We've taken down the guidance through the year, and we're ending up exactly where we had hoped to be. I think it's good to see also that the cost control in the business during 2025 has been good. We have had very few surprises. And I think that really is encouraging for a strong organization to continue to deliver predictable cost levels.

Needless to say, the unit or the CASK is impacted by the transactions on the aircraft where we purchased 13 aircraft during the year. And then we -- as a consequence of that, we reversed some of the maintenance reserves related to these leases. So that obviously impacts the CASK, but a good level and as guided. So happy to see that.

I think very important for 2025 was the cleanup of the balance sheet. We're now coming out of the -- of 2025, we really have a balance sheet which is well-positioned for the activities ahead of us. We did repay the corporate debt, the legacy debt. We got rid of the convertible bond. We got cleared with what -- on the government ownership that held a portion of the convertible bond. So there now they sold out.

We did the aircraft transactions, which is a very good use of the balance sheet, bringing down the cost as we move forward. We came into the year with owning 4 aircraft, now we own 17 aircraft, which is a really good -- on the way to -- on our ambition to own a much higher portion of the fleet. And finally, of course, that enabled us to pay a dividend last year, which we have worked very hard to do.

So, and then with all these transactions, we're still coming out with a very robust balance sheet with a liquidity position of NOK 10.1 billion. That includes some short-term investment and also deposit for the outstanding bond. Equity ratio, a solid 18.2%. And then very happy to announce the NOK 0.8 dividend equal to a payout ratio of 31%. It's actually an increase of 33% from last year, a total of NOK 844 million. So happy to see that. And then we're sort of setting the stage for being a business that gives priority to dividend as we move forward, balancing the dividend amount with the investment requirements, so of course, very happy to have that and being our second dividend for the company.

All right. So that's kind of the broader summary. Revenues. Obviously, we see from quarter-to-quarter last year coming from NOK 6.4 billion for Norwegian to NOK 6.6 billion, obviously driven by lower CASK, but we see the benefit of the lower capacity on the yields as well as the load factor coming up. Then just a small other factor, bringing the total revenue to NOK 6.6 billion, adding a very nice contribution from Widerøe and then ending up with a group revenue of NOK 8.5 billion.

A little bit of a deep dive into the P&L. On the top line, we can clearly see operating revenues going up by 4%. We're seeing that the cost lines are as expected. We have the personnel cost expenses, which are up as expected due to the salary increases, both particularly among the flying crew. So, no unexpected events there. We see the aviation fuel at a pretty stable level. We have the benefit of the weaker U.S. dollar and also lower fuel price, but we also have additional costs relating to the ETS allowance -- reduced ETS allowance and increased SAF mandate.

The increase in the airport and ATC charges as well known. We talked about that for several quarters. Up 16% compared with the same period last year, bringing us down to an EBIT of NOK 21 million that we just mentioned compared with minus NOK 93 million last year and then with a bottom line result of minus NOK 16 million versus minus NOK 233 million last year. So, a good improvement, of course, seasonally impacted by -- particularly on the Norwegian side with Widerøe being kind of the stabilizing factor, having a more stable quarterly variation. So overall, we're happy. It's a good fourth quarter for Norwegian.

Looking at the full year, obviously, very happy to see the earnings before tax of NOK 3.016 billion, just about NOK 3 billion, nice improvement on operating revenues, 7%. Personnel expenses, we talked about that several times. Same on the aviation fuel, some headwind, some tailwind on that. And then the airport charges, as we've talked about so many times, coming up -- going up by 21%, so a good result. Obviously, aircraft lease depreciation and amortization, quite a bit down, impacted by these 13 aircraft purchases where we reversed previous maintenance reserves relating to the leases, having kind of obviously a very positive impact on the depreciation line. Then we have the EBIT of NOK 3.7 billion and the profit before tax of NOK 3.016 million, a significant improvement from 2024.

Balance sheet. This is between the quarters, not a big difference between each of the quarters. Really, total assets is literally the same. We did take delivery of 2 aircrafts in the quarter, impacting tangible assets slightly. But otherwise, other than that, no big differences. Seasonally down on the cash balance. I'll come back to that in a minute, but in a very strong position. And as Geir mentioned earlier, since the end of the quarter, since the end of the year, it's seasonally up as we always expected. So we are in a good position.

Final comment on the balance sheet. We're happy to see that the group on the aircraft -- air traffic settlement liabilities, it's up by 6%. That's kind of proof that our -- the sales is better than last year. And we're happy to see that number, and that matches very well with the load curve and the load figures that Geir just mentioned. And then with an equity ratio of 18.2%, pretty much the same as at the end of the previous quarter.

Net interest-bearing debt, slightly up by NOK 1.1 billion, driven by a seasonal reduction in cash and also the aircraft financing related to the delivery of the 2 aircraft. So total control of net interest-bearing debt in a very good position. And we are, as a business, literally debt-free with the exception of the aircraft financing. There is a little bit of small debt in Widerøe. But with that exception, all these transactions that we actually undertook during 2025 has left Norwegian without corporate debt. And that's a really good position to be in as we move into 2026 and the years beyond, where we have a lot of deliveries and great financing deals ahead of us for the financing of the aircraft fleet growth.

Again, going back to the dividend, happy to see that we can announce subject to AGM approval, of course, NOK 0.8 equal to a payout ratio of 31%, an increase of 33% compared with 2024 and kind of signaling a strong commitment from the Norwegian to shareholders that we would like to continue to have a dividend-friendly mindset on that. Having a responsible level of dividend as we move forward.

Final comments on the cash. I think we talked through that a lot, not very big variations, largely driven by normal seasonal variations with the cash going from -- that is -- this is the cash excluding the short-term interest investments as well as the money placed on deposit for the retained claim bonds with the cash going from NOK 7.8 billion or NOK 7.9 billion to NOK 7.4 billion, reduction in prepayment seasonal. Good operational cash flow, normal level of investments and then also a normal level of financing activities in the quarter.

It's also worth noting that we have prepaid to date NOK 3.6 billion of the order book that we have with Boeing, and we have very, very limited remaining prepayments before 2028 of less than NOK 0.5 billion. So overall, we are in a robust financial situation. And I think 2025, also from a balance sheet point of view and how we've been driving the debt levels down and getting rid of the corporate that has been a good outcome, enabling us also to pay dividend. Thank you.

Okay. The way forward. To the left, you can see a beautiful picture from when we took delivery of the first of the 80 aircrafts in Seattle in October. We are very cost conscious. We're not planning to do deliveries as glossy as that on all the aircrafts. So, this is -- this was a special occasion. It's the first aircraft. And this aircraft also delivered with a new logo, the new Norwegian logo, which looks fantastic, I have to say. But on the aircraft side, these new 737 MAX 8s are burning less fuel, which is extremely important. It also delivers a better experience for the customers and for the employees in Norwegian with less noise. So, it's just a better product on many areas. We are also very comfortable on the fleet that we need for the upcoming summer. We are having one delivery prior to the summer, which we expect to happen within the next few weeks. And then we are all set on the fleet side for what looks like a good summer coming up.

I like the optionality that we have also on the fleet side. As you can see on the chart, we still have quite a few 737 NGs. Most of them are leased. And looking at the growth for the coming years, building the fleet from 95 aircraft in the upcoming summer to 104, we have the flexibility of potentially extending the leased aircraft if we should wish so. And if the market allows, we could grow more aggressively. That's an optionality we like, and we like to play that in the next coming years. We have also done quite a few acquisitions during 2025 of the leased aircraft. And if opportunities comes up on similar basis, we are more than welcoming that and time will show whether that will materialize. But that is the fleet side.

I'm also going to share a little bit more on Program X this time. In 2025, Program X delivered NOK 1.3 billion, NOK 900 million of that is what we call nonrecurring. The majority of that includes the profit that we booked on the acquisitions of the 13 aircraft. And the portion of that also is included in the NOK 400 million, which is recurring, and which will take down the ownership costs on these aircraft going forward. In 2026, we do expect to materialize NOK 600 million in effect from Program X. So, in total, in 2026, you will have NOK 1 billion recurring effects coming out of Program X.

If you take that NOK 1 billion and look at the pie chart on the right-hand side there, that is how it divides. So, 22% is applicable to the fleet side, acquisitions of the aircraft. 32% is coming from the new distribution platform and the revenue opportunities that gives us. That also includes the interlining capabilities that, that will bring. And we will start interlining with Widerøe as soon as absolutely possible. Group synergies is synergies between the 2 airlines that includes facilities. It includes organizational synergies and not at least the procurement synergies that we are seeing on the basis of the fact that we are a bigger company with more power towards our vendors.

Also on the cost control, it includes the huge areas in the airline. It includes the whole fuel value chain. It includes the ground ops operation that is quite significant. It also includes another big area, which is crew efficiency and how we utilize our crew. And it also includes, as mentioned, the whole value chain around fuel, not talking about the fuel price, but everything else related to fuel, including the handling of fuel, et cetera. We have, during the last quarters, been guiding more than NOK 1 billion in effect in what you call profitability improvement. We are increasing that to more than NOK 1.25 billion as per today, and then we will see during the next quarters how that delivers. So I would say that Program X is delivering in accordance to plan and happy to kind of increase the guiding slightly this time.

Finally, outlook. On capacity, 3% up for the year as a whole. We are -- we have reduced capacity in the first quarter, but then we are going into a ramp-up period for the remaining 3 quarters in 2026. On unit costs, we are saying low single-digit percentage increase versus prior year. But have in mind, comparing to prior year, we are adjusting for the nonrecurring effect in CASK in 2025. So, the basis for the low single-digit increase is a CASK of NOK 0.52. We have been writing it at the bottom of the page. So have that in mind.

All in all, 2025 was a good year. 2026 is also looking to be a quite good year for actually both airlines. Hopefully, we can beat 2025. That ends the presentation. Jesper?

Thank you. Hans-Joergen as well, if you can come up. We'll then start with some questions. We'll start with the audience. Any questions here? We'll start with Hans Jørgen.

A few questions for me. Happy to note that you did the best year ever in '25. Congratulations for that. Also very happy to learn that the new distribution platform is now soon in place. That's something we have been waiting for quite some time. And that will open up for able to sell into Widerøe. Can you explain a bit about that? Does that only apply on your own booking engine? Or will it go on the GDS travel agent and so on use? And will this also open up for interlining that other airlines like long-haul airlines, Sai, Singapore Airlines, British Airways or Finnair that you can do agreement with them so you can fly passengers to their points in and out of Europe and how are your plans with that?

Also, Wizz Air has recently tested what they call WIZZ Class, which is a kind of copy pass past of SIS, new Europe business class product where you block the middle seats. This was a success and Wizz Air this week informed that they will roll this out on all their routes in Europe. What is the Norwegian plans for this segment as you are so keen on improving your corporate and premium leisure sales? And then the last one is on Starlink. Starlink is Southwest just will fit Starlink on all the 810 aircraft. Norwegian has a Wi-Fi system today, which is aircraft ground based. Do you have any plans to migrate to Starlink because it seems like Starlink is going to be like a standard for the aviation, for the airlines going forward?

Let's start with the first one. Yes, the new distribution platform is delayed. No doubt about that. But we are now currently, as we speak, running a so-called AB testing where 50% of our customers is going to the new platform and 50%, and then we will test the conversion. Hopefully, that shows good results, and then we can go live in all the 3, let's say, important markets, meaning Norway, Sweden and Denmark. That will give us the ability to do interlining with Widerøe. That means that we will also be able to sell Widerøe on Norwegian's platform. We think that that will definitely have an effect, so do Widerøe. When it comes to interlining with -- when it comes to kind of the SAS portion of that, what we are seeing is that the transfer passengers between Widerøe and Norwegian or Wider or SAS is developing in the right direction for us, meaning that passengers going to assess aircraft is going down, it's going up for us. And that is, I would say, as expected.

We are not planning to go the risk direction by blocking the middle seat. As you saw today, we had in the fourth quarter, 86% load, which is very promising. That said, what you -- I think you could say that what you are seeing in the, let's call it, the ultra-low-cost market or low-cost market, if you include the U.S., is the fact that the low-cost carriers are actually moving towards the legacy players offering a more premium product, not all the way, but partly moving in that direction. And that is actually the position that we have today in Norwegian. So, we are very happy with the position that we are currently having, where we feel that we are -- where we think we are actually having a better product than the ultra-low-cost guys. So that is -- so we are very happy about that. What was the last one?

It was about Starlink.

Starlink. Yes, we are seeing that a few players are making a lot of media attention on Starlink. I mean we are upgrading our Wi-Fi system on board our aircraft. As per today, Starlink is not even certified for a 737 MAX. And then we will see down the road how we -- what we decide to do. But right now, we are staying with what we have, but on an upgraded version.

And just one comment before we get the next one, you didn't answer my question on Norwegian's plans of interlining with other airlines outside the group. Is there anything in that we can see in the near future to happen?

Yes. First of all, we would like to come into a position where we can actually do interlining, and we are now very close of being in that position. I've said earlier that we are in dialogue with a few of the airlines that are currently flying into Scandinavia. And then we'll see. It depends on a few things, not at least a commercial agreement and whether that makes sense for us. It brings complexity into our operation, and we need to get paid for that complexity. So that is the status.

Move to the next question, Tomas?

Tomas Helgo from Danske. On airport and ATC costs, now that some airports have put out their price increases for this year compared to last. How much of an increase can we expect this year compared to 2025? And then I have a follow-up question after that.

This is a constant, I would say, dialogue that we have, first of all, here in Norway with Avinor. And they have had over the last couple of years, quite aggressive cost increases, fee increases. For 2026, it looked quite bad during the period. But how we ended up was in a much better place meaning it's a single-digit increases on the fees. It's, I have said many times that I think we need to be careful when we are looking at the cost level at, for example, Avinor and the fee increases they are bringing on to us and other airlines in a way that we have to be careful. So, we're not kind of pricing us out of the market. And the fact is that neither us or SAS, which is our main competitor is actually growing in Norway these days. And Avinor fees is a factor in that picture. And we are free to move aircraft where we want, and we have also been moving aircraft around in 2026 compared to 2025. So this is a constant. I'm calling it the dialogue. It's a tough dialogue.

And then on the follow-up question regarding carbon quotes for prices, are actually regarding the need to acquire these quotes for 2026. Have you hedged a portion of that? Or is it, do you pay kind of spot prices when needed?

The policy that we have is to stay current. So meaning that when you have been flying a month, you buy the quotes for that month and then by that, you are staying current. Right as we speak, we are more or less covered for 2025 because we have been expecting that the prices for those quotes to come down. And as we discussed with you this morning, what you have seen just during the last couple of weeks is that the price has come down from, let's say, mid-90s down to mid-70s. Why has that happened? Yes, because it is a speculation that that EU will postpone or even keep the free quotas, not for the airline industry but for other industries. And that's why you are seeing a selling off of these quotas over the last weeks. That is an opportunity for us. Should we take the benefit of that opportunity and buy more? Maybe.

So I think both on that area also within -- on the currency side, we have seen, as many of you have seen, the dollar weakening. I think we have some -- there is some tailwind both on ETS and on the development of the strengthening of the Norwegian kroner weakening of the U.S. dollar, which at the moment is, has a positive impact for Norwegian.

I then think we move on to some questions from the web. Start with Ole Martin Vasa from DNB Carnegie. Can you comment on the current competitive landscape? And adding to that, how do you see industry capacity growth in 2026? Is there a risk that the capacity growth represents potentially any negative yield impact?

I think the short answer on that, Jesper, is that the competitive landscape is, I would say, relatively stable in the markets where we are flying.

We move over to -- I think actually, we move over to a question from Andrew Lobbenberg there. Competitive pressure from SAS specifically, okay, growing quite a bit in Copenhagen. Do you see any pressure from that?

I mean SAS is our main competitor, and it's a constant fight between the 2 airlines. And yes, they are moving. They are focusing very much on Copenhagen. So what we need to do in Copenhagen is just to make sure that we are treated fair in kind of as a main hub. But the fact that they are moving towards Copenhagen as a hub also gives Norwegian an opportunity. And that's why we are coming up with a slogan, Why Connect When You Can Fly Direct. And that is, it's a slogan but it's an opportunity, a big time.

Another question from Andrew. The outlook for Widerøe and Widerøe margins into 2026 coming out of a strong 2025. How big of, call it, an impact or how big of a factor is the PSO subsidies to PSO Widerøe to this?

Well, I mean the PSO routes is performing well also due to the fact that the ticket prices has been reduced by 50%. That continues into 2026. And then the opportunity that we have between the airlines is to make sure that the commercial part of Widerøe can be even better aligned with the Norwegian network going forward. So we can actually increase the performance from the commercial part of Widerøe. But looking into 2026, as mentioned here on Norwegian and the bookings and how the market is developing, it looks equally as promising for Widerøe in 2026 as 2025 turned out to deliver.

Final question from Andrew. Outlook for cost of revenues given the current or the recent strengthening of the NOK.

Yes. I think, obviously, we -- the fact, as I mentioned, the quite significant weakening of the U.S. dollar has a big impact on our cost base. We're hedged just above 20%, 25% at the moment at good levels. They've come further down. So, I think that is something which has to go into the spreadsheets of the analysts to factor in a, should we believe in a continued weaker dollar, which a lot of analysts believe and also the consensus is, that should impact our CASK and also our cost level positively during 2026.

And have in mind that 40%, 45% of our cost is in U.S. dollars and that converts into the fact that NOK 0.10 on the NOK is more than NOK 100 million on the bottom line. And it's not only obviously on the CASK, it's also the fuel CASK, including fuel.

Then we move on to a question from Petter Nyström, ABG. Interest costs, it was a bit up in the fourth quarter. Is this a representative level for the coming quarters? And how is the interest cost impacted by new aircraft entering?

I mean that is the answer to the question. We're adding aircraft, and that is really the reason for why interest costs are up. And so the net interest is coming, is developing not negatively, but as expected on the cost side. So it's really only the impact of the additional aircraft that is impacting that. There may be some also currency fluctuations, particularly in Widerøe on the net financial cost. But overall, it's purely impacted at the moment on the increase or changes in the aircraft fleet.

That's the final question we have from the web. I'll ask again if there are any questions from the audience. There are none. So that means that we conclude the session. Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Good morning, and welcome to the third quarter presentation for the Norwegian Group. My name is Jesper Hatletveit, and I am the VP of Investor Relations here at Norwegian. Today's presentation will be held by our CEO, Geir Karlsen; and our CFO, Hans-Joergen Wibstad. The presentation will be followed by Q&A from the audience and the web. Please go ahead, Geir.

Thank you very much, Jesper. Good morning to all of you. Good to see you. Also good morning to you listening in online. Let's start with some highlights for the quarter.

The third quarter ended as a good quarter for the group, both for Norwegian and for Widerøe. We ended the quarter with an EBT of NOK 2.891 billion, the EBIT of NOK 3.071 billion for the group divided on Norwegian with an EBIT of NOK 2.797 billion, and Widerøe also contributing very well during the quarter with an EBIT of NOK 274 million. This is a significant improvement compared to the same quarter last year. There we -- this year ended with a margin of 25.1% versus 18.4% last year. It's an historic high quarterly EBT and EBIT for the group.

Also, unit cost, excluding fuel, down 6% year-on-year. And Program X is really starting to deliver. We have done quite a few things on the fleet side. As you know, I'll come back to more details on Program X later in the presentation.

We have had some tailwind on macros, not at least on the U.S. dollar compared to the Norwegian krona. As mentioned, Widerøe really delivering this quarter. Passenger records in the third quarter with a 9% passenger growth compared to the same period last year. Widerøe has also been having a solid operation during the quarter with a high on-time performance as well as a high regularity. EBIT, up NOK 82 million year-on-year, and as such, a really good quarter as well.

Especially very nice to see that the commercial network in Widerøe is delivering well, and that has been something that we have been looking forward to and now we are seeing a good performance. Finally, Widerøe is now a member of Norwegian Reward, and we do expect an effect from that as well in the weeks and months and years to come.

Norwegian is also delivering well on operations, very few cancellations, and we are still ranked among the top European airlines when it comes to operational excellence and on-time performance.

Net Promoter Score is close to 50. That is a constant battle to make sure that we are offering a good service to our customers. And this is also an opportunity to give a big thank you to all the flying crew, especially, and our colleagues taking care of our aircraft during a very hectic high season during the year.

We are still capturing corporate, let's say, market share on the corporate side of the business. Spend is expanding with more activities, more numbers, and we are really looking forward to onboarding live the Reitan Group, which will hopefully happen by the end of this year and at the latest during the first quarter of 2026.

We are continuing to receive awards. The latest one was the best -- as the best European airline at the Danish Travel Awards just a couple of weeks back. That shows that our customers are really appreciating the product that we are offering and the network that we are flying.

We used the quarter as well to declare the 30 options that we have been talking about for quite a while, and we now have a firm order of 80 Boeing 737 MAX-8 that will deliver from now until the end of 2031. We have done some small amendments to the delivery schedule for these 80 aircraft, aligning it with the growth path we would like to have and aligning it better with the redeliveries that we have or part of the current fleet that are leased.

Boeing is really delivering aircraft these days. We have already taken 12 aircraft so far this year out of 13. The last one, the 13th, will be delivered during the very next days. So it's really nice to see that the production line in Boeing is working well these days, and that is what we expect also for the months and the years to come.

Balance sheet wise, we paid out our first dividend in history during the quarter of NOK 0.9 per share to our close to 75,000 shareholders; very also nice to be able to pay down the legacy bonds and good to see that the Norwegian government that really helped us through the pandemic has got back their money with a nice positive nominal return.

We also used the quarter to buy back more aircraft. So this quarter, we bought back 3 aircraft of the aircraft we are currently flying, booking a nonrecurring gain as well as a recurring gain for the years to come.

Looking at the traffic figures. 7.6 million passengers during the quarter between the 2 airlines. On load, the load is more or less on par with what we saw in the same quarter last year. But passenger wise, we are up 3%. Again, very good to see the solid performance operationally by Widerøe with a punctuality of 91.8% and the regularity of 98.2%. Normally, we are seeing in Norwegian a reduction in punctuality in the high season, which is very hectic. And it ended this quarter with 77.8%. It is actually up 3.6% compared to the same quarter last year. Regularity, 99.3%, continues to stay strong and stay high. That is also due to hard work from a lot of colleagues in Norwegian and Widerøe.

Traffic figures. Again, we have a 2% increase in capacity, record high unit revenue. As mentioned, we are up on yield, and we are marginally up on load. And very nice to see the strong September with a load of 86.5% and a yield of 0.91. We are also seeing solid demand for the months to come into the winter season.

A little bit of the same for Widerøe. Really strong quarter, 1.125 million passengers, 9% up compared to the same quarter last year. Very stable load with increase in number of passengers as mentioned, and also a couple of records during the 4 last months, 1 passenger record on a monthly basis in June, as you can see, which was actually beaten marginally, though, in September.

We are continuing to see an increase in the interlining traffic between Norwegian and Widerøe. It's up 30% over the last 12 months compared to the previous 12 months. And again, Widerøe contributing with NOK 274 million in EBIT, up NOK 82 million year-on-year. What we have done this quarter is -- or this summer actually is to align the 2 networks in a better way, meaning that Widerøe has been flying more domestically compared to earlier years, freeing up 737s in Norwegian so that we can put that capacity into the summer, typical summer leisure destinations. That is probably something we will also do going forward and to optimize the network between the 2 airlines in such a way.

Also, again, Widerøe, finally, part of Norwegian Reward. We have an ongoing top-tier status match between Widerøe -- between Norwegian Reward. The Strawberry club as well as, of course, EuroBonus.

Booking figures. As you can see on the top right-hand side of the slide, this is the 7-day rolling sale figures on number of passengers. As you can see, the 2025 curve is more or less aligned with 2024. So we're seeing the same development. We are going into this winter with 5% less capacity than last year. So we feel that we have aligned now the capacity with how we are optimizing the networks. And we think that this is the right capacity going into what you can call a low season.

As per today, we have sold more tickets compared to the same date last year. And as such, for all months from November to March, we are today higher on load and we are also higher on yield. So the winter season, the low season, I would say, is looking comfortable. And then we will see how this is going to develop over the next few months. Hans-Joergen.

Thank you, Geir. Good morning, everyone. Great to see you here. So I will go through the quarterly result in somewhat more detail as usual and also go through the balance sheet where there has been quite a few changes during this quarter, both due to the aircraft acquisitions, but also things that we have done on the debt side and equity side.

Like we said, so the group had a good revenue growth of -- at -- up 6% to NOK 12.3 billion during -- compared with last year and also Widerøe contributing very nicely with NOK 2.1 billion. That is driven, obviously, by a very good strong traffic across the group with both capacity up by 2%, total unit revenue up by 4%, which is a really important KPI, and I'll come back to that in a minute. And also, it's marginally higher load. And as Geir said, the Widerøe is delivering also a solid top line development.

The quarterly result is really strong this quarter as you have -- many of you have noticed already with a group EBIT of NOK 3.071 billion, which is an improvement from approximately NOK 2.1 billion in the same quarter last year. So a really big lift there, and that's driven by a few things that I will revert to later in the presentation. Operating margin to 25.1% and with Norwegian contributing approximately NOK 2.8 billion versus NOK 1.9 billion last year. And also, as was mentioned, a very, very strong contribution by Widerøe delivering NOK 274 million versus NOK 192 million in the same quarter last year.

So Widerøe with a strong performance, also, as we talked about earlier, a bit of a slow start on Widerøe in the year, but have really picked up and delivering a solid result and actually improving quite a bit from the third quarter of last year. The aircraft fleet initiatives is really -- we're leveraging on that this quarter. We acquired 3 additional aircraft, bringing the total number of aircraft that we have actually purchased this quarter -- sorry, this year to 14 and bringing the total fleet to 17 aircraft that we own.

So we started the year with 4 and now we are at 17, and that's part of the strategy to own more aircraft. And I think we've been able to leverage that very nicely in the quarter, which also is contributing with a gain relating to the reversal of kind of lease liabilities in our balance -- in our P&L, which we also saw the same -- impact we saw also in the first quarter with the 10 first aircraft.

Unit cost at NOK 0.42, a reduction of 6%, very happy with that as well. I think we're happy with the cost control. We have seen -- like Project X, we've seen -- Program X, sorry, we've also seen other initiatives, which enables us to have very good cost control. And of course, with the aircraft fleet initiatives also contributing to the good unit cost level. It's a quarter with a lot of balance sheet changes, as we have talked about with -- but we're coming out of the quarter with a liquidity position of NOK 10.5 billion.

We have done the bond repayment. We paid the dividend. And also, we've added 5 leased aircraft. And also, we have -- the aircraft that we have acquired also has an impact on the balance sheet. But all of -- the whole exercise is coming up just as planned, and we're coming out with a robust cash and liquidity position.

As mentioned, very happy to finally announce then the dividend that we talked about during -- over several quarters that we were working to achieve -- to get in that position.

And we were able to do that through the repayment of the legacy bound. We call the retained claim bonds. We repaid ordinary NOK 1.5 billion and deposited the other NOK 1.5 billion, and then we were able to get ourselves into a dividend position. And that is hard work and good planning. And we're happy that, that process, which we started at the beginning of the year ended in a very good way.

The first phase of that was obviously to retire the hybrid convertible bond in the second quarter. And then the last bit of that was obviously the retained claim bond and also the dividend payment that we ultimately did in August.

Just a few more details on the top line. Obviously, we can see that the -- it's a very nice increase in Norwegian, 5%, driven by volume increase, yield increase of 3% and then load factor marginally up by 0.3 percentage points and bringing us to NOK 10.2 billion. And then with Widerøe contributing with NOK 2 billion, driven by very strong growth figures on the passenger side, and the total revenue then at NOK 12.2 billion or NOK 12.3 billion for the group.

Going to the EBIT bridge that we normally go through, we can easily see here the contribution from the volume impact, the increase in yield and load for the quarter, contributing a combined NOK 361 million. Then a fuel price, obviously, lower fuel price, lower U.S. dollar, but countered by higher ETS costs and also on the SAF blending mandate, which has a negative impact. But overall, fuel price and fuel contributing positively. We have the normal kind of underlying inflation and FX impact, NOK 245 million negative, other gains and losses, which is the balance sheet adjustment to the -- relating to the FX adjustment. And then we have the relatively large impact of NOK 528 million on depreciation and amortization of lease, which relates to the reversal of the lease liabilities on the NOK 269 million on the 3 purchased aircraft. We have delayed compensation relating to the delays that we have experienced with in the past. And also, finally, there are a number of other factors, including FX wet lease, the fact that we now own more aircraft. So it's a combination. But in total, that is contributing NOK 528 million.

Positive, bringing Norwegian EBIT to NOK 2.8 billion approximately. And then Widerøe with a very nice increase, NOK 82 million, up from last quarter -- or same quarter last year, to NOK 274 million, and then the total EBIT to NOK 3.071 billion.

I will not repeat all the numbers on the P&L because I think we've been through it all. For the most part, revenue up by 6%, obviously, to NOK 12.252 billion. Personnel expenses not a big increase. Fuel obviously impacted, as I mentioned earlier, on the ETS allowance and also the SAF mandate, but at a pretty flattish level. Airport charges and ATC charges up 15%, quite a high increase, and we have talked about that in earlier quarters. We've been able to reduce that somewhat through smart routing and other measures. So that's -- it's good to see that this number was actually -- the increase in the second quarter was higher than in the first quarter.

Handling charges, pretty much on par with last year. Technical maintenance, actually down. So in total, I think we're quite happy with the cost control that we have this year. We're seeing that the developments are -- that our efforts in Program X and other measures in the company is paying off. On top of the of course, impact of the fact that we're buying aircraft that we have previously leased.

So that's -- I will not repeat the positive deviation on the depreciation. But it's clearly aircraft purchases, higher share owned aircraft FX and delay compensation, and then the EBIT of NOK 3.071 billion.

Net financial items, slightly up due to higher share of owned aircraft. We have our own financing for that, and we have also been able to finance in a very, very good way, the new additional, the 3 aircraft. So all the 13 aircraft that we've acquired has been financed on very favorable terms for us, but we're seeing that the net financial items increased a little bit because of that. And then we have a profit before tax of NOK 2.9 billion. And then we, as we did in the second quarter, have started to have a tax expense of NOK 342 million, bringing the net profit for the quarter to NOK 2.549 billion.

Again, we're coming out to all the things that we have done in terms of preparing the balance sheet for the future. With all the exercises we've done, we're coming out with a robust balance sheet. We're seeing that the total asset goes up because we have taken more deliveries and also own the aircraft more. So that's going up by approximately NOK 2.3 billion. We have the use of the cash to pay dividend, to repay the bond, and also we have also done predelivery payments relating to the exercise of the options of nearly NOK 0.5 billion. That brings the cash down, but the total liquidity is at a very, very good level, and we're happy with that. And of course, you can argue that a couple of quarters ago, we -- our cash was very, very high. We knew that what we were going into and what we're seeing now is exactly what we have planned to happen.

On the debt side, a bit of the same picture with additional of aircraft, adding debt to the balance sheet, but also repaying the bond, which is helpful. We're seeing that the aircraft traffic settlement liabilities is down, which is seasonal, quite normal, but very happy to see that the aircraft traffic liabilities, which is the prepayment of tickets is up 4% year-over-year compared with last year, which is kind of proof of the pudding that we have good booking momentum compared with last year.

Last point on the balance sheet is the equity ratio, which is healthy and going up from 12 -- 13.4% last quarter to this quarter at 18.3%; a good development.

On the net interest-bearing debt, obviously, going up by NOK 3.5 billion driven by the dividend, PDP and also the additional -- addition of aircraft, both owned aircraft as well as IFRS or leased aircraft, but at a very manageable level. You can -- the corporate debt of the business is down a lot this year because we're about -- so the remaining debt in the company effectively now is aircraft financing, whereas we went into the year with both a convertible bond, and we had the retained claim bond. Now we are essentially a debt-free company with the exception of the aircraft financing, which is a good thing, and that has been our objective over the last couple of years to get in that position.

Dividend, we talked about that. PDP, which is prepayment impacting our net interest-bearing debt and acquisition of the 3 aircraft. So lot of things happening on the balance sheet, but all in a good and controlled way, and we're coming out of the quarter with a strong and solid balance sheet prepared for the future.

Cash flow, no need to repeat everything that we talked about earlier. But obviously, seasonal ticket prepayments going down, NOK 2.9 billion; strong cash flow from operations. We have purchased the aircraft, the 3 aircraft and also then the deposit on the bond, NOK 2.9 billion. And also on the financing activities, we've repaid the bond part -- half of the bond. We have done the leasing, we paid the dividend. And also finally, we have financed the 3 aircraft that we acquired in earlier this summer at very attractive terms. So happy with that.

Final comment on the -- what's not on the balance sheet. The cash is ending at NOK 7.9 billion approximately. What's recorded as financial investments now is fixed income fund at NOK 1.1 billion, effectively cash, but still recorded as financial investment and the deposit for the repayment bond.

The prepayment, we're in a good position in terms of our commitments for payment of PDPs going forward; increased, as I mentioned, NOK 468 million in the quarter relating to the exercise of the 30 options. And we have a very, very good position as we are remaining prepayments relating to the aircraft order is less than NOK 0.5 billion until the -- by first quarter of 2028. And even going beyond that, it's a very solid position. So in terms of financing of the order of 80 aircraft, we are in a good position and have prepaid most of what we need to do as we move forward, and the financing market for those aircraft is very good for us. So with that, Geir?

So some final words. As we all remember, Norwegian exited out of the pandemic with 51 aircraft. We have grown the fleet into the next summer, taking it up to 95, 96 aircraft. So as such, we have close to double the fleet, and we have done that in a profitable way every year.

Widerøe has been investing heavily into capacity in Bergen. That is now turning into a big success as we see it. Widerøe and Norwegian is today covering 60% of the total number of seats in and out of Bergen. Back in 2017, Widerøe had 1 international routes out of Bergen. Today, Widerøe have 10. And together with the 24 in Norwegian, we are now offering the population in Bergen and the surroundings connectivity that we haven't seen in a long time. And as such, Bergen as a kind of a hub is important for Norwegian in Norwegian, and we really hope that the population at Bergen will appreciate the increased offering. And as we say in Norwegian, why connect, when you can fly direct?

A little bit of the same is what we have done in Denmark. And as you can see on the left side here, it's nice to be Norwegian in Denmark these days. And we are putting a lot of capacity now into Billund, trying a little bit of the same as we are doing in Bergen seen from a Norwegian point of view, where we are -- have already launched 10 new international routes from Billund to the rest of Europe. And we are also giving an offering to the population in Billund and the surrounding at Jutland. And have in mind that the catchment area in Billund is more than 2 million people. And again, why connect when you can fly direct? So now we are giving an offering to the people in Jutland and to the rest of Europe that you haven't seen in a while.

Also, Best European Airline at the Danish Travel Awards. And we're also happy to see that we won the tender given by the Danish government to fly more sustainable in a period from March 2026 until the end of 2027, where we will fly approximately 3,500 flights with a 40% blend of SAF into the wing subsidized by the Danish government. This is the first ever government tender of this type in EU. This is the way the Danish government is now trying to make sure that we can fly more sustainable. And seen from Norwegian's point of view, we are definitely looking forward to this, and we hope that the Danish population and the passengers will appreciate the fact that you now have a chance to fly more sustainable.

Fleet, I think we have covered most of it. But have in mind that even if we take delivery of all the 80 aircraft that we now have on order, the growth we are seeing over the next years is, I would say, moderate in the area of 4% to 5%. So in that sense, it's more of a fleet renewal than an aggressive growth. And as you can see, we are now building the 737 MAX fleet and there we are going to reduce the older aircraft, the so-called 737 NGs. And by that, been offering an aircraft that is burning significantly less fuel and also gives a better experience seen from the passengers’ point of view.

Again, as Hans-Joergen said, we have continued to buy out, I would say, relatively expensive leased aircraft, relative. And then we are gaining -- we are booking a gain of NOK 270 million in the quarter.

So what we are thinking now is to find the right balance on aircraft that we are planning to own compared to what we are going to lease seen up against the cash flow as well as the dividend capacity we would like to continue to have in the quarters and the years to come. We intend to continue to pay dividend in Norwegian.

Even if we have ordered 80 aircraft, we have a lot of optionality during the years to come because we have still a quite high portion of the fleet that is leased. We can decide to redeliver all these leased aircraft when they mature or we have always the option to extend them. And in that way, we have optionality with regards to growing the fleet in line with how the market is developing. And the financing terms we are receiving these days are the best that Norwegian has ever seen before.

Program X. We are not giving a lot of details on Program X this quarter. We are planning to do that in 2026, and have in mind that the program is going to give in excess of NOK 1 billion increased profitability, sustainable for the years to come compared to a base case coming out of 2024. And that will take the company into an EBIT margin that we feel will be sustainable and that we feel will be then competitive also to other airlines or to the best-performing airlines in the market in Europe.

So what have we done so far in 2025? We have done a lot on the fleet side as we have been through in very much detail. We are continuing working to have a high on-time performance. High on-time performance is, first of all, very important for the passengers. It's very important for the efficiency in the airlines. And it's definitely very important on the cost side of the business as well. It's very expensive to not be on time. And the performance in Norwegian over the last years has been good, in my opinion. And it's hard work every single day to make sure that we can keep that on-time performance in both airlines and to compete with the best airlines in Europe.

New distribution platform is coming online and live very soon, which also gives us the possibility of doing what I call proper interlining. The first one will be with Widerøe, but it could also be potentially with other airlines. We are also working on realizing the synergies between Widerøe. We have already been merging so-called support functions, including customer care, IT and communication. And we are constantly then working on taking out other synergies as well, not at least on the network side, which I have mentioned broadly -- have mentioned earlier in the presentation.

We are constantly working to be efficient to keep the cost level in the company as low as absolutely possible. And based on what we have done so far in 2025, 40% of this is recurring effects that we will have every year going forward.

Other areas that we are working on operations. Asset performance, we have still opportunities there. Fuel side is a very high cost element in both airlines, and we are doing measures there as well to reduce the total cost of the fuel. Crew and aircraft efficiency is another big area where we have been doing -- where we have been investing into better tools to make sure that we can optimize how we rotate aircraft and crew around in the network. Overhead rightsizing in both airlines and in combination between airlines is something that we are in the middle of as well as investing then into automation, into AI and tools that can increase efficiency in both airlines and between the airlines; as well as the top line, obviously, interlining has been mentioned; and potential partnership is also something that we are exploring and hopefully, we can share news. So when we are coming into 2026, I hope we can give you a much more detailed overview of Program X. And hopefully, we can increase the target of NOK 1 billion in underlying profitability as such for the years to come.

Outlook. Capacity, 3% up in 2025. In Q4, we are taking capacity down 3%. We are also reducing capacity, as mentioned earlier, in the first quarter of 2026. But for 2026 as a whole, we have 3% increase in capacity. Over the last year, we have been guiding on the unit cost exclusive fuel. We have been stepping that guiding down over the last quarters, and we are doing that again this quarter, guiding then the unit cost down to a flat unit cost compared to the whole year of 2024.

That ends the presentation.

I ask you guys to come up again. We'll then start with questions from the audience.

You have previously talked quite extensively about the problems with increased airport and ATC charges. Recently, we have seen some of your competitors in Europe threatening to reduce capacity quite significantly at some airports due to the increasing charges. In your opinion, are things getting worse?

Good question. I think what is important is that the airport charges as well as the Eurocontrol fees, as you mentioned, is kind of increasing in line with the market. What we are seeing in at least part of the Scandinavian market is that airport charges increasingly massively more than the inflation. And as such, it's more expensive to fly. That also applies to the market here in Norway, as we have been mentioning also in the media over the last week. So that is a concern.

And it is a fact that Norwegian is actually not growing that much in Norway anymore. Part of the reason is exactly what you are saying. So I think it is very important that we can find solutions with -- in this circumstance, Avinor, to make sure that we have a sustainable growth in the capacity as well as the growth in fees. So that is definitely a concern in Scandinavia and in the rest of the market in Europe.

Petter, ABG. A follow-up question on that one. How do you see the cost inflation going into 2026? You talk about the airport fees and those sort of things. I mean the largest drivers, how do you see those developing into '26?

I think the area I mentioned here earlier, the airport fees, Eurocontrol fees, fuel, the total fuel costs when we are going now into a period where we are kind of give -- we are not having the free quotas anymore, you have the blending requirements where we have to blend in 2% SAF. SAF today is 3 to 4x as expensive as fossil fuel. These are probably the main drivers increasing the cost for any airline. So our target and our goal then is to find mitigating actions to make sure that we can have savings on other areas. And I think we are showing that today when we are actually guiding the cost down to a flat cost compared to 2024, knowing that these cost elements is going massively up.

And then on the market, the competitive landscape, we're seeing that Ryanair is adding some capacity in Sweden and in Denmark. How do you see the overall capacity from your competitors? And how do you see the different markets?

I would say that the competitive landscape is relatively stable, I would say. We have changes maybe going into 2026, maybe a little bit more capacity coming into Kastrup and slightly more as well into Arlanda, but not -- I would say it's not significant even if we're looking at it very, very carefully. But in total, I would say the competitive landscape is relatively stable, and it has been relatively stable as well for a while.

Okay. We'll then move on to some questions from the web. We'll start with Andrew Lobbenberg. You had quite a few questions from Barclays.

The order or the expansion, the exercise of aircraft options, we are going for the MAX 8 and not the MAX 10. You previously mentioned the MAX 10. Why are we now sticking to the 8?

So we have decided to go for the MAX 8 for the options. The MAX 10 is not yet certified. We don't really know when it's going to be certified. And before the MAX 10 is going to be certified, the MAX 7 would need to be certified. So as per now, we have chosen the MAX 8. But if -- depending on how things develops on the MAX 10, we can always revisit that decision and potentially convert some of the MAX 8s into MAX 10s. It remains to be seen.

Okay. Another question from him. Can you give some color on the trading in the Baltics also as airBaltic go through strategic uncertainty? With adding capacity, Ryanair withdrawing capacity, do you expect to build the Riga base or keep it steady?

Well, we have put 2 aircraft into Riga. First, we started to fly into -- mostly into the Nordics. But today, we are also flying to other destinations in Europe from Riga. As you are correctly mentioning, airBaltic is more turning into a wet lease operation, flying, for example, a lot for Lufthansa. So this is a market we are very much looking into. And hopefully, we can grow the base and into other markets as well in Europe, not only flying into the Nordics from Riga.

Okay. Last question from him. Western European airlines adding a lot of capacity to the Arctic region across all the Nordic markets really. Is this a problem for you? Or is it just a reflection of the growth in Arctic tourism?

I think it's great what's happening into this area. Tromsø, for example, is a huge success when it comes to inbound traffic. And I think there's more than 15 airlines flying into Tromsø today. I think the capacity flying in there is a little bit too high, to be honest. It's -- but then I think that will probably adjust itself.

We put up routes last winter, for example, where we were looking into how much of an inbound traffic we could have. And I think we were all surprised by a 70%, 75% inbound traffic. And it's a little bit the same you see into Rovaniemi in Finland. But I think now it's probably an issue where the hotel costs are going massively up. But it's just great news in reality where we can have kind of a counter seasonal inbound traffic coming into our area.

Okay. We'll move to another question from [indiscernible]. On dividend, are you planning to pay a quarterly dividend or once a year? And if you can say something about the dividend policy, the size of it or how should we think about the dividend policy?

We don't have a dividend policy as per se. We have paid out the first dividend ever in this company. And what we can say is that we intend to continue to pay dividend to our shareholders, then we will find a balance between the cost of capital, financing aircraft, the cash position and the dividend capacity. So that is something we will have to come back to.

Okay. Moving on to some questions from Ole Martin Westgaard from DNB Carnegie. Can you please provide us an update with the remaining cost-cutting potential from Program X and in Widerøe?

I think we have covered that saying that we plan to come with more details into 2026, and have in mind that the targets we are setting us that we are putting in place is a profitability increase coming out of 2026.

And let's segue to that as well. Where are we on the synergies between Norwegian and Widerøe, you say?

I think we have covered that as well, both on the cost side of the business and on the network side as well.

Yes. And also last question for him. Industry growth capacity during the winter, how do you see our competitors doing as well?

Everybody is reducing capacity, so are we. We are reducing by 5% compared to last year. We think that is -- I think that gives us a better performance in a low season.

Okay. I'll then ask if there's any more questions from the audience.

I can add one and that goes on the balance sheet and aircraft deliveries. Are you happy now with the 50 plus 30 aircraft deliveries from Boeing? Or do you expect to do potential more sale-leaseback transaction in the coming years? Buying back the leased aircraft then?

If the price is right, definitely. Right now, the price is too high. And I think we did a very good deal on the 13 aircraft. So it is a balance, as mentioned. But right now, of the 25 first deliveries, which are financed, it's a 50-50 approximately between owned and leased. Also dependent on the leasing market, obviously, and the cost of the financing. I think the general plan is to have approximately 50% of the fleet owned.

Okay. No further questions. So we'll conclude the session there. Thank you very much.

Thank you.