Earnings call transcript: Nordnet’s Q2 2025 sees flat revenue, stock dips

Nordnet AB reported its Q2 2025 earnings, revealing flat revenue growth year-on-year despite an increase in customer base and trading activity. The company’s stock dropped 4.07% in pre-market trading, reflecting investor concerns over rising operating expenses and a decline in net interest income.

Key Takeaways

• Nordnet’s revenue remained flat compared to the previous year.
• Customer growth reached 14% year-on-year.
• Operating expenses increased by 13%, with significant impact outside of Germany.
• The stock price fell 4.07% in pre-market trading.

Company Performance

Nordnet AB, a leading digital investment platform in the Nordic region, reported stagnant revenue growth in Q2 2025. While customer numbers grew by 14%, and the number of trades increased by 18%, the company faced challenges with rising operating expenses and a decrease in net interest income due to low interest rates. Despite these hurdles, Nordnet maintained a strong capital position and continued its dividend and buyback program.

Financial Highlights

• Revenue: Flat year-on-year
• Customer growth: 14% increase
• Savings capital: Exceeded SEK 1 trillion, up 10%
• Operating expenses: Up 13% (9.7% excluding Germany)
• Net interest income: Declined

Market Reaction

Nordnet’s stock experienced a 4.07% decline in pre-market trading, following the earnings announcement. The stock’s last close was at 279.8, trading near its 52-week high, and the drop reflects investor concerns over the company’s increased operating expenses and declining net interest income. This performance contrasts with the broader market trends, where many financial stocks have shown resilience. According to InvestingPro’s Fair Value analysis, the stock currently appears to be overvalued. For more insights on market valuations, visit our Most Overvalued Stocks list.

Outlook & Guidance

Looking ahead, Nordnet plans to expand its private banking services across the Nordic countries and is preparing for a market entry in Germany by 2025. The company anticipates full-year cost growth of approximately 8%, excluding Germany, and expects continued growth in customer numbers and savings capital.

Executive Commentary

CEO Lorchok Knolling emphasized the company’s growth trajectory and commitment to customer trust, stating, "We have grown the revenue by 25% per year since ’19, while the cost is only growing around 7% per year." He also highlighted the importance of maintaining customer trust: "We are in a trust business. We need to earn that trust every day."

Risks and Challenges

• Rising operating expenses could pressure profit margins.
• Low interest rates are impacting net interest income.
• The upcoming German market entry presents potential challenges and costs.
• Competitive pressures in the digital investment platform space.
• Economic uncertainties in the Nordic region could affect customer behavior.

Q&A

During the earnings call, analysts inquired about Nordnet’s private banking strategy and assumptions regarding net interest income. The company clarified its market performance variations and addressed potential competition and pricing strategies, reaffirming its focus on scalability and cost control.

Nordnet’s Q2 2025 earnings highlight the company’s ability to grow its customer base and trading activity, but rising costs and declining interest income remain significant challenges. As Nordnet prepares for its German market entry, investor focus will likely remain on how the company manages these hurdles while pursuing growth opportunities.

Full transcript - Nordnet AB (SAVE) Q2 2025:

Markus Lindbergh, Head of Investor Relations, Nordnet: Okay. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the presentation of Second Quarter of twenty twenty five. My name is Markus Lindbergh, and I’m the Head of Investor Relations at Nonet. With me today, as usual, I have our CEO, Lorchok Knolling and our CFO, Leonard Kerran. Lorchok and Leonard will start off by presenting the results, and then we’ll have a Q and A session.

During the presentation, all participants will be on mute. And then when we come to the q and a session, you have two alternatives to ask questions. So you can either click the raise hand button in Zoom. I’ll then unmute you and call your name, or you can submit a question in writing. The presentation itself is available on our corporate website, nodetab.com.

Okay. Let’s start the presentation. Lars Hakke, please go ahead.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: Thank you, Markus. Go to next slide. Starting with some key highlights. We had seen a stable financial performance with continued growth in core business and both revenue and profit in line with quarter two last year. Positive net savings and good customer growth overall, strong trading activity and continued robust revenue margin from an increasing customer base and also higher share of cross border trading.

And we see a decline in net interest income due to low interest rate levels, partly compensated by higher deposits. OpEx, excluding Germany, is up 9.7% due to sequencing of marketing spend last year, where we’re and we expect to meet the full year guidance of around 8% cost growth, excluding Germany. Also high activity in releases and and product development, where we have launched eight new trading venues in Europe in our app and web and also currency account in the wrappers in Sweden and much more. I’ll come back to that. We also launched a new private banking tiering with clearly defined benefits in Sweden that has been well received.

Overall, a very strong capital situation. We have the dividend of 8.1 that’s paid, and a new buyback program announced that Leonard, our CFO, will talk a little bit more about later. We can go to next. Some of the highlights, financial highlights. Continued strong customer growth.

We see 14% growth underlying year on year. Savings capital growth of 10%. So once again, above SEK 1,000,000,000,000 in sales capital on the platform, mainly due to net savings because the market’s year on year has been fairly flat. Number of trades up 18% from a growing customer base, but also higher volatility due to tariff uncertainty. Revenues overall is flat year on year.

We see a decline on net interest income due to lower rates, but an increase in our core business trading and fund. Costs year on year is up 13%, excluding Germany is 9.7%. And again, what I said is that we expect to meet the full year guidance of around 8% for the year versus last year, excluding Germany. And profit level is also on high level, aligned with last year. Can go to next.

We see continued good momentum in customer growth during the quarter. Net savings, though, is a little bit lower this quarter versus last year, and it’s mainly due to existing customers’ transfers a little bit less money this quarter. And that’s due to that they had we had a very high net savings in quarter one, so that and also high dividends and also some sellouts in April, March that then enabled a lot of cash on the accounts, thereby less need to transfer money from other banks during the quarter. But we see net savings picking up a little bit in July. Okay.

Go to next. And we benefit from having four markets that derisks our business model and enables growth. And we’ve had a good momentum growth momentum in all countries where we grow most in customers in Denmark. Where we see that savings capital is growing the least, and that’s due to fairly big market decline in Denmark during the year due to Novo Nordisk. Can we go to next?

Talking a little bit about the revenue streams now, starting with the the trading revenue, and we see in the graph to to the left here that the number of trading customers is increasing in line with customer growth. Up to the right, see, we use trades per trading customer is about the same level as last quarter, where we see a very high level in April due to trade volatility, but then the markets calmed down in May and June. Still the high share cross border trading even though it was a little bit less than last quarter, but that’s from also the country mix, high share cross border trading outside of Sweden. And trades today are at multiyear highs, and each trade also drive more revenue. And we see here in the graph to to the left that trades per day is increasing steadily, and that’s due to growing customer base.

We have more than doubled the customer base since 2019 from 1,000,000 customers to more than 2,000,000 customers. But we also see that trades per customer is up a little bit in first half of this year due to high volatility from tariffs. Looking at the right graph, you see that income per trade is increasing due to a higher share of cross border trading, and it’s mainly due to country mix where we grow a lot outside of Sweden, and it’s more cross border trading in Norway, Denmark and Finland because their local exchanges are fairly small. So they trade a lot of outside their local exchange. Can go to next.

The fund business keeps developing in a good way. We see a steady growth in fund capital. We had a little bit dip in revenue in quarter two versus quarter one due to a volume effect where the markets were down quite a bit, as you know, and also that the customers sold off a little bit of the funds. But we see, I mean, the fund capital is now back again to to the levels before we saw the downturn. So, hopefully, in quarter three, that would not have an effect.

We see continued good growth rate in the Nordnet branded funds, which is more than one quarter of the fund capital on the platform. And overall, activity in funds and more than half of of the customers’ own funds on the platform. Go to next. Looking a little bit on net interest income, starting with deposits and deposit levels. So deposit versus savings capital overall is around 8% like last quarter.

You see an increase in deposits from around 79,000,000,000 to 83,000,000,000 in a quarter from net savings, high dividends, but then, of course, offset by net buys. And we see now net buys in in brokerage and funds is back to to more normal levels where quarter one was low. Go to next. So looking a little bit of the different components of NII, starting with a liquidity portfolio, we estimate to have revenue of 1,600,000,000.0 in 2025. Assuming the volumes we saw in quarter two and the currency allocation credit spreads and the Aviso in quarter two and also the market consensus of IBOR rates going forward.

And of course, the sensitivity here is deposit volume, where we likely have an upside with growing customer base and additional net savings coming onto the platform. And there’s also deposits that have driven the liquidity portfolio up the last quarters and thereby generating a high end revenue. We see interest rate pass fairly stable versus last quarter, a little bit down in Sweden, Norway, but up in Denmark and Finland, so no big movements. Looking at the loan portfolio, the estimated revenue there for this year is 1,100,000,000.0, then again assuming second quarter volumes and interest rates as per July 1, and also the IBOR rates we saw on the previous page with a pass through rate of margin lending of 50% and mortgage 100%. Of course, the sensitivity here is margin lending volume, where we also here, we likely have an upside if the market stabilize.

If you look at margin lending volume in the graph to the left, it’s a bit down in a quarter, both from risk off, but also from a strongest SEK since we consolidate in SEK. But overall, our lending business at low risk, we didn’t see any credit losses in margin lending even though the high volatility in March, April. We also managed to maintain the margins for margin lending on a good level in spite of central bank decreases of interest. Looking at the last component then, deposit interest, so interest we pay to the customers, estimate that to be around 400,000,000 in 2025. Sensitivity here is volume on capital on savings account, where we also likely

When the interest rate goes down, there’s going to be less money on the savings accounts. We saw a little bit uptick in the quarter due to high cash volumes from, again, sell off and high dividends. But over time, I think the volume of savings account will decrease a bit. So in summary, we have good development in all the revenue streams, both net interest income, the fund business and the trading business. Again, once again, over one trillion second savings capital on the platform.

If you look at the margins, it’s margin on deposits, of course, a bit down due to lower interest rates. You see the trading margin is a bit up due to higher share cross border trading and a stable fund margin. We have a business model with great operating leverage. We’ve grown the revenue by 25% per year since ’19, while the cost is only growing around 7% per year. So most of the top line growth ends up on the bottom line, so a true position of profitable growth.

On to next. We’ve had the high release rates both in quarter one and continue into quarter two, not least for features and products for the more active customers. We’ve, this quarter, launched a currency count on the ISK and the capital for tracking in Sweden. We also launched eight new European venues for electronic trading via our app and web, and that’s been well received since it’s now not high interest to invest in Europe versus The US. So smaller releases, have a AI summary of news.

We have a generative AI, which is exciting. And we also built in really nice native Movement pension flows in the app in Norway and Denmark, and also built in savings code into the app. And we also launched had a very exciting launch of a new private banking offering in Sweden, and it’s a tiered model based on savings capital. It’s four tiers. It’s called platinum, black, and signature.

And if each tier, we have very clearly defined benefits, so you have lower commission, you have lower mortgage rates, you have, coming soon, also discounts on margin lending rates, you can have an upside on interest rates on savings account, you have access to certain products specific for this segment, like currency accounts on ISK and KF and also prioritize customer service. And much more is to come. This is a framework that we can build on for for a very long time, and we we have a very high release rate, and and a lot will happen here. And we also then focus to launch this in the other countries also during the fall. And what we want to do, of course, is to track more capital from the private banking segment, both from existing customers to try to nudge them to the next level, the next tier, so they get additional benefits.

But also then, of course, retaining capital by the nice benefits they have, but also on top of that, attract totally new customers to our private banking offering. But it’s been well received and a good start. So with that, I hand over to you, Lennar, to talk a little bit capital liquidity and some buybacks and other things.

Leonard Kerran, CFO, Nordnet: Thank you very much. It’s always a pleasure to talk about the capital and liquidity situation. It is, as you know you can go to the next slide. It is, as you know, a very solid and robust situation we have, both capital and liquidity wise. And that is also the reason why we have decided to continue the share buyback program, which we last year did about 500,000,000 share back for,

The intention is to do the same this year, but we start out with the launch of 250 on Monday going on until the November 7 this year. And then we will most probably launch another tranche of this one. But the intention is, as I said, to go for 500, continue the same way as we did last year. We also, had a strong capital situation that will enable us to do the 70% dividend continuously as well. So very nice figures to say talk about, but, I don’t have very much to say more to say about it, really.

It’s it shows itself. Thank you.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: Thanks. A little bit on the strategic focus. What’s the next? So we have four key strategic focus areas. Of course, starting with the customer side, they want to have the most satisfied customers by having a one stop shop with a truly great customer experience and low price.

We also, of course, want to have engaged employees, and we know to have happy customers, you need to have really skilled and passionate employees, which we have, but also that we can attract and retain top talent, which we also believe that we really can. Third area is sustainable business. We are in a trust business. We need to earn that trust every day, and especially we need to manage our risks, both compliance risks and other risks in a good way and overall be a trusted and like brand. Fourth area, it’s profitable growth, so it captured the fantastic growth potential we have in The Nordics to continue to take market share in a growing market, and on top of that, launch in Germany during next year.

But, of course, continue to focus on on scalability and cost control. And we have a very good long term growth in both customers and savings capital. We have critical mass of customers in all countries, and they really like our platforms. We have a strong word-of-mouth driven growth. And what drives our revenue growth over time is customer growth and net savings.

So customer sign up to the platform, they like what they see, they transfer money from other banks and start using our products like our fund products or or trading products or or lending products. And we are taking market share in a growing market, and we have a lot of room to grow also going forward. Only around 8% of the Nordic population on our platform. We have 7% of the addressable market of 18,000,000,000,000 sectors, a big market. And it is a growing market, which has an underlying growth.

And we’ve taken market share last year, we had 6% market share in 2024, 7%. And we see it in the graph to the right, we have highest market share in equities and lower market share in funds and pension, those are two very important focus areas for us, and we’re really moving in the right direction with really good growth in both areas. Go to next. Also, very good scalability and cost control overall in the business. We doubled the customer base since ’19 from 1,000,000 to 2,200,000 customers with a limited cost growth.

We have decided to invest in three areas, and that’s one area is additional marketing to drive brand awareness and thereby higher customer growth. The other area is the German launch, which would enable a market as two and a half times as as big as as Swede Nordics. And the third area is more development staff to have a high release speeds, which is key if you’re going to succeed in a competitive market like The Nordics. Go to next. When performance versus our financial targets, it’s okay.

Customer growth is 14% in line. Sales capital per customer is a little bit lower than the $500,000 but not that much, partly due to a little bit weaker markets in H1. But again, income per in relation to sales capital is higher than the guidance due to higher deposit levels and also higher trading activity. And expenses, like I said, we estimate that to be around 8% per year, excluding Germany. Looking at the key priorities, I mean, a lot of focus, of course, on Germany, where they had they have the country manager in place since May 1, and now we’re recruiting the team around him.

They also define the scope that’s needed for developing the platform in Germany, and we also started that development. And we also notified the the SFSA that we we intend to then passport the bank license we have in Sweden to Germany. So overall, good progress in in the German project. And we’re going to continue to focus, of course, on the fund and pension business where we had a bit lower market share, but very good traction and not least realized the potential in the new dividend pension product in Denmark. And we also focus on enhancing the high end offerings and offering for the more active customers with really good releases both in quarter one and quarter two.

And we’re gonna continue to to roll out the new brand campaign. It’s a new marketing burst starting in August. And, And, of course, continue to focus on scalability and overall cost control. So with that, Markus, I hand it over to you for q and a.

Markus Lindbergh, Head of Investor Relations, Nordnet: Great. Thank you, Lofgren Lennart. So now we’ll start the q and a. So like I said before, if you want to ask a question live, just click the raise hand button. I’ll announce your name and unmute you or feel free to submit a question in writing.

So the first question comes from Edmund Kirik at D and B Carnegie. Please go ahead, Elman.

Edmund Kirik, Analyst, D&B Carnegie: Good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. Maybe if we start on private banking. It seems like you don’t expect any price erosion with the introduced tiering. Do do you expect it would be enough then to drive in much more volume?

And if we flip it the other way around, you also talked about introducing some more attractive pricing on the margin lending there. So just generally, how do you think about kind of price versus volume given that you already have an installed base in private banking? So that would be the the first topic. Then the second one, just on NII, how do you think about the price changes from here? Is the assumptions you have in the slides with 50% pass through on margin lending and and for the deposits, is that your best guess given how competition has looked down the last rate cut?

And then lastly, just on the deposit base, how do you expect that to develop from here given that you’ve had support from the dividend season, which I suppose now is is kind of behind us? Thank you.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: Yeah. So looking at the private banking, of course, it will take a little bit of our revenues, but it’s still nonmaterial. I think what’s important here is that we’re really clear on the tiers and really clear on the benefit per tier and that we are very transparent and overall, of course, low price. But the higher capital you have, the better commission level you have, the better mortgage rate you have, the better margin rate you will have, better savings account rate you will have, etcetera. But this is also start.

I mean, it’s much more to come that would be launched in this framework. So both with I mean, it’s not just the price component, it’s it’s other things that can be interested in there as well. But we we seen a big interest from from from from the launch, both from existing customers that really liked it, but also, of course, try to nudge them to the next level to to transfer a little bit more capital so that so they enter the next level. But also then attracting fully new customers. And and for us, it’s a little bit new generation private banking.

It’s digital. It’s transparent. It’s low price, and and it’s gonna be a fairly high development speed of new things to come. Looking at NII, yeah, I would say it’s a best guess and a snapshot. And as we know, I mean, it’s been no real surprises on our previous assumptions.

I think those will hold here as well. So and deposit base, I mean, ultimately, that’s also a function of net savings and customer growth. And we will grow customers, and we will have high net savings over time. So that will also build deposit base. And we’ve seen even though dividends are being lower now, it’s on a stable level on deposits.

Edmund Kirik, Analyst, D&B Carnegie: Excellent. Thank you very much. Have a nice

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: Thanks. Same.

Markus Lindbergh, Head of Investor Relations, Nordnet: Thanks, Armin. Okay. The next question comes from Potik Berthelius at ABG. Potik, go ahead.

Potik Berthelius, Analyst, ABG: Thank you. Can you hear

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: me? Yes.

Potik Berthelius, Analyst, ABG: I can. Perfect. Yeah. I will start with the two follow ups, on admin’s questions. So if we start with the private banking, area.

So could you talk a little bit more and elaborate on how you view the competitive situation, especially in Sweden, but also how your offering that you plan to launch launch in the other market stacks up with the current offering in the other regions outside of Sweden?

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: Yeah. I mean I mean, the the competitive wise, we plan, of course, to to take customers both from other platforms, but but but also banks by having a little bit more modern private banking offering. Like I said, the the nice with very clearly defined tiers, a nice experience, how you move between the tiers and also clearly defined benefits. So it’s very transparent and also low price, but also framework that we can add a lot of exciting stuff in over time. Of course, we plan to launch this in the other countries as well, hopefully, during the the fall.

And again, as usual, competitive situation is always highest in Sweden. It’s less outside of Sweden. So but I think it’s a framework that works well in in all of our our countries.

Potik Berthelius, Analyst, ABG: So do you see, for example, outside of Sweden that your product offering will be broader than peers, or or is it also better in pricing? How does

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: that affect I mean, again, I think it’s it’s both digital is very transparent, very clearly defined what benefits you get per tier and low price, of course, but there’s also gonna be additional components in the offering that’s gonna be exciting that will come over time.

Potik Berthelius, Analyst, ABG: Thank you, Emma. My next question is also a little bit of a follow-up. We saw historically the deposit in relation to savings capital being above 10% and close to 10%, while it’s it’s been closer to 7% the last couple of years. It has come up in the last in H1 given the uncertainty we have seen. But do you expect now in the short term that this will continue up?

Because we have, in the past, talked about that in a normalized rate level, you expect it to move back towards this 10% level ish? Or do you expect that customers has built up capital now in the short term, so this should trend down coming six months?

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: I think in the midterm guidance we gave for revenue thereby NII, we’ve fairly modest in assumption of growth of deposit versus AUM. But we’re still growing in absolute terms. We grow in the savings capital. We grow in the customer base. Have more net savings coming in.

But it’s also a little bit different mix. I mean, also more funded pension customers now, which are not going in and out of positions as much as equity or brokerage customers. So thereby creating perhaps a little bit less cash. But let’s see. I mean, we’ll grow deposits.

And even with 8%, we will grow deposit in absolute terms in a nice way. And, of course, if if you we know if you have a downturn in your market, the deposit is gonna definitely increase. So hopefully, we have some upside anyway going forward. But, anyway, absolute terms would grow.

Potik Berthelius, Analyst, ABG: Thank you. Then I just have two two minor questions that’s a little bit not not impact the the big picture. But the net of the commission, it was positive from 2019 until mid twenty twenty four, and now we have seen four quarters in a row with negative result. What is driving this difference? And should we expect it to be negative going forward as well?

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: I don’t have all

Markus Lindbergh, Head of Investor Relations, Nordnet: the details on that.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: I don’t know, Markus, if you have.

Markus Lindbergh, Head of Investor Relations, Nordnet: I know. I mean, I know one factor is that there were some fees in there associated with the the unsecured lending product. So when that was sold in q four, you would have seen I think that’s when you saw sort of the the shift into more negative numbers. That would have been, I think, the biggest biggest shift. Other than that, of course, that that other line contains a lot of other things that can move a bit.

But that’s the only sort of major shift I can think of.

Leonard Kerran, CFO, Nordnet: Correct.

Potik Berthelius, Analyst, ABG: Thank you. And another minor detailed question is that the lending book has decreased by almost SEK 2,000,000,000 since the start of the year, while the credit risk is up by SEK 2,000,000,000. So just for my understanding, what is driving this development?

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: You can pronounce that. It’s probably the positions in the liquidity portfolio, Landmark, but you can answer.

Leonard Kerran, CFO, Nordnet: Sure. Can you take that once again? Yeah.

Potik Berthelius, Analyst, ABG: Yeah. The the the credit risk is up by 2,000,000,000 since the start of the year, while the lending book is down 2,000,000,000. So the the shift in delta, yes, for a better understand

Edmund Kirik, Analyst, D&B Carnegie: Oh, yes.

Leonard Kerran, CFO, Nordnet: No. We have a very high liquidity or increased liquidity portfolio. And, also, we have then increased the credit risk weights within this one in short positions to gain a little bit more on the net net interest income, leveling up at a at a certain level as we have this very strong capital situation as well. So so it’s actually optimizing the path without taking any further credit risk because those are all short papers, so we’re very much in control of them.

Potik Berthelius, Analyst, ABG: Very clear. Thank you so much.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: Thank you. Thank you, Patrick.

Markus Lindbergh, Head of Investor Relations, Nordnet: Thanks, Patrick. Next question comes from Jakob Hestlevik at SEB. Jakob, please go ahead.

Jakob Hestlevik, Analyst, SEB: Good morning. If we look at the P and L development, total income is flat versus a year ago, while cost has increased by 13%. So if income doesn’t come back in the second half of this year, how do you view your cost development? Are there any investments you could pause, for example?

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: Yes. But if you look at revenues in line with quarter two, last year cost is higher, but also we don’t have any credit losses, as you know, this year since we offloaded the unsecured lending business. But that way, also given a little bit less revenue on lending, of course. So it’s not I mean, we foresee, of course, a continued growth in customers’ net savings and thereby by top line over time. But as you know, it can be impacted by fluctuations in in in the markets quite a bit from quarter to quarter.

But, of course, we I mean, there’s always levers that you can pull if if needed. Like I said, we we we decided to to invest in marketing new new development resources in Germany. I don’t think we would do anything in Germany, but marketing, of course, you can you you can work with and also new recruitments you can work with as well.

Jakob Hestlevik, Analyst, SEB: Thank you. And then my second question is on the margin on transaction related income. It came down quite a bit in the quarter, and I guess FX played a part there. Is it only due to lower volumes? Or do you see a margin compression as you have rolled out your FX accounts to pro and private banking clients?

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: No, it’s not margin compression. It’s just due to a little bit lower FX volume, but especially a lower trading value on FX. And then, I mean, the the currency accounts have been well received, but it’s just a few 100 accounts opened, and and and we also see if they trade on those accounts. Also have higher volumes. So it’s it’s a little bit wash.

There’s no impact from currency accounts.

Jakob Hestlevik, Analyst, SEB: Great. Thank you. Wish you all a good summer.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: The same. Bye.

Markus Lindbergh, Head of Investor Relations, Nordnet: Thank you, Jakob. The next question comes from Elrico Bozzoni from JPMorgan. Elrico, please go ahead.

Elrico Bozzoni, Analyst, JPMorgan: Hi, good morning. Can you hear me okay?

Markus Lindbergh, Head of Investor Relations, Nordnet: Yeah. Morning.

Elrico Bozzoni, Analyst, JPMorgan: Monik. Thanks for taking the questions. One, a follow-up on NII, which was clearly good versus consensus. Can you just give us some extra color on what you think drove such a good print? Is it because you managed to secure some pretty good deals with the liquidity portfolio?

You mentioned the credit exposure as well. We hit the ceiling or you think that potentially you could push the portfolio a bit further into higher yielding securities? So that’s my first question. The second question is on the Swedish market. You posted roughly flat customer growth relative to the previous quarter.

And I appreciate this quarter probably has been a tougher one. However, you’re also spending more on marketing. So can you give us some color and your thoughts on whether you think the marketing investments you’re doing there are actually bearing fruits? And whether you think that from Q3, for example, we may already see an acceleration perhaps in customer growth? And then finally, the Private Banking, I was just wondering if you could give us some KPI on perhaps how many clients you have seen already moving some asset to maybe fall within one of the better bands that you are currently offering?

Thanks.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: Yeah. I think on NII, I mean, it’s mainly that we have a higher deposit volume, thereby, a high liquidity portfolio and thereby, higher revenues. Of course, you have a little bit upside on taking a little bit more risk in in in the investments there, but the main driver is deposit levels. When it comes to customer growth in Sweden, I mean, we see clear signs anyway that that the market campaign is well received. We see that campaign recognition is very high.

Campaign liking is very high. We see also an uptick in aided brand awareness in Sweden that will hopefully spill over in in additional customer growth over time. But it will always take time to shift sentiment for from awareness to to to to preference as well. But we also then very happy to see that MPS development in Sweden is also very positive and and partly closing the gap to Avanse. So all this taken together at some point should should also enable a bit higher customer growth.

But we still see that we have good customer I mean, we have good customer base. We have good customer growth. There’s good customers coming in in Sweden. So as we know, higher income per service capital per customer, high income per customer, high activity per customer in Sweden. Private banking, of course, gonna support all of our countries, not least Sweden.

Like I said, well received. I don’t have I can’t share stats today, but we see a really big interest both from existing customers to to go to the next level. We have had several cases where customers have smoothed in more money to go to the next tier to enable more benefits, but also attractive versus new customers as well. And we see positive trend in net savings in July partly from this.

Edmund Kirik, Analyst, D&B Carnegie: Thank you.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: Thank you.

Markus Lindbergh, Head of Investor Relations, Nordnet: Thank you, Enrico. The next question comes from Martin Eckstadt at Handelsbanken.

Martin Eckstadt, Analyst, Handelsbanken: Thank you. Can you hear me? Yeah. We can. Excellent.

So I just wanted to ask a little bit about Norway. And you use g o g mainly in the presentation, but just taking a bit more near term stance and looking at income by country very simplistically by transaction related revenue volumes. So Norway seems to continue its outperformance this quarter, although all markets are down quarter on quarter. For example, the Nordics group is down 17% quarter on quarter in brokerage income, but Norway is only down 11%, with Denmark, for example, on the other hand, being down 21%. The same is actually the true for fund income from Norway.

Could you speak a bit more about the dynamics behind Norway’s assumption perhaps? And perhaps also the recent decline in Denmark, although there, it seems more like a shift to funds actually. Could it be related to the Livent, the product that you launched there? If you could give us some more flavor of the dynamics for those two markets, please.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: I think this is a benefit of having four markets because they move in a little bit different directions, so you spread the market risk in a good way. And Norway is a bit different since there’s a lot of oil and fish and other parts of industries that you don’t see in the other countries. And and I think with the with the volatility we we saw in in March, April, I think it hit I mean, they also sold down in funds in Norway, clearly. But but trading wise, I think they saw an opportunity as well. And so and Norway has been a strong market this year versus Denmark.

There’s been a really bad performing market this year, and we know market sentiment impacts also activity. And Denmark is down quite a bit this year due to Novo Nordisk, and Novo Nordisk is still on very low levels. So that’s impacted the sentiment in Denmark quite a bit. So but this is what we have all the time. Basically, the market moves in a little bit different direction, but thereby also spreading the the the the market risk.

On Sandemark, I mean, Libriant is, I mean, we have good strong net flows in pension for for the first half, of course, around 2,500,000,000.0 so far. So that’s impacting, of course, the fund business positively.

Martin Eckstadt, Analyst, Handelsbanken: Okay. Excellent. Thank you for the added clarity there. And then a second one, if I may. So I asked this question of Avance as well.

Given how fund margins look perhaps artificially lower this quarter since fund capital dropped between quarter ends, which is not captured in an average volume calculation, would it not make sense to give some more data on this in your monthly data packs, for example? Just volumes would clearly be helpful.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: It does. So we we plan to actually break down the savings capital in in the month report per per, yeah, brokerage funds and deposits.

Martin Eckstadt, Analyst, Handelsbanken: Okay. Super. That would be very helpful.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: Yes. So I agree. It’s not it was not a normal movement, but it’s clearly V shaped during the quarter, but we understand that that creates a problem for forecasting.

Martin Eckstadt, Analyst, Handelsbanken: Excellent. That was all from me. Wish you all a good summer.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: Yep. Same.

Markus Lindbergh, Head of Investor Relations, Nordnet: Thank you, Martin. Next question comes from Zach Wirth from Autonomous. Zach, please go ahead.

Zach Wirth, Analyst, Autonomous: Hi there. Good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. I’ve just got two, please. Firstly, can you give us a bit more color around brokerage margins during the quarter?

Are there any other drivers here of the decline versus 1Q aside from lower foreign trading levels? And then secondly, on the release of digital trading in eight new European markets and pre market trading in The U. S. During the quarter, just what drove these launches? Is this in response to specific customer demand?

And what has uptake here looked like thus far? Yes.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: So revenue margin versus quarter one trading volume versus quarter one is mainly due to little bit lower share of cross border trading volume, but a little bit lower still on traded value. And since we don’t report traded value, that’s probably why you didn’t fully meet the the forecasting on that parameter, but but there’s no other big movements. But still, the the margin is is very high compared to to what we’ve seen before. So, clearly, on a high level than 2024. When it comes to the launches premarket U.

S, it’s been very well received. 10% of the trades in The U. S. Now is to being made, give or take, premarket. And we also see a tendency that the customers that take premarket also have a little bit higher traded value.

So hopefully, that will play out good over time. Also Europe launch was also well received since there’s a lot renewed interest now in investing in Europe. But so far, we saw a little bit less volume in Germany, but more more volume in the other markets. So total volume in in in Europe has been about the same, but it’s been a shift from from Germany to to the other markets.

Zach Wirth, Analyst, Autonomous: That’s great. Thanks very much.

Leonard Kerran, CFO, Nordnet: Thanks.

Markus Lindbergh, Head of Investor Relations, Nordnet: Thank you, Zach. Next question comes from Michael McNaughton from UBS. Michael, please go ahead.

Michael McNaughton, Analyst, UBS: Hi there. Morning. Can you hear me okay?

Markus Lindbergh, Head of Investor Relations, Nordnet: Yep. Morning. Yes.

Michael McNaughton, Analyst, UBS: Great. Yeah. My first one was just on the private banking rollout as well. I think when you rolled out in Sweden, you commented that if people if customers near the tier barriers change, that would add about or attract $20.20 22,000,000,000 billion stack of new savings. Do you have similar numbers for how that would look in your other markets?

Is it a similar quantum, or is it is it much less?

Markus Lindbergh, Head of Investor Relations, Nordnet: I think the I think the 22,000,000,000 was a pan Nordic number. Might have been unclear.

Michael McNaughton, Analyst, UBS: Yep. Okay. Okay. Got it. Thanks.

Then just on Norway, I saw that you reduced your platform fee on external funds. Yep. Just could you just talk about the the the reason behind that, what you’re seeing there in that market, and then if there’s any risks of similar moves in your other markets and what the competitive dynamics there are? Yeah.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: I we don’t as you know, we’re very careful normally with price lowering the price, especially a bit versus new small competitors. But when we see bigger players move and our our gap to to the big players We we we see we need to defend our price position. And in Norway, it’s mainly that’s owned by Storebrand. So one of the big players has very low fees on index funds, platform fees, and the gap has been a little bit too big versus us.

And especially with KLP, the most yeah. The biggest, basically, the index provider in Norway changed to a clean share clause where they gave themselves a bit more margin and thereby ending up that the KNP funds looked very expensive on our platform versus Kruhn. We saw that we need to act. It’s not dramatic. I think it’s 6,000,000 on a on a yearly basis impact, but we we don’t see any spillover to any of the other countries.

Michael McNaughton, Analyst, UBS: Okay. Thanks. And then maybe just on that, any comment on if you’re seeing any pickup in competition in Sweden from Sabre as well in that regard?

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: Not really. I mean, Sabre, you know, was also acquired by Landsver Shark in our bank recently. I think that shows also that I mean, it’s a very competitive market in Nordics. It’s very low prices in general, so it’s it’s difficult to build a profitable business. You need a lot of customers, a lot of sales capital, a lot of transactions before you get there.

But but we don’t see any impact from from saving in Sweden.

Markus Lindbergh, Head of Investor Relations, Nordnet: K. Great. Thanks.

Michael McNaughton, Analyst, UBS: Have a good summer.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: Same. Bye.

Markus Lindbergh, Head of Investor Relations, Nordnet: Thank you, Michael, and good luck going forward. I know you’re you’re moving so well, so it might be the the last queue call. Next question comes from Andy Lowe at Citi. Please go ahead, Andy.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet0: Hey, thanks for taking the question. Just would like to go back to the net flow dynamic in Sweden. So you annualized about 2% net flows in the quarter. Similarly, Avanda had a quite a weak quarter. Just curious to hear what you think the diagnosis is for that.

On a Vanders call, the CEO said that the capacity is there for people to save and it was more a lack of inflows due to risk appetite. So do you think that comes back in the second half given that markets have fared much better? And the second one is just a request really, like the margin or the revenues per trade, obviously, sort of caught people off guard this quarter. Would you consider disclosing the average traded volume? That would just be a helpful metric for us to track.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: Yeah. Yeah. So net flows, it was weaker, not just in Sweden. Was a little bit weaker in all countries in in quarter two. And the main reason, like I said, is that existing customers have more cash on their accounts because it was very high net savings in quarter one.

There was a sell off in March, April and also very high dividends. So it was we have existing customers, both recurring net savings that wasn’t impacted, but they also do one off transfers when they see a need. But there’s been less need of that because the cash the deposit level has been very fairly high on their accounts. So it’s mainly due to that not so much risk off, I would say. And we see a positive development in that savings now in July.

Martin Eckstadt, Analyst, Handelsbanken: Thanks.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: Margin per traded value, etcetera. I mean, you can take that with you, Markus. I mean, I think the biggest one is if if have trading volume and not just trading value and not just trading volume.

Markus Lindbergh, Head of Investor Relations, Nordnet: Yeah. Alyssa, we’ll we’ll consider it for sure.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: Normally, they go much very much hand in hand, but not not every quarter.

Markus Lindbergh, Head of Investor Relations, Nordnet: Okay. Thank you so much, Andy. The next question comes from Ian White from Autonomous. Ian, can you hear us? Hi there.

Hey. Yeah. Sorry. Can you hear me? Yes.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet1: Yeah. Thank you for taking my questions. Just two for me, please. First, I just wanted to ask on capital and the glide path to a 4% to 4.5% leverage ratio. Basically, if I look at the, let’s say, 500,000,000 of buybacks you pointed to today, you will more or less accrue that capital back in the second half, even post the sort of 70% dividend payout.

So I’m just wondering how you’re thinking about getting down to that 4% to 4.5% leverage ratio range that you’ve given us previously? When do you think we should expect you to be in that target range essentially, please? And secondly, slightly broader question. We saw a competitor announce the launch of tokenized equity products for clients in Europe in the last couple of months. Just wanted to hear your thoughts on that, please, and wondered if it’s something that Nordnet would also consider launching, strikes me the way to internalize flow and reduce trading costs and and make product launch maybe a little bit more flexible.

So so just interested to hear any thoughts on that from from your perspective, please.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: Yeah. I think the glide path, you can probably answer that, Lena, but we also have an increasing deposit level or deposit volume over time that we need to consider as well. But perhaps you want to give some more color and an 81 that’s coming up soon as well.

Leonard Kerran, CFO, Nordnet: Yeah. I would say I mean, we are very cautious, and we are in long term term capital planning to be this strong all the time. But as Roshu said, we have the $81,600,000,000 that we’ll be able to call next year, and that we have to consider all the time and see see how we’ll continue with that one. So so, actually, it’s a gliding path, and I would presume somewhere ’26, 27 that we will be down to four point zero, 4.5. But it also depends on the deposit levels, and that is what we always adjust to.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: And then tokenized equity products. Yeah. I mean, overall, it’s an area, of course, we we watch. I don’t think we’re there yet, but but but it’s an area we definitely watch. And and and crypto also on top of that and such also.

But but there’s a lot of things happening in the tokenization space, which might be interesting over time. But we also need to really secure that we have a really trusted service to to our customers.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet1: Got it. Thanks very much.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: Thanks.

Markus Lindbergh, Head of Investor Relations, Nordnet: Thank you so much, Ian. We had a few written questions. I think we answered most of them, but that’s one we haven’t answered yet. So the question is Nordet has been in the German market before. What’s different now, and and why will the company succeed now?

I believe we Nordet exited Germany in 02/2011.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: Yeah. Correct. I mean but but it’s a very different situation now. One is that the German market is is maturing when it comes to equity and and fund savings, and there’s a lot of other players there to do the platforms as well that tries to behave to to to use the the the platforms. So that’s one.

But probably the more important reason is we were not mature. We had we’re so far away from profitable growth in in in Denmark, Finland, and and Norway during that time, and we need to do a lot of development for those countries and reach scale there before we could focus on anything else. So I think it was right move to to pull out of Germany to focus on on Nordics, but now we have profitable growth and very strong base in The Nordics, and now now it’s a better time and also more mature markets in Germany.

Markus Lindbergh, Head of Investor Relations, Nordnet: Okay. Great. That was actually the the last question for today. So thanks everyone for attending this presentation. Please visit our website, nordantab.com if you have any need more information, or you can reach out to me.

So, yeah, thanks again for your interest in Nordant. Have a a nice day and a fantastic summer. Goodbye.

Lorchok Knolling, CEO, Nordnet: Yep. Bye bye.

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