Havila Kystruten AS ($HKY)

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and a warm welcome to today's earnings call of the Havila Kystruten AS following the publication of the first quarter results of 2026. I'm delighted to welcome CEO, Bent Martini, and CFO, Aleksander Røynesdal. So the gentlemen will speak shortly and guide us through the presentation and the results, followed by a Q&A session, where we will be happy to take your questions. And having said that, Bent, I already hand over to you.

Thanks a lot, and welcome to the first quarter presentation for Havila Kystruten. I will take you through the general update and then Aleksander will go more into the financial highlights. As always, we repeat a bit what we are doing. We are part of the historical Norwegian coastal route, selling on a contract with the Norwegian government, visiting 24 ports from Bergen to Kirkenes And back. We are doing this route together with our competitor, Hurtigruten.. We have 4 vessels and Hurtigruten, they have 7 vessels in this route. We -- the contract contract or concession are up to end of 2031 and the government had an option to prolong this contract with 1 year. Presently, the Ministry of Transportation is working with the next concession from 2030 to 2040. And we have received last week, finally, a very positive signals from the Minister of Transportation that the intention of coming out with a new tender and new concession for 2030 to 2040 is soon to come. And this route is extremely important for the Norwegian coastal society, especially in the North. With the geopolitical situation today, this route is even more important for Norwegian society. So we are very eager to look into this new tender. And as a company with 4 new vessels, we are very well positioned for the next tender. So that's the positive side. First quarter of 2026, if you look at the performance and operational uptime, we are continuing to have a very firm and positive operation, 100% uptime with new vessels is extremely good. And it's, of course, extremely important for us both with regards to our reputation and not at least in order to create the revenues we need for this operation. So the business highlights, as already mentioned, the 100% uptime is important. We reached first quarter occupancy of 72%. That's up from 61% if you compare with the first quarter last year. In general, we are growing the revenues. The bookings have been extremely strong in the beginning of the year. And for the whole year, it's very strong. We do see that the growth of revenues is up 15% year-on-year for the first quarter. And see an increase both in the average cabin rates, the onboard sales is coming up. And we have kind of a booking income that is very, very strong. I'm very pleased to say that we will continue with reducing the CO2s, actually also improving this from last year. So that is extremely important for us as a company, keeping up our promise with a sustainable operation. We can also mention in this meeting that the bookings forward is very strong, all-time high bookings for May. We have passed 87% bookings for May, that's extremely strong. So it looks very, very good for the coming months and quarters. So EBITDA, NOK 30 million in EBITDA for the first quarter is very strong, robust. The first quarter is the weakest quarter for these operations. So we are very satisfied with the results this quarter. On the cost side, we are continuing to be very careful with the increase in costs. Of course, some costs increase we will have. Most of the cost is reflecting kind of the increased volumes we have in the occupancy -- when it comes to kind of the geopolitical situation and the situation in the Middle East and increased cost of fuel, we will come back to that in the financial highlights. We also see that we have kind of continuing the sales on our own channels is important. Having kind of a platform with the agents and tour operators is important for us. But still, we are selling most of the tickets on our own channels, and that is extremely important for us to reduce the kind of commissions that naturally we pay to the agents and tour operators. So we do see that the investments we have done in the new CRM system is now coming into the operations with the work we are doing on sales and marketing and on the customer service center, enabling us to get more into directly in contact with the guests and customers. I can also mention here that the customer service center we have actually was awarded and won a very important prize this last 2 weeks, we received an award that the customer service center was actually the best customer service center in this branch, and that is extremely -- we are very proud of that. So continuing kind of the focus on selling.. on our own channels is extremely important going forward and to drive the profitability. We look at the customers, the cruise passengers. The concept we have and the products we are offering is actually enabling us to differentiate the segments and the customers is coming from now more kind of high-paying areas. We have increased a lot in the U.K. We are increasing a lot in North America, Canada especially. And also from Southern Europe, we have quite huge increase in bookings. So the balance if you look at the customers, it is a very positive kind of mix when you look at the -- both for the first quarter and for the coming quarters, it's positive when it comes to the balance of different customers. We could mention here also, of course, that the geopolitical situation, especially from Oceania, we have they have problems in coming to Norway because of the flights canceled, but we offered them to rebook and they have booked almost everyone rebooked for later voyages this year. So that's very positive for us. 90% of the targeted capacity is already booked. So 69% of our capacity is booked and the booking pace is very positive going forward. If you look at the cabin it's a lot of the kind of the cabin that has been booked. So we still have cabins available going forward, more high priced cabins. So that is kind of a very positive balance we have on the booking side going forward. We still have capacity to increase the ACR and the FIT bookings is coming up quite quickly now going forward. Aleksander will take you through the financial highlights.

Thank you, Bent. Okay. So Q1, as Bent mentioned, it's seasonally the weakest quarter during the year. So we're very proud of being able to deliver a positive EBITDA of NOK 30 million for the quarter. Looking at the underlying revenues, we have 70% increase in passenger nights. So we have a huge volume increase compared to the same time last year. We have a 4% increase in the average cabin rate and which is also positive in the sense that we have been able to fill a lot of the interior cabins in the first quarter. So that is kind of driving the ACR. So I think the underlying ACR is higher, but because of the mix effect between the cabins, the average ACR is a little bit lower than on each cabin category. We have a good and solid growth in onboard sales, which is a high focus area for the company. And we have a little bit of the same point on the onboard sales where we have high growth in onboard sales per passenger night in the different categories, but we have a bit of a mix effect in the first quarter with high sales of interior cabins. Looking at the EBITDA, we had a one-off adjustment in the first quarter of last year related to the compensation from the Norwegian state, about NOK 15 million. So if you adjust for that, the growth in EBITDA was more than the NOK 19 million. It was close to NOK 36 million compared to last year. Going forward, we do expect to see additional effect from the efforts that we are putting into onboard sales. And we also do expect to see effect of efficiency gains in the operations as well. Looking at the key KPIs, and these are the key revenue KPIs. Occupancy, as I mentioned, is sharply up compared to last year, up from 61% to 72%. So a huge increase in volume. The cabin factor, which is the number of guests on board in each cabin is also trending slowly upwards towards 2 persons per cabin, and this is positive because it's also driving the onboard sales. The more people we have on board, the more onboard sales we can generate. The average cabin rate, about 4% up compared to Q1 2025. And we are also -- I think we have to keep in mind that we are coming off 2025 where we achieved 20% growth in the cabin yield for the year in total. Onboard spend also slightly up compared to Q1 2025. And as I mentioned, there's a bit of a mix effect here where the underlying spend per passenger night is a lot higher between -- in between the different categories, but then that has an impact on the total. So the total onboard sales is also showing positive trend with 14% growth compared to Q1 last year. Over to the cost side. And I think I'll just jump to the next slide. This is a slide showing the cost composition against occupancy over time. As well as the share of cost as a share of total cost. Looking at the cost development for the first quarter, starting with the 2 elements which are most variable to occupancy, cost of goods sold, up 20% compared to last year, and that is primarily volume driven, also driven by 17% increase in occupancy, and then you have a bit of inflation as well. Payroll crew also primarily because of higher occupancy. So on the vessels, we have security manning and a minimum manning. And then as the occupancy increases, we do increase manning on board the vessels. On the more fixed side, OpEx vessel and OpEx hotel is related to the operation of the vessel. and it's pretty stable and more following inflation over time. LNG or energy is variable with spot prices in Q1, sharply down from same period last year, primarily linked to lower spot prices realized in the first quarter. So our bunker pricing is based on the previous month spot price average. So the increase in the spot price in March will only materialize in our P&L from April onwards, and I'll get into that on the next slide. But it's also due to the effect of the revised LNG sourcing agreement that we renegotiated last year, where there's a positive effect on the overall cost for the year because of the revised agreement. If we look at the admin OpEx and payroll, it's up and it was up in the fourth quarter as well as the first quarter. And this is reflective of increased efforts on marketing in particular and then also on sales. So it's driven by marketing and sales investments, both in terms of spending on marketing, but also in terms of the organization. If you look at the right-hand side, this is the charting of OpEx against occupancy. And there's a trend line or a pattern where increased occupancy leads to higher costs. And you have to take note that this is not in place. So I mean, looking back at Q4 2023 is not really comparable with the latest quarter. Looking at the outlook, we have a slightly revised target for the year from NOK 600 million -- to NOK 500 million to NOK 600 million in 2026 -- we are maintaining the long-term target for '27 onwards of NOK 600 million to NOK 800 million. And I think the short-term revision is linked to fuel costs where we are exposed to higher fuel costs, and we expect that to show up in the P&L from the second quarter onwards. And just taking into account the spot price in Q2 as well as the forward curve for the rest of the year, there's approximately an effect of NOK 50 million compared to our initial expectations. So that is the reason for the revision and it's more of a timing issue because we have in the contract with the Norwegian government, there's an annual indexation of the contract where fuel is a large component. So approximately 70% of our fuel price increase is recovered through higher contract revenues, but it comes with a time lag. So higher fuel cost in 2026 would translate into higher compensation in 2028. Looking at the other parameters, we are on track to achieve the occupancy target for the year of 75% to 80%. We are steering towards 10-plus percent growth on the ACR, the average cabin rate. We are at current at plus 7%, but we see that we have a high booking now on the interior cabin amongst other. And we see that once group bookings convert into final bookings as well as upgrades on board when we get on board, we are kind of trending upwards on the ACR, and we have a target of plus 10% for the year. And we do expect to see increased effects of the efforts that we are putting in, especially on onboard sales, but also the efficiency projects we have ongoing related to the operations on board. So we do expect that to yield results going forward. Looking out on the curve, '27 onwards, the target remains NOK 600 million to NOK 800 million of EBITDA -- we see the occupancy rate of 75% to 80% to be kind of a sweet spot. It's difficult to have a higher occupancy than that, especially during the winter season. We do see that there's a potential to further increase the average cabin revenue of more than inflation. As the brand becomes more recognized as we become more of an established player, there is room to further increase the ACR. And there's a strong focus now on the next steps, which is product development and development of additional revenue streams, which would potentially include pre, post-voyage bookings such as flights, hotel, et cetera. So that is part of the revenue streams further out on the curve. Over the financing, we refinanced the company last year. This gives us a very stable platform that can be optimized at a later stage. It gives us certainty going into a new tender process, certainty that we have financing throughout the next concession period, which is positive for the company. The facility can be refinanced from year 3 onwards, so in 2028. So it's a platform that can be optimized once we have realized the operational targets that I just went through. The covenant has also been improved substantially from the previous facility, and we see that at year-end and at Q1, we have solid headroom against the main covenants. Looking at the balance sheet, we have value adjusted equity of NOK 2.3 billion. This is based on independent broker values, which we collect every quarter. At Q1, these stood at EUR 670 million. We had a positive net result in the first quarter of this year of NOK 117 million. This is primarily related to currency effects. where we had an unrealized gain of NOK 260 million plus for the quarter. So this is related to strengthening of the Norwegian krone against euro and also USD. And this is kind of opposite of what's been the case for the last couple of years where the NOK has weakened and the weakening of the NOK over the past couple of years is also one of the reasons why there's a negative book equity. So the book equity improved during the first quarter of the year. So overall, we completed a reverse share split at the end of last year to support a more robust price formation on the share. We think that there's substantially values underpinning the share with broker values close to 2x the book value of the vessels. And this is also confirmed by newbuilding quotes. So I mean, we have different indicators to support the asset values. We do that by collecting broker values, but we also look at comparable newbuilding prices, which is supporting the broker valuations. We will continue to focus on sustainability. Last year, we conducted the first round voyage on liquid biogas. We have a strategy to become climate neutral and to phase in biogas in our fuel mix during the next couple of years. And we are now looking at ways to start blending in more biogas on a regular basis. And we see that with the introduction of the FuelEU Maritime, which is not implemented yet in Norway, it's implemented in the EU. It's actually going to be economical for us compared to running on LNG to blend in biogas. There's a focus on developing additional revenue streams to improve margins. So that means taking a bigger piece of the customer journey. So owning the customer from their home and all the way to the voyage and back again. We see that the guests that have shorter trips, half trip, plus/minus, they have a higher spend. We achieve a higher average cabin rate on the shorter trips. It's a bit more complex logistically to fill the ships, but we are seeing the opportunity to further push that part of the bookings to drive margins up in the future. And as Bent mentioned, we are well positioned for the next concession. We have 4 new vessels that can comply with any stricter environmental regulations on the route. The vessels are built for expedition. So the vessels are not specifically built for the route, but they are built for expedition and designed to fit with the requirements of the route. So we are quite optimistic about the outlook beyond the current concession. So I think that concludes the earnings call presentation, and we're open for questions from the audience.

Thank you so much for the presentation Bent and Aleksander. Ladies and gentlemen, we are now open for your questions.[Operator Instructions] And we received the first hand from Tim Kruse.

A couple of questions actually from my side. Firstly, on the LNG on this tax and emission change in March. In your report, there's a mention that in Q1, there was EUR 7 million of these tax effect you realized in Q1. So was that a positive on the LNG on the bunker costs in Q1? Or is that a potential effect you could realize? Because I gather the 2024 and 2025 refund, which is not clear yet, which is not yet reflected anywhere.

I mean the bunker cost in Q1 reflects kind of the actual cost of bunkers as well as the CO2 taxes both to the Norwegian government and to the EU for that period. So the Q1 is not impacted by any any previous period. I think what happened in Q1 was that the Norwegian government finally introduced a reduced CO2 tax, which the Norwegian Parliament has decided back in end of 2023 to account for '24 and '25. So I think that the event in Q1 was that the Norwegian government introduced the reduced tax from March onwards. They have now proposed a refund for January and February. And we expect the Norwegian government to introduce a refund for 2024 and 2025 -- so this is all reflected in our P&L, but it's not reflected in our cash. So we do have a cash refund that we expect from the Norwegian government of NOK 47 million for 2024 and 2025.

But when was that reflected in the P&L last year already?

It's reflected continuously. I mean it's part of the fuel cost.

Okay. So that's not -- there's no positive P&L effect if that is finalized, it would just be a cash effect, correct?

Yes.

Okay. And if it's not, then it will be a negative P&L effect. Okay. Then on the Yes. On the -- just to get the onboard spend in ACR, what you mentioned there, is there a trade-off? So is there some onboard spend, which is in cabin packages, which then sort of goes against and brackets against the onboard spend, which you report as onboard spend?

I mean, do you mean -- are you addressing kind of the top line growth per passenger night or...

Well, you said that onboard spend was only up 3%, but sort of the underlying is higher due to mix effects. And I was just wondering if some of the cabin packages actually include onboard spend. So you would have a shift from what you report as onboard spend to sort of cabin revenue due to that, that is included in some of the packages you said.

It's more related to the mix of guests and the level of spend that the different guest categories have. So in the first quarter, we have sold up a lot of the interior cabins compared to Q1 last year. And interior cabins, usually the spend is lower per passenger night than in the seaview cabins or in the upper cabins like the suites. So when you blend in that into the mix, the overall onboard spend per passenger night seems to be quite flat. But if you look at the each underlying segment, the growth in onboard sales per passenger night is in the core segment, 10%, 20%, 30% up. I hope that addresses your question.

Yes, yes. But do you expect -- because your ambitions for onboard spend were, I think, 15% to 20% increase for the year. So as the summer months come and the other cabin categories get more filled, you would probably expect that to increase also, right?

Yes. But if you look at the overall onboard spend for the Q1, it's up 14%. So I mean, now we're talking about onboard spend per passenger night. which is the KPI then.

Yes. Understood. Understood. Thanks. And for the -- Bent, maybe you could give us an update on the time line for the tender. So you said the government reached out, you would expect that to initiate, but what can we -- how will that sort of proceed? That would be helpful.

We don't have kind of specific detailed time line yet. But in the meeting we have with the administration, they have put a lot of resources on the tender process now. So we believe that we will know much more over the summer. The more specific time line for the tender process. So the target for the ministry is to have everything closed by mid next year.

And if I recall correctly, the timing for the government being able to call on the extension on the 31 for the 1-year extension, is that end of this year or end of next year? Could you?

That is end of 2027.

Okay. Okay. Understood. And then maybe the final one for Aleksander on the revised outlook of the NOK 50 million on additional cost for LNG, could you maybe just outline on what sort of LNG cost expectation that is based? Is that the current level? Or do you expect increase or a decrease in energy costs over the year, that would be helpful.

Yes. So I mean, we don't have a crystal ball where we know the future energy cost or spot prices, but we have applied some of the forward pricing and looked at where that is compared to the expectations at the beginning of the year. So very simplistic, if you increase the Dutch TTF, which is the reference rate by EUR 10 per megawatt hour, that translates into approximately EUR 30 million increase in costs over a year. At present or over the past couple of months, the average price has been close to EUR 48 per megawatt hour. So we see that with the current forward curve, that would translate into up to EUR 50 million in increased bunker costs for the remainder of the year should the forward curve materialize. But as I mentioned earlier, it's a bit of a timing thing for us because we have the indexation of the contract. So approximately 70% of that would be compensated through increased hire further out 1 to 2 years out.

Thank you so much for your questions, Tim. By now, we have no further questions. So ladies and gentlemen, if there's anything you would like to ask or to just raise your hand or post in -- but it seems everything appears to be answered by now. So with this, we will come to the end of today's earnings call. Thank you, everyone, for joining and your interest. And also thank you to you, Bent and Aleksander, for your time and for guiding us through your Q1 figures. I wish you all a lovely remaining day, happy weekend. And Bent, the final remarks belongs to you.

Thanks a lot. Thanks, everyone, for listening in. And I'm really looking forward to presenting the next quarter for you all. Everything looks quite good for us now, and full speed ahead for us. So very much looking forward to the next presentation. Thanks a lot.