Norse Atlantic ASA (NORSE) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Welcome, everyone, and thank you for joining the Norse Atlantic Second Quarter 2026 presentation. As you are aware of, we are in a very challenging period for the entire airline industry with conflicts impacting air traffic and travel demand. Today, we will take you through the actions we have taken to navigate these challenges and to position Norse for the future, including the ongoing strategic review. We have reduced capacity where the economics did not work and delivered record unit revenues in our own network. I believe this shows that we offer a great product to our passengers. However, the sharp reduction in production, our fixed cost base and higher fuel prices impacted profitability. Our ACMI operations were also affected with lower-than-planned production and longer flight durations on the IndiGo operation. Overall, this has been a bad quarter for Norse from a financial perspective, and we will need to implement further measures to reduce our costs. In this situation, we are strongly focused on executing on our strategy with increased commercial flexibility and ensuring that our cost cut program, Falcon, continues to deliver. The strategic review is also progressing with strong interest from multiple parties from different parts of the world. Some have described Q2 as the worst quarter since the pandemic for the airline industry. Fuel prices were exceptionally high going into Q2, and they have remained elevated. Travel demand has been reduced due to the conflict in the Middle East. And while the industry has trimmed available seat capacity, costs have not followed suit and industry profitability has halved according to IATA. For Norse, the impact was seen on both parts of our business. In our own network, our decision to minimize losses by reducing the number of flights resulted in ASK production per aircraft falling by 31% from the first quarter. However, lower production also means that a relatively fixed cost base is spread across fewer available seat kilometers. In addition, we incurred USD 21 million in additional fuel costs due to the elevated prices. In ACMI, IndiGo production was below the level planned at the beginning of the quarter as Middle East disruptions affected operations between India and Europe. Longer routings also increased crew and operating while engine-related issues had an additional negative impact. Our focus remains on building a sustainable and profitable long-haul airline. Commercially, the high grading of our network is delivering results with record high unit revenue, and we will continue to allocate capacity to the opportunities where we see the strongest returns. At the same time, we are strengthening our financial platform. Following the rights issue in June, we have entered into a senior secured financing agreement. And we continue to execute Project Falcon. Most identified initiatives are now in process with savings gradually coming through during the second half and the full impact expected in 2027. We are also gaining significantly greater flexibility in how we deploy our fleet. As announced in July, we have agreed with IndiGo to discontinue the ACMI cooperation with the remaining aircraft returning to Norse by November 1. As mentioned before, the economics of that operation has changed materially during 2026. In addition, the returning aircraft give us new options. We are in discussions with several airlines regarding new ACMI and charter opportunities and expect a decision within 3 to 4 weeks. With the return of aircraft from IndiGo, we see an opportunity to add capacity selectively in our own network where demand and returns are strong. This includes our expanded Europe-Thailand winter program as well as additional capacity to New York and Orlando. This is what airline on-demand means in practice. Norse has a uniform fleet of 12 modern Boeing 7879 Dreamliners with highly attractive long-term leases and several structural advantages. The global wide-body market remains constrained. Based on the current order book and 2025 delivery rates, it would take 12 years to deliver the existing Boeing 787 and Airbus A330 and A350 backlog. Our young Dreamliners also have a structural efficiency advantage with fuel consumption per seat around 25% below comparable modern long-haul aircraft. The wide-body supply-demand imbalance is expected to persist well into the next decade. Aircraft manufacturers continue to face supply chain constraints, while record order books are extending delivery lead times for airlines looking to grow their long-haul fleets. The result is that wide-body demand is expected to exceed available supply into the 2030s. And this brings us to the strategic review, which now has advanced into a formal process. The return of the IndiGo aircraft increases our fleet flexibility and broadens the alternatives available to Norse and to potential strategic partners. We have received strong interest. Multiple parties have signed confidentiality agreements and entered the process and direct engagement is ongoing with support from our financial adviser. Potential outcomes may include a sale, merger, or partnership. With that, I will hand over to Anders to take you through the financial performance.

Revenue for the quarter was USD 132 million, reflecting lower production in our own network, which combined with elevated fuel prices resulted in an EBITDA of negative USD 8 million. At the same time, our load factor remained extremely strong at 97%. Revenue in our own network decreased significantly, while a high share of our network costs is fixed. Fuel burn declined by 62%, broadly in line with the capacity reduction, but the average fuel price was 1.9x higher than last year. Six aircraft were operating under ACMI compared with 1 aircraft a year ago, driving substantial revenue and EBITDA growth year-over-year. However, block hours were lower than planned and costs were affected by Middle East traffic disruptions and engine-related issues. As you know, TRASK, which is total revenue per available seat kilometer, is an important unit metric for us when evaluating how our own network performs. TRASK increased by 24% year-over-year demonstrating the positive effect of the network high grading. The reduction in production caused non-fuel CASK to increase by 57%. The commercial performance is also visible in revenue per passenger. Average revenue per passenger increased to USD 447 in the second quarter, up from USD 372 last year and USD 380 in 2024. Cargo revenue per flight increased by 32% year-over-year to USD 7,400, supported by higher-value cargo and the route mix. For our charter and ACMI business revenue increased from approximately USD 6 million to USD 45 million, while EBITDA increased from USD 2.3 million to USD 11.7 million. Double-digit flight cancellations related to engine issues and traffic disruption had an approximately USD 2.5 million negative impact, while block hour production was also somewhat below the level originally planned. I want to spend some time on liquidity because the movements during the quarter are important to understand. The June rights issue generated approximately USD 99 million in net proceeds after fees and currency effects. Around USD 20 million was used to repay the overdraft facility and approximately USD 30 million was paid to lessors and suppliers. That left approximately USD 50 million available for general corporate purposes, around USD 10 million below the original plan due primarily to currency movements and higher payments to lessors and suppliers. Operating cash flow during Q2 was negative USD 29 million. At quarter end, reported free cash was USD 67 million. However, following repayment of the USD 41.7 million bridge loan in early July, the adjusted cash position was approximately USD 25 million. Given the continued challenging operating environment, we have secured a USD 52 million senior secured financing agreement for general corporate purposes, and to support the group's liquidity position. Looking at the income statement, personnel costs were slightly lower. Fuel costs declined on reduced flying despite much higher fuel prices and SG&A was down 46% as cost measures started to take effect. Net finance costs also include a USD 32.9 million IFRS-driven non-cash loss related to the early conversion of the convertible bond. Operating cash flow was negative USD 29 million in the quarter, including a working capital outflow. Free cash was USD 25 million at quarter end, adjusted for the bridge loan repaid in July. The balance sheet reflects the rights issue completed in June, which significantly strengthened equity and liquidity. As discussed, we have subsequently entered into a senior secured financing agreement. I will now give the word back to Eivind for summary and outlook.

Thank you, Anders. We believe Norse has several important pillars that are difficult to replicate. We operate 12 fuel-efficient Dreamliners on attractive long-term leases. We have a trained and experienced crew base of around 300 pilots and 580 cabin crew. We have deep in-house Dreamliner maintenance capabilities and a scalable 24/7 operations control center in Riga. The Middle East conflict continues to create mixed effects for Norse. In the near term, jet fuel prices remain elevated and disrupted flight patterns are increasing operating costs across the industry. At the same time, we are seeing stronger demand for direct connections that avoid Middle East hubs, particularly between Europe and Asia. That supports the long-term opportunity for Norse on Europe-Asia, where less than 25% of current flights are direct. This represents a significant growth opportunity for us. Our bookings for the coming quarters follow the same trend as before, namely with double-digit growth in fares and strong load factor build. For the winter season, we are increasing capacity between Europe and Thailand, where we continue to see attractive demand. We also plan additional winter capacity between Europe and New York and Orlando. Beyond that, capacity allocation will remain flexible. We expect to be able to provide more clarity on the fleet allocation in the coming months. To conclude, Q2 was a challenging quarter, and we are not satisfied with the financial results, but it also demonstrated why we are transforming Norse. We reduced uneconomic capacity, continued to improve unit revenues, and executing on our USD 50 million cost program and strengthened the liquidity. We now have greater commercial flexibility. And importantly, the strategic review has moved into a formal process following strong interest from multiple parties. Thank you for joining us.