Oljepriset stiger – Thule höjer priserna

The Korean AI frenzy continues. Oil prices pass $90 per barrel. And Thule, which reports today, raises growth, margins, and prices. This is Börsfrukost. Yes, a warm welcome to Börsfrukost here on EFN on Monday, July 20. Here I am with Gabriel Mellqvist. Welcome.

Mm, welcome. Exciting. I must say thank you. Exciting Monday. Many balls in the air.

Yes, but few companies reporting today. On Friday we had 77 listed companies reporting their second quarter. Today we have four.

Only one that counts and that is Thule, which gives us a taste of the consumer and hopefully a scent of a recovery.

Mm. And their CEO Mattias Ankarberg is with us later in the studio. Then we'll grill him.

Mm.

But

Speculation? A quick reflection is that we had many large caps last week. They haven't always been reported so well or received so well despite strong reports. A bit more small caps in the mix or more focus on small caps this week. Will be fun to see if they get a warmer welcome from the market.

And then there are a few large caps left. I'm thinking of Boliden, eh Securitas, eh Alfa Laval. Eh it will be exciting. Eh some quick news then Gabriel. Eh, the South Korean KOSPI was down 3.7% overnight Swedish time. Renewed concerns about AI investments and price increases on semiconductor equipment are believed to be behind it. Eh, we often talk about the Korean stock exchange.

Yes. On the other hand, we've learned that 3-4% isn't much with Korean measures. It should be 10-8-10% to get really worried. But this AI worry that characterized last week got new momentum from a Chinese AI upstart, a new DeepSeek moment one could say, where we suddenly think that all the money plowed into AI in the US and Korea, or especially the US, which benefits the Korean stock exchanges, now eh should be unnecessary, or a Chinese player could like zoom past the Americans very quickly. This is an exciting and worrying time, and you can add political unrest in Iran to the worry list, and we may have continued work in the stock market ahead.

Mm. From eh China and Korea on to Ireland, the airline Ryanair has released its quarterly report and profit fell by a full 34%.

Yes. Due to the conflict in the Middle East, which has partly driven up fuel costs for Ryanair and partly made consumers eh a bit less willing to fly. That we might come back to when we talk about and with Thule later, because Thule likes nearby vacation trips. Ryanair pays the price in profit development.

Mm. Another thing that happened on Saturday was that the technology group Teekon reported on Saturday and eh I raised my eyebrows a bit that CEO Johan Stene compared Teekon to the Argentine national football team.

This word was written after the match against Egypt when they were down 2-0. Everything looked hopeless, then they made a historic comeback, but it was written before the match against Spain where they were down and didn't come back. And Teekon's report is strong but no super winner if you want to describe it that way. Significantly improved profitability. Eh, the profit measure EB rose by 36%. This is the fourth consecutive quarter of margin improvement. So I don't know if it's like Argentina class on this team, but it is at least a clearly upward-pointing form curve after a dip.

Upward-pointing form curve and confidence, one might add from Teekon. Eh, but eh if we rewind the tape Gabriel, I think that last week we had a really heavy reporting week eh with several large caps. It was ABB, SEB, SAB, Atlas Copco, eh Volvo. Eh if in some way eh you touched on that summary earlier. You mean that they didn't receive these fairly strong reports so well. Is is is that an expression that expectations are so high on Swedish listed companies right now? Yes, I think so. It almost feels like it's not enough to beat eh profit expectations as we see in analyst compilations. You need even more forward-looking optimism. You can come in with strong numbers but if you have a fantastic like upward forecast adjustment, it's not enough. That's my feeling. And I thought we saw it in the US on Friday, a company called Cadence Design which is interesting because a Swedish company is Cyrical eh sorry eh a company called Intuitive Surgical, excuse me, which is like Surgical Science beats the report but they don't have enough bombastic forward-leaning comments and then they are traded down heavily despite good numbers. That applies to Swedish large caps too. It takes a lot to get eh an upward push on the stock exchange in this climate. Mm. Now the Stockholm Stock Exchange has opened and while you get acquainted with that screen, we can report that we have some changed price targets and estimates. The fat company AK's stock was punished heavily on Friday. The stock was down as much as 13% at close and now several analysts are lowering late forecasts and price targets. The furthest goes Handelsbanken Capital Market which lowers the price target from SEK 300 to SEK 233. Companies that instead get raised price targets are Sveko, Lagerkrans and Billrud. Eh, how Thule's eh price target will be adjusted after today's report. We'll find out later today and tomorrow. But what we know right now is that Mattias Ankarberg, CEO of Thule, is here in the studio. Warm welcome. Thank you very much. Eh, you have delivered your second quarter today and eh I can only state that eh a bit surprising. Organic growth is up 2.5%. Eh, but it declines in North America and you increase in Europe. That's a bit of a reversed world. Eh, if you could give us a picture of your market.

Because intuitively it feels like the US economy is doing quite strongly. Consumer figures, okay, people are negative in surveys but they still spend, while Europe is struggling with a lot of headwinds. But this is a bit the opposite. Report.

Back to the report eh you you raise the margin compared to the same period last year from 20 to 22%. What what is behind that eh increase? Eh, both positive, what we call mix effects, so we have sold better of products that have slightly higher margin eh and some own sales, thule.com for example, slightly higher margin but also [clears throat] a work we do with efficiency improvements. So we have two priorities one could say. Partly to drive growth of course and we focus on what we call champion product categories, categories where we can be global market leaders and drive innovation. Eh, but our second priority is to become more efficient and there we have worked on lowering costs and we also have nine own factories that we like trim further so that also contributes in the quarter. You still manage to raise prices which is impressive. Can you tell us more about what you manage to raise prices on and how difficult it is?

Sounds like the K-shaped economy. The top is doing well. Exactly. But eh do you raise prices because you have to or because you can, or a combination? Eh, but right now we raise prices every year and we do that to like update to external conditions and on top of that we launch new products that also drive up our price point. Now we do it to counteract these raw material prices. For us it's mainly aluminum that has shot up and we need to defend our profitability to continue to invest in product development and like sales and marketing. So that's why. Mm. Eh, Thule, you have headquarters in Malmö where you sit, but it is still a company with roots in Småland and Gnosjö. Eh, I still have to ask if in some way it is noticeable that Thule is a Gnosjö company?

Do you have someone with a drawer of secrets there maybe?

Gabriel, what do you think?

Maybe I'm thinking of dog owners, not shareholders. Dog owners and eh active parents, right? Active with kids and dogs is like the bright spot or fastest growing segment. Can you give me some color there?

Now you've made a small acquisition, harnesses it was, right. Eh it sounds from you like that future acquisitions will come too. Yes, but we like what we call eh our champions then, product categories where we can be global market leaders and we have six today. And looking at Thule's journey since the stock exchange introduction that we talked about, actually 90% of our value creation has come from this group of categories despite having so much more. Then we have now identified a few that can become champions, among others the ones I talked about, and we want to invest in them. So buying a company that makes some of the world's best dog harnesses fits perfectly with our investment in dog transport for example. So in that way yes, we want to grow our existing champion categories and the future identified champion candidates, our fund transport. Yes. Eh, CEO Mattias Ankarberg believes in champions within product categories. Remains to be seen if Thule's stock becomes a champion on the stock exchange today. We'll see how eh it develops as we can get up a eh a spring start screen there. Do you keep a close eye on like analyst you missed expectations on some points and beat on others and it looks like the stock is actually trading down eh a bit here. Reflection on partly the expectation picture, communication with the market, and partly how does it feel when you present a strong report and get a cool reception?

A long-term question then eh the organic growth here is positive and that's good but you have a target of 7%. How much is how much is up to you to reach that target and how much does the market have to turn?

Yes, Thule which eh announces price increases. I thought Gabriel that this was a consequence of the oil price which has passed $90 per barrel. But it is mainly aluminum prices.

But it must be plastic too, right?

Besides the energy crisis, we have had a tariff crisis. Eh, how much detail do you give about tariff effects and tariffs in the report and is it that you can get reimbursement like some companies do?

I wonder if a focus on dogs can mean that the dog years are over for Thule, that could be like the headline here. But I

You are a sporty parent of young children too, right?

Yes, today we will actually continue talking about Thule. We'll also talk about Arus Karlssam which was downgraded earlier after last week's disaster report.

Who is the guest? Then Johan, the analyst at Handelsbanken who has written about both Thule, Erik Sedberg, sorry, eh written about both Thule and AAK and consumer goods. Maybe a little salmon will also be covered.

Exciting.

Eh, we look forward to the stock market lunch. Now we say thank you for your attention. We'll be back here on EFN at 11:45. Goodbye.