Good morning, and welcome everyone to this webcast with a presentation of the Q1 2026 report from Norden that was published this morning. In the first part of the presentation, you'll be in a listen-only mode, which will be followed by a Q&A session. During the Q&A session, if you dial in by phone, you'll be able to ask questions verbally by pressing pound or hashtag followed by 5 on your phone's keypad. If you're watching this webcast online through a browser, you can ask your written questions in the chat below. Those questions will not be published. The operator will read them aloud. With that, I'll hand it over to CEO Jan Rindbo and CFO Martin Badsted from Norden. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much. Hello to everyone. Thank you for joining. Let me start by just giving you a brief introduction to Norden. We are a leading global operator transporting the essential commodities for industrial customers worldwide. We have a capital-efficient fleet strategy combining owned and chartered vessels, which enable us to navigate market cycles and deliver competitive returns. Today, we will take you through our performance and the strategic positioning of the company. Let's dive straight into it, and let's do that with probably one of the most discussed topics at the moment, the conflict in the Middle East, which obviously are having big impact on both the markets and operations.
We see, obviously on the tanker side, a strong support on the tanker rate. We've seen surging spot rates where, you know, tankers are in high demand to help rebalancing oil markets, in view of the lack of the oil supply that's coming out of the Middle East. The dry cargo market reaction has been more muted, and here it's probably more the additional operational impacts and costs that affects the business. We've seen, obviously, with higher oil prices, a significant increase in the bunker costs, so they're up roughly around 50% since the start of the conflict.
That does not directly impact the Norden because we hedge the directional risk of the oil price, but we are seeing physical delivery premiums have spiked that cannot be hedged. Norden has, as you can see here on the map, we have 7 vessels inside trapped inside the Persian Gulf, 6 dry cargo vessels and 1 tanker. We have obviously suspended all new business coming into the region. We'll obviously touch much more on the situation in the Middle East later in the presentation. If we look at the highlights, the financial highlights of the quarter, we've made $11 million net profit in the quarter, which is giving us a return of just under 8% on the return on invested capital.
We have a very strong operational cash flow of $172 million in the quarter. What is probably the most significant development overall in the quarter has been this increase in the net asset value of our business and our fleet of 11% since the end of the year. In just 1 quarter, the net asset value of the company has actually gone up by 11% to now stand at DKK 422 per share. We continue to return cash to investors. In this quarter, we are continuing with a quarterly dividend of DKK 2 per share.
On top of that, we have a share buyback program of $25 million, and that brings the total payout to $35 million for this quarter. When we look at the group fleet overview, we continue to be very active in optimizing the fleet. We have, in this quarter, sold seven vessels. 4 of those are from declared purchase options. We also continue to log in longer term earnings through time charter out, so we've done eight long-term deals on time charter to secure forward earnings. We also continue to add ships, so we've actually added more ships than we have sold. We've added 11 vessels in the quarter, eight leases with purchase options, and then we have purchased three vessels.
We continue to sit on this big portfolio of purchase options. We have 91 in the portfolio, of which 33 can be cleared over the next 2 years at prices that are currently 22% below current market prices. If we dive a little bit more into the fleet and look at the fleet composition, you will notice here that we are reducing exposure mainly on the ships that exposed to what we call the positioning margin, so that's more the ships that are dependent on directional market calls. Typical the larger dry bulk vessels, but also the MR ships. Here we have specifically sold one Cape and chartered out 3. We've sold 2 Panamax.
On MRs, we have sold 2 ships and time chartered out 5 ships. Quite a lot of activity on these large and medium ships, but predominantly reducing exposure in those segments. The ships that we are adding to the fleet have all been in what we call the smaller vessel sizes. They are more exposed to the base margin part of the business. This is the core operating margin that is not dependent on the market direction. This is where a combination of cargoes, reducing ballast time, loading more niche-type cargoes, you know, add additional margin. Here we have added the 2 Handysize ships to the core fleet, and then 9 multipurpose ships.
We now have built a core fleet of multipurpose ships of 22 vessels, and strategically, this is sort of one of the areas that we're focused on building. Most of these ships are newbuildings. The first one will deliver later this year, and then this fleet will deliver in the coming years. One deal stands out in the quarter, and that is that we have signed a newbuilding contract for 2 ice-classed multipurpose vessels. Those ships are ordered against a long-term contract that we have signed with a Swedish mining company. And the ships will be used partly to perform that contract when they deliver in 2028.
With that, I will hand you over to Martin, who will talk a little bit more about our NAV.
Thank you very much. Yes, as Jan already alluded to, at the highlights page, the NAV developed quite positively during the quarter, up 11% to 422 DKK per share. It was actually a broad-based increase in the value of assets, both in Dry and in Tankers. You'll see from the table here that, currently, actually, in terms of our own fleet, the majority of the value, DKK 800 million, lies within Dry, whereas DKK 200 million are in Tankers. When you look at the value of the TC portfolio, including purchase options, it's actually a little bit overweight Tankers with $263 million.
On the right-hand side, you will see sensitivity analysis of what happens to the DKK 422 per share if we change both the forward curve and the asset values by 10% or 20%. You will see the outcome ranging from DKK 308-DKK 559 per share, all actually either in line or above the current share price. Oh. Sorry for that. It's a little bit slow. Looking at the market development in the dry, it was actually a fairly strong quarter. When you look at the turquoise line in the middle of the graph, you will see that the spot rates for Supramax, as an example, were far higher than 2025. Actually, they were up to 41% over the quarter.
That was mainly driven by the standard commodities, iron ore, bauxite, grains, whereas coal was actually quite weak, although we are seeing that changing currently. We do have a firm view on the long-term outlook for dry cargo, not least based on a favorable supply side, where you'll see on the right-hand side that the order book is actually matched more or less by the share of the fleet, which is over 20 years. There's good reason to believe that you can actually still have favorable fundamentals in the dry cargo market going forward. Looking at our earnings in dry cargo, you will see that we made on EBIT level a loss of $45 million, which is, of course, unsatisfactory.
It was mainly driven by Dry Operator large and small, which both made a loss in the quarter. Of course, some of this was related to cost as a result of the Persian Gulf conflict, where we both have vessels stuck within the within the Persian Gulf. Certainly also the regional bunker premium that Jan talked about in the beginning, which are hedged to the extent possible. There is still some non-hedgeable items of the bunker exposure we have that has cost us quite dearly during the during the quarter. Of course, it's not all the Persian Gulf.
It's also what we call regional positioning, which really means that we have decided to reposition some of our vessels from the Pacific into the Atlantic in expectations of higher Atlantic rates. The benefits from this has yet to materialize, we still expect some of that to show up in the Q2 earnings. We do see gradual improvement in earnings in Dry Operator going forward. In tankers, it was a super strong spot market during the quarter, of course, driven by the dislocation of trade flows following the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. You'll see the graph here actually coming up to close to $70,000 a day.
That was actually an average of very large regional discrepancies, where the U.S. Gulf ramped up exports quite aggressively and paying rates close to $100,000 a day, whereas it was a little bit more muted, but still good rates of, call it, $30,000 a day in the east. The development in rates has turned around in recent days. Of course, the underlying problem here is that the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, we are lacking 15%-20% of volumes that will normally have occupied a lot of seaborne capacity. Also here, actually, fundamentally, we are not so worried about the supply side, as you will see on the right-hand side also here.
The order book is matched more or less with the share of the fleet being more than 20 years old. We do think some of this order book is starting to accelerate deliveries during the second half. That should put some pressure on rates going forward. In tankers, we made a total EBIT of $47 million. It was actually mainly in the Dry owner which has some spot exposure through our Norient Product Pool. The Tanker owner made $37 million, and the Tanker operator just over $10 million in the quarter. That brings me to the full year guidance, which, as you know, we upgraded end of April. We raised it by $40 million to a new guidance of $70 million-$140 million.
That includes a reservation of $30 million to cover possible costs for the 6 TC vessels that we have stuck within the Persian Gulf. Those vessels may stay there actually until the end of the year before they can get out. The earnings that we expect for 2026 are quite front-end loaded, meaning that much of it should come in in Q2 and then taper off within the second half of the year. In terms of risk exposure, we have about 2,300 open tanker days and close to 7,000 open dry cargo days, all being long against the market. That concludes my part of the slides, and I will hand you back to Jan.
Thank you, Martin. This is just a reminder of the key drivers in the business model and how we approach markets. We have these four drivers, dry cargo and tankers, you know, are two, and then asset heavy and asset light, you know, the operating business. We have these four drivers that helps us to adjust our exposure to the prevailing market conditions. What we're seeing now is that in a very, very high tanker market, we have decided to reduce exposure there and move more of that exposure towards dry cargo. As we explained earlier on some of the previous slides, we've done a few deals to both sell tanker vessels but also take longer-term time charter contracts on tankers.
We now have, on average, around 80% cover for our tanker business until the end of 2028. Taking advantage of these high tanker rates and locking in long-term profits in that part of the business. That means that we have more exposure in the dry side and within the dry cargo business. As we explained on 1 of the previous slides, we are moving exposure more towards the smaller segments where we have more impact on the earnings than just being driven by the market. We think this flexibility in the business model where we have, you know, several drivers, realizing that it's not always all 4 drivers that will go at the same time.
Over a rolling five-year period, we can see that this generates higher returns than industry peers that are more specialized in just one segment. This ability to switch between the segments actually has a lot of value for Norden in the long run. If we move to the next slide and then look a bit more at the direction we're taking towards 2030, we see an opportunity to go even deeper in our relationships with customers at a time where there is a lot of focus on supply chains and geopolitical uncertainty. Norden stands out as a reliable service provider in the freight industry.
That is something that we want to leverage and continue to build both more cargo networks with complementing contracts, but also have more efficiencies in the way that we operate the cargo book and the fleet. The expansion towards the smaller vessel sizes within Dry cargo is also with a view to focus more on what we call the base margin, the core operating margins in the business, and thereby reduce the volatility in our earnings. Because in the smaller segments, project cargo, minor bulk commodities, but also the logistics part of our business, it is less exposed to market fluctuations and thereby giving more stable returns through, you know, the expertise that we can provide in those segments.
We will, however, continue to be focused on this, adjusting our exposure and remaining what we call asset agile, and continue to take the opportunities that we see in the market. Both buying and selling our vessels, as an example, is largely driven by the opportunities that we come across in the market, and that sort of is an important part of providing, you know, strong upside in better markets. That's exactly what we're seeing right now through the whole optionality portfolio, you know, where we have a lot of extension options and a lot of purchase options in our fleet. In rising markets, there's a lot of value there that we can that we can realize.
That brings me just to the last slide and just, you know, a few points here on the investment story in Norden. When you zoom out and look at the industry, we think actually the macro view of the industry is fundamentally very positive because when you take a longer-term view towards 2030 and beyond, we see a aging global fleet both in dry cargo and in tankers. We currently have a low order book, especially on the dry cargo side.
This replacement need of all these older vessels is not currently being met by the order book. As we've also previously explained, all the geopolitical uncertainty and the dislocations are creating longer distances for transportation, and that means that we have a very healthy market balance as we see it. Even if, even at times of lower economic activity, the inherent risk of a prolonged oversupply situation is much, much smaller than what we have seen historically over the last couple of decades.
Our business model, point 2 here that we can adjust to the different markets that we are in gives us huge flexibility to manage the risk through the market cycle and deliver better returns compared to a pure play company. We have the strategic focus on expanding in areas where we believe we have even more impact ourselves in terms of our operating capabilities, and really building this business that is more sophisticated, not least with the AI driven opportunities that we also see in enhancing our decision-making, and really bringing out, you know, the what we call the Norden platform.
You know, the value of being one of the largest operators in the industry and having a global network of offices close to our customers bring out all of that value as an important part of our strategic focus. The last point we're making here is that we continue with a relatively asset-light approach in our business model, but with the upside from purchase options on the asset upside that enables us to return a lot of cash to shareholders and have this disciplined capital allocation that over time, at least historically, had driven a ROIC outperformance compared to the industry.
I think with those words, let's turn over to the Q&A session, and hopefully there are questions where we can put a little bit more color to some of the points that we've made here today.
Thank you, Jan and Martin. Yes, we are now ready for the Q&A session. Just to repeat, you can get in line to ask questions by pushing the pound key or hashtag followed by 5 on your phone's touchpad if you dialed in by phone. Should you wish to withdraw from the line, you can push the pound key or hashtag followed by 6. If you're watching the webcast online through a browser, you can ask your written questions in the chat below. Those questions will not be published, but the operator will read them aloud to management. Let's start off with a couple of the written questions here. They were originally in Danish, this will be our translation. The energy company Mash Makes, which among other things was supposed to produce biofuel for DS Norden's fleet, has gone bankrupt.
It is reported that they were unable to raise capital for the next phase. You've been invested in the company since 2023. Can you tell us what loss you'll be taking in Norden's future financial reports in connection with this bankruptcy?
Yes, I can respond to that. When you look at the future financials, this will have no impact because all of it has been provided for in the current accounts already. Of course, we've been very happy to work together with the team behind MASH Makes, and I think they have very interesting technology. I think the phase that they are coming into now means that they will, they will need new investors to take this forward.
A follow-up question in connection with this. Can you tell us how this will affect your transition to biofuel? Are there new partners on the horizon or any concrete partnerships in the works?
Our efforts to work on decarbonization and offering that also as a product or service to some of our clients is unaltered. We have a strong belief still that biofuel is part of the answer for the shipping industry. We are working with several partners to help them actually realize zero emission transportation based on our products.
Thank you. The next question here is, as an investor, one has noticed that the bulk slash dry cargo market for what is by now an almost excessively long period has not been optimal for Norden. The tanker market on the other hand, is booming. Looking a bit into the future where we also see risk of, for example, lower Chinese growth, wouldn't it make good sense for Norden to look more towards the tanker market over the coming 1, 2 years and prioritize this business leg more heavily? Do you agree with this analysis, is also stated?
Yeah. I think let me start by saying that, going back to the business model that we have, both being in dry cargo and in tankers, you know, there will be periods where one leg is more attractive than the other. Only a few years ago it was the dry bulk business where we actually got the same question. You know, why are we not just focusing on that? I think we've shown over time that the strength of having both activities, that's important. If you talk about the risk-reward from where we are today, yes, clearly, tanker earnings are very strong right now, and it's attractive to be in tankers. To invest further in tankers right now is also very expensive and quite risky.
The risk-reward we think is more skewed towards the dry cargo side. That's also why we're running with relatively high coverage on the tanker business. We have actually made money overall in dry cargo last year. We are of course having a more difficult first quarter in dry bulk, which Martin also explained are some different drivers, some repositioning costs that will come back. We do expect better dry cargo performance in the coming quarters. Of course our focus is on obviously ensuring that we have the best possible performance. It's also a little bit ties in with the strategic choice of going towards the smaller vessels where we have more, you know, impact on the results through our own operation and not just being driven by the market.
Thank you. A question related to the current situation in the Middle East. It goes, "How do you see the scenario for yourself when the Strait of Hormuz is reopened and peace returns to the region? One would imagine you'll be extremely busy for an extended period with simultaneously high freight rates, primarily for tankers. Do you agree with that expectation? If yes, how long might one expect it to last and would you also have a positive impact on the dry cargo from this?
Yeah, that's a very good question or a number of questions, actually baked in there. I think overall, our view is that closure of the Hormuz Strait as we are seeing now is fundamentally negative for the tanker market. Yes, there has been some super short-term spot rate earnings in the last couple of months, we think those are temporary. After that, if it continues that long, there will be a lack of 15%-20% of normal seaborne volumes, which we think is such a demand hit that the market will be under pressure.
Of course, if the Strait of Hormuz were to open tomorrow, I think you're right that there could be an added employment for, again, a temporary period because countries and companies would need to restock and there would be quite a lot to do in that case. It's very dependent on the timeframe that we are discussing here. It's less of an issue on the Dry side where I think the impact on the market is more indirect through the impact on the macroeconomic environment. If global economy suffers because the oil price goes to $150 a barrel, then that will also lead to pressure on demand within dry cargo.
Overall we think it's a fundamentally negative story with some very strong positive temporary effects that we have experienced in the last couple of months. I hope that answers your question.
Thank you. Then a more specific question towards the tanker segment. Jan Rindbo mentioned earlier today in the radio show, Millionærklubben, that Norden has already secured coverage of 80% of the tanker order book through the end of 2028. Is that understood correctly? Does that mean you're looking to bring more tanker vessels into the business going forward?
Yeah, that is correct. We have covered now around 80% of our tanker capacity until the end of 2028. Bringing more tankers into the book, probably right now in terms of long-term deals, so time chartering in ships on long-term contracts and buying ships, right now we don't think that that's the right time to do that. You know, prices are very high, rates are very high. That's why we've done the opposite, selling ships and taking in cover by chartering out ships.
Of course, how the market plays out in the coming quarters if there's an opportunity, for example, in the scenario that Martin describes that if there is a softening in tanker rates then that could be an opportunity then to step in and take more capacity on again. That is obviously part of the playbook in our business model that we can do that. Right now we feel that the risk reward is not there to add tanker tonnage.
A question related to this, it says here, "A tanker outlook beyond Q2, you say the market eases or expect to be easing in second half of 2026. How severe could this easing be if Hormuz reopens quickly versus stay closed?
Yeah, that is a very difficult question. As I said before, if it opens immediately there will be some short-term benefits from I think desired restocking. If it lasts for a very long time, then we think, as we said, then the easing will come and being driven to a large extent by the lack of volumes, but also by newbuilding deliveries that will accelerate in the second half of the year.
Thank you. We will then look at the dry cargo segment. There's a few questions here related to this. There's one here, "Entering Q1 you were short the dry bulk market. How much of the dry cargo loss can be attributed to a wrong positioning?
That is part of the explanation, but it's not actually the main driver of the results in the first quarter. We now have a long position also in dry going forward. The main driver of the results in the first quarter is the additional costs that we've seen following the conflict in the Middle East, and then this repositioning of ships on lower paying backhaul routes from the Pacific into the Atlantic. The benefit of then positioning those ships back at fronthaul rates will only come in the coming quarters.
Thank you. Another question related to dry cargo. Could you provide more detail on the bunker price impact in dry cargo during Q1, especially why the sharply higher regional bunker prices following the Persian Gulf conflict could only be partially hedged, and how much of this impact you expect to reverse or normalize over the coming quarters?
That's actually a very interesting question, I think there are multiple sort of impacts on the oil market overall. What you normally see based on quotes in the media and so forth is typically the development in the standard barrel of oil, where you've seen the rising prices maybe from $70 before the crisis, up closer to $120, $25 per barrel. On top of this, when you look at then diesel and gasoline and some of these refined products, then the price changes have been even more vehement. If you then look into the specific prices when you actually go into a bunker port in different regions, you've seen spikes that we probably have never seen before.
This goes to explain why even though we have a hedge framework that actually hedges all our flat rate exposure, if you will, sort of the standard price of oil, then you can't hedge what happens in local bunker ports here and there, because there are no price indices, there are no derivatives to do the hedging. That means that when you have to perform a cargo, and you go into bunker, then suddenly you are met with very unpredictable and, in this case, very high bunker prices, that will then seriously affect the voyage results that you can incur.
Thank you. Another question to the Dry Operator segment, and specifically on the small vessel segment.
It says here you're still loss-making at US dollar $9.2 million. When do the multipurpose Handysize additions start to show up positively in this segment?
The core fleet that we are building, the 22 ships that we referred to earlier, the majority of those ships are newbuildings that we'll deliver in the future. The first newbuilding will deliver to our fleet during Q3. That is the latest estimate for that delivery. It will ramp up, you know, through 2027 and 2028. It will come over the next sort of two to three years in terms of that core fleet, and that includes these 2 ice-classed newbuildings that will deliver in 2028.
Thank you. A question related to the fleet and the options that you have here. It says You sold 7 vessels year to date, and then you have 33 purchase options in the money at strikes 22% below broker values. What's stopping you from declaring more of these now while asset values are at a multi-year high?
Well, one thing is that the underlying charter rate is very attractive compared to the current market rates, and then we have options to extend that as well. In addition to the purchase optionality that we have, we also have an extension optionality, and there's also value in that. When we look at the development on asset prices, we are quite optimistic that the prices are not going to decline substantially from the current levels because new yards are full with newbuildings. The markets, especially on both dry and tankers, you know, under built, you know, the current asset values.
We would like to both get the value out of the extension options and then subsequently also get the value out of the purchase options. I think it's also important to highlight that we are also from time to time declaring purchase options without necessarily also selling the vessels at the same time. We could also, and we are also looking at declaring some of these options and then actually keeping the vessels in our fleet as owned vessels.
Thank you. Then a question related to your net asset value and capital allocation, and what now seems to be the last question. Now it's up to DKK 422 per share, while the share price is around $294. That's a 30% discount. You're distributing around $35 million for Q1. That's DKK 2 in dividend and a buyback of $25 million. With the shares trading well below now, would you not lean more aggressively into the buybacks rather than dividends?
Yes, that, I think is a good question and something that, we of course also, have discussed. There is, there is one problem, which is really that, there are some, legal limitations as to how big, a share buyback program you can undertake compared to the general liquidity, in the share in the market. We can't actually do much more on the share buyback side than what we are doing. We actually agree in the argument, that, it's trading at a discount, so it's a good place to actually invest. But we have maxed out on that opportunity already.
Thank you. There seems to be no further questions, so I will leave the word to management for a final remark.
All right. Well, thank you for tuning in. Thank you for great questions, related to the Q1 report. Thank you again for joining us here, and we look forward to seeing you again for the next quarterly presentation. Thank you.
Thank you.