Good morning, and welcome to our fourth quarter presentation from 2025. My name is Rolf Barmen, Head of Elmera Group. Our CFO, Henning Nordgulen, is also, as usual, with me and will take us through the financials. Morten Opdal, Head of Investor Relations, is also with us and will take questions during the presentation and address them to Morten to Henning and myself during the Q&A session. So in general, the group improved our EBITDA adjusted year-on-year by 3.1% compared to fourth quarter 2024. Taking into consideration a 5% reduction in volume sold, this is a really solid performance. The weather has been warm in all of 2025, and fourth quarter was no exception. The quarter was characterized by mild weather compared to both fourth quarter 2024 and historical norms, which contributed to lower-than-normal volumes across all of our segments and lower average consumption.
The volume decrease was also impacted by portfolio optimization initiatives, including phase-out of low-margin tender customers in the Business segment and the run-off of legacy contracts in the Nordic segment. Regarding the dividend, the board of directors proposes a dividend of NOK 2 per share for 2025, subject to approval by the AGM. Over to the reporting segment, starting off with Consumer. First off, I would say that I'm very satisfied with how we have handled Norgespris. After solid customer growth in the Consumer segment ahead of implementation, the segment experienced an initial churn increase in October following the Norgespris launch. However, the customer growth trend turned positive through the quarter and has continued into first quarter 2026, supported by targeting marketing campaigns and sales efforts.
Approximately 50% of Norwegian households and holiday homes have selected Norgespris, and both internal and external data shows higher electricity consumption per delivery among Norgespris customers. The Business segment continued its strong and consistent track record and delivered another strong quarter financially, with significant improvement in operating profit year-on-year. As for the Consumer, volumes were lower than normal, driven by both mild weather and reduced exposure in the low-margin, high-volume tender customer segment. In New Growth Initiatives, changes to the Alliance business model reduced segment revenue while lowering the group's financing cost. Increased sales and marketing costs and strategic costs affected profitability both for Mobile and Alliance this quarter. In Nordic, operating profit improved year-on-year, supported by lowering operating expenses. Sales figures were influenced by seasonally lower demand for spot products during winter, while we increased sales capacity and continued the portfolio transformation.
As stated in previous presentation, we continue to observe a positive momentum for M&A transactions. I'll come back to further comments on outlook and financial targets, but first, I will hand over to Henning, who will take you through the financials. Henning, the floor is yours.
Thank you, Rolf, and good morning to you all. Let's start with the key financials. Net revenue adjusted ended at NOK 463 million in the quarter, compared to NOK 486 million in Q4 of the previous year. Adjusted EBIT was NOK 159 million, up from NOK 154 million in Q4 2024. The full year 2025 net revenue adjusted was NOK 1.686 billion, compared to NOK 1.793 billion in 2024, and the full year adjusted EBIT was NOK 487 million, compared to NOK 569 million in 2024. Adjusted OpEx came in low at NOK 304 million in the quarter, down from NOK 332 million in the Q4 in the previous year.
The full year adjusted OpEx was NOK 1.199 billion, compared to NOK 1.224 billion in 2024, and that is well inside our nominal OpEx guidance. Cash payments to obtain new contracts were NOK 35 million in the quarter, compared to NOK 27 million in Q4 of 2024, and it was NOK 150 million on the last twelve months basis. Since our Capital Markets Day in 2024, we have described how the changes in our financing structure relating to the insourcing of the power trading function would affect the year-on-year comparison. In Q4, we saw the typical seasonal increase in net working capital, driven by increased volumes and higher spot prices. We reiterate that the former supply credit arrangement was also interest-bearing and underlying leverage remains unchanged.
The dividend proposal of NOK 2 per share is somewhat higher than the underlying cash generation in 2025, and the board's assessment includes a portion of the cash proceeds from the sale of the Metzum shares a year ago. So let's go over to the market development. On the left-hand side, you can see that weekly Elspot prices, and they have been both volatile and higher than last year, which is positive for credit compensation revenues in the Business segment, but has a negative impact on variable margins in the Consumer segment and also on overall group financing costs. On the right-hand side, you can see the monthly supplier changes in Norway. We saw elevated switching activity around the Norgespris implementation in October, before a normalization in November. Then over to the segments, and let's start with Consumer.
Our market share was maintained quarter-on-quarter, despite increased churn following the Norgespris introduction. The initial churn increase subsided during October, and the growth trend turned positive through the quarter, and as Rolf said, supported by targeting marketing campaigns and sales efforts. The segment's net revenue declined by NOK 9 million year-on-year. This change was driven by product migration from variable to spot contracts and increase in sales-related incentives. Mild weather reduced average consumption per delivery by 2% year-on-year, but it was fully offset by customer growth, leaving the total volume sold flat versus Q4 of 2024. Volume sold over the last two months decreased year-on-year due to the reduced average consumption. Moving to Business. Overall, we are very pleased with the Business segment's continued strong and consistent performance, delivering a particularly solid Q4.
We saw a slight decrease in deliveries in the quarter, driven by a reduction in low-margin customers, which, again, they are primarily larger tender customers. Volume was down year-on-year, mainly due to changes to the customer mix and mild weather. Despite this, net revenue grew year-on-year, supported by increased credit compensation from higher spot prices. The quarter also benefited from low operating expenses, further supporting a strong development in EBIT adjusted year-on-year. As you can see from the orange LTM line in the chart to the bottom right, the total volume in the segment has decreased as we have reduced our exposure to the beforementioned low-margin customers in combination with the milder weather, while the LTM-adjusted EBIT has remained stable. Then over to the Nordic segment.
We expected a decrease in deliveries quarter-on-quarter as winter demand shifted from spot to fixed-price contracts, reducing the spot contract sales momentum. Volume was down year-on-year due to the mild temperatures and the phase-out of legacy fixed-price contracts. The last twelve months' volume was stable around 1.5 TWh. Net revenue was negatively impacted by lower volumes and credit and hedging losses. These losses were moderate in the quarter and in line with our indication in Q3. The year-on-year comparison was further affected by the fact that both revenues and costs were temporarily elevated in Q4 2024. More specific to this quarter, year-end effects reduced OpEx, with a resulting improvement in EBIT adjusted year-on-year. Then turning to the New Growth Initiatives. Alliance volume sold increased both year-on-year and over the last twelve months.
We also saw Alliance growth, growth of 21,000 deliveries in the quarter. Net revenue decreased year-on-year, primarily driven by reduced credit compensation within Alliance, following the Business model revision last spring, which also contributes to reducing group financing costs. Increased sales and marketing costs and strategic costs related to new products and services had an effect on the adjusted EBIT in the quarter. However, our plans and expectations are for a significant EBIT improvement in the segment in 2026. Then finally, net working capital and cash. As explained initially, the year-on-year change in reported net working capital is affected by the replacement of interest-bearing supply credit previously classified under net working capital with bank facilities. The quarter also shows the seasonal increase in net working capital, quarter-on-quarter, driven by increased volumes and higher spot prices.
On the right-hand side, you can see the movement in net cash through the quarter. Our cash EBIT adjusted in the quarter was NOK 166 million, and the net interest-bearing debt was NOK 1.9 billion at year-end. That concludes the financial review. I'll now give the floor back to Rolf for the outlook section.
Thank you very much, Henning. Before I walk you through our financial targets for 2026, let me outline some high-level considerations regarding our main segments. For the Consumer segment, our internal data indicates 3%-4% higher electricity consumption delivery among Norgespris customers. We expect this to increase during low-temperature periods, and there is also reason to believe that long-term trends will push consumption even higher. Approximately 50% of Norwegian households have selected Norgespris for their homes and cottages. This number is still increasing as Norgespris becomes more and more relevant in all price areas, now also relevant off-winter season, as price predictions are coming in fairly high throughout the year. We expect this to employ an accelerated phase-out of our variable portfolio. We also expect that price volatility and a high price level as such will put pressure on our imbalance cost, affecting our COGS.
Finally, one of our top beliefs is that increasing complexity and stress margins in our sector bring growth momentum along. We have the resources to gain market shares, and we will take the opportunity to win customers in this market sentiment. We are also chasing M&A prospects also in Norway, and observe increasing interest from sell side. When it comes to the Business segment, this segment has been the top performer of the group for many years. We expect this to continue, even though competition is tough. As for the Nordics, we expect the ongoing expansion to require further investments in brand building and distribution to accelerate scale and strengthen our market position. We also expect credit-related headwinds in parts of the Swedish portfolio to remain a factor in 2026, although we do not expect high quarterly losses on the level of second quarter last year.
We stand firm that customer growth within our core business in the Nordic is the main target for the segment next year or this coming year, supported by our cross-border initiative as the rollout of our IT platform, both in Sweden and Finland. Furthermore, we continue to actively pursue acquisitions, and similar to the situation in Norway, we see increased interest also from the sell side, both in Sweden and Finland. So our message regarding Nordic is that short term, we invest in growth, not expecting significant financial contribution the coming year, but long term, these efforts will positively impact shareholders' value as growth turn into profitability. Next, our financial targets and guidance for 2026. Compared to our previous communication, we have adjusted our guidance slightly. We target net revenue growth on group level from 2025 to 2026.
We also reiterate our focus on stable nominal adjusted OpEx in line with 2024 and 2025, as cost efficiency remains an important focus area for us. We expect adjusted EBIT to be in the area of NOK 550 million, versus our previous guidance of 550 million-600 million. The adjustment reflects a combination of factors, as mentioned in my outlook section. On dividend, our target payout rate remains at least 80% of net income, adjusted for certain cash and non-cash items. So with that, we move to the Q&A session, and I welcome Henning to the stage. Morten, do you have any incoming questions for us?
We have a couple of questions, and we can start with one on guidance. It goes the following: Volumes increase in the first quarter, and Nordic performs well. The change in guidance seems counterintuitive. Can you comment a bit on that?
Yes, I understand the question. The volume development so far in first quarter has been better than expected, no doubt about that. But on the other hand, there are a couple of negative drivers that we must consider. One is, that the high price sentiment and the price volatility put pressure on our variable margins. As I said in the presentation, our belief is that the phase out of this product is accelerated by the fact that Norwegian price now gains momentum also in the mid and northern price areas, as the high price sentiment seems to develop, both regionally, but also in time, taking into consideration that the prediction for price level throughout the year is increasing. Another factor is the imbalance cost.
We have managed to reduce the imbalance volume of the insourcing of power trading, but we expect that increased prices actually will outperform the operational improvement to some extent. Not to forget the fact that in the Nordic segment, we still expect some credit-related headwinds, and part of this is the Swedish portfolio also in 2026, even though it will not be in the level of second quarter 2025. On the positive side, in addition to increased volume, we do have identified the coming season as a, you can say, season of light when it comes to gaining market shares, both in Norway, Sweden, and Finland, and we really want to seize this opportunity to take necessary measures.
Doing so will of course have some short-term impact on our profitability, but in the long run, it will strengthen both our market position and our margin resilience across all our markets. So weighing both the pros and cons from our expectation for 2026, we remain disciplined in how we translate these effects into our short-term guidance. And therefore, we target an improvement from NOK 487 million full year 2025 to around NOK 550 million in 2026.
Thank you. We have another question on the net working capital. Net working capital increased significantly. Was this more than anticipated, and how will this affect financing costs going forward?
... No, just to remind that we have been very clear since the capital markets day in 2024 that the changes from the financing structure from interest-bearing supply credit to predominantly syndicate the bank debt, we still have an arrangement with Statkraft, but now rely more on the daily physical power trading at Nord Pool. It will, of course, have an effect. And the balance sheet as of year-end came in according to our expectation. It is, of course, affected by both the volume and the price structure.
When it comes to the impact on cost, we have given guidance and some indication of how to calculate the financing cost in terms of outstanding receivables and the credit terms that are listed in our notes and accounts. It is, of course, clear that with high price, high volume scenario that we have so far in Q1, this will be also a quarter with higher financing costs.
Thank you. We have a question on the Consumer Council regarding variable contracts. Can you please comment upon how you view the recent claims from the Consumer Council, and what actions are you taking in regards to variable contracts that are still outstanding?
We have informed all the customers multiple times, according to try to get them to change their product and their services with us. And we have a continuous connection with the authorities. And from our perspective, consumer authorities fully has supported the way we have handled this so far, and we have no reason to believe that they won't support how we handle this going forward either. So, what the Consumer Council says, they take this from time to time, they come with these kind of discussions, but we do what we can do. And as I said, I think that the market sentiment will phase out this product during this year.
And it will be accelerated actually due to the Norgespris subsidizing scheme. So, I think that's my answer for now.
Thank you. We have a question on customer growth. You state that customer growth has been positive into the first quarter. Can you elaborate a bit on that?
Of course. We experienced a solid growth in Consumer segment in Q3, as we reported. And apart from during October, we also experienced growth in the fourth quarter, and this trend has definitely continued into this first quarter. We do remain active in our sales and marketing efforts, and this is an important measure to increase long-term profitability for the group.
Okay, and then a last question on dividend. What's your reflection on the proposed dividend level of NOK 2 per share?
No, we believe that the, as do our board, that the proposed dividend represent balance allocation of capital, taking into account both the shareholders and, and other stakeholders. As I said earlier, the NOK 2 per share is somewhat higher than the underlying cash generation in 2025, and the board's assessments includes a share of the cash proceeds of the Metzum shares sale ago, and that's, it is a principle that's established in Elmera Group, and we have a. When we are able to develop assets that come to a fruitful conclusion, we share the proceeds with our shareholders.
Thank you. That concludes the Q&A session. We thank you all for your attention, and have a nice day.