Wind turbine maker Nordex sticks to 2022 sales drop forecast

FRANKFURT (Reuters) – German wind turbine maker Nordex reported a 21% fall in 2022 first half sales on Sunday, citing lower demand for installations, and stuck to a forecast of a drop for the year as a whole.

Nordex said the war in Ukraine, the COVID-19 pandemic and ensuing energy and logistics disruptions had led to negative first-half earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) of 173.3 million euros, after a positive 68.4 million euro result in the same year-ago period.

The company also reported a consolidated 283.2 million euro net loss for January to June, a sharp deterioration from a net loss in the comparable period of 2021 of 63.7 million euros.

Looking to the full year, consolidated sales in 2022 should come in between 5.2 and 5.7 billion euros, compared with 5.4-6.0 billion originally forecast, and the EBITDA margin at minus 4% to zero%, Nordex reiterated.

The EBITDA margin in the first half of the year was minus 8.1%. Nordex wants to achieve a margin of 8% as a strategic medium term target.

“With markets remaining challenging, our business performance in the second quarter was as expected,” said chief executive Jose Luis Blanco.

But having strengthened its capital structure through capital increases in June and July and with a strong order book, Blanco said Nordex is confident it would benefit from positive growth prospects in the mid-term.

Nordex said the drop in installations in the second quarter was especially noticeable outside Europe and Latin America.

The value of new orders in the six-month period totalled 2.4 billion euros, which was 20.2% higher than a year earlier.

(Reporting by Vera Eckert; Editing by Alexander Smith)