Nordex narrows 2022 outlook due to inflation, supply chain woes

Nordex SE (ETR:NDX1) has revised down its guidance for 2022 as inflationary pressure and disrupted supply chains dented its performance in the first nine months of the year, causing its loss to swell.

The German wind turbine manufacturer now expects its operating margin (EBITDA margin) to be around minus 4% which is at the lower end of the guidance from May that suggested a result in the range of minus 4% to 0%.

In the nine months through September, Nordex saw its net loss widen to EUR 371.6 million (USD 383.45m) from EUR 103.7 million a year earlier.

Supply chain disruptions led to a decrease in wind turbine installations with new additions falling to 791 wind turbines with a total capacity of 3.6 GW in the period under review from 1,216 machines of a combined 4.9 GW installed a year earlier. The lower installation number led to a decrease in the revenues generated in the projects segment to EUR 3.5 billion.

Order intake in the projects segment, excluding services, fell 4.3% on the year to 4.4 GW but the volume of incoming orders rose 12.5% to EUR 3.6 billion thanks to higher selling prices. In the third quarter alone, the average selling price per megawatt of output was 32% higher than a year ago.

In the January-September period, Nordex manufactured 4.9 GW of wind turbines, up from 4.8 GW a year ago.

The group's order book grew 21% to nearly EUR 9.7 billion with the projects segment accounting for the majority of EUR 6.5 billion.

Despite the tough environment, Nordex maintained the forecast for consolidated sales of between EUR 5.2 billion to EUR 5.7 billion and capital expenditure of around EUR 180 million in 2022.

More details about Nordex's performance in the first nine months of 2022:

Amounts in EUR million	9-mo 2022	9-mo 2021
Sales	3,873	3,956
-- thereof Service segment	397.9	331.8
Gross revenue	3,892	3,585
EBITDA (loss)	(199.8)	100.7
EBITDA margin	-5.2%	2.5%
Consolidated net profit (loss)	(371.6)	(103.7)
Order Intake (Projects)	3,647	3,219
Order Intake (Service)	471	422

(EUR 1 = USD 1.032)