Nel ASA’s Samsung-Backed Guarantee Aims to Unlock Green Hydrogen Financing as Orders Slide 73%

The Oslo-traded shares of Nel ASA have rallied to within touching distance of their 52-week high, closing Friday at €0.35 on Tradegate, a gain of 1.01% on the day and 6.71% for the week. The stock has soared 82.6% since the start of the year and a stunning 96% from the March low of €0.18. But the technical picture — a Relative Strength Index of 49.6, neutral territory, with the 200-day moving average of €0.21 left far behind — belies a fundamental deterioration that has analysts sounding alarms.

The real story lies not in the chart but in the product launch that could reshape how green hydrogen projects get financed. At the World Hydrogen Summit in Rotterdam, Samsung E&A and Nel unveiled the CompassH2-A+, a 100‑MW electrolyser system built from containerised 25‑MW modules that cut floor space by roughly 50% compared with conventional designs. The breakthrough, however, is a unified full‑performance warranty covering the entire plant — including the stacks — underwritten by Samsung. In a sector where guarantees have historically been fragmented across multiple vendors, this bundled assurance could be the key that unlocks project bankability and makes lenders comfortable. The CompassH2-A+ is the third product in the CompassH2 family, joining atmospheric alkaline and PEM variants.

Yet the technology milestone arrives when Nel’s core business is contracting sharply. In the first quarter of its fiscal 2026, the Norwegian hydrogen specialist generated revenue of 148.1 million Norwegian kroner, a decline of 4.66% year‑on‑year. The net loss per share narrowed from NOK 0.10 to NOK 0.08, but the operating picture was bleaker: EBITDA swung to a loss of NOK 100 million. More worrying for the outlook, order intake collapsed by 73% to just NOK 85 million, and the order backlog shrank by 24% to NOK 1.1 billion. Management has acknowledged that the current pipeline is insufficient to achieve meaningful capacity utilisation in 2027. Headcount has been trimmed by 26% from its peak to roughly 300 employees, cutting personnel costs by 21%, but the company warned that the downsizing has eroded both manufacturing and project delivery capacity.

Should investors sell immediately? Or is it worth buying Nel ASA?

Nel does have a comfortable cash cushion of 1.44 billion Norwegian kroner (roughly €125 million) to weather the downturn. Additional liquidity is expected in the second quarter from the first tranche of EU Innovation Fund grants, amounting to around €11 million, with a total of up to €135 million potentially available for the industrialisation of its new pressurised alkaline platform. That platform, developed over more than eight years, reached commercial launch in May 2026 after successful prototype testing at Herøya in Norway. Nel says the turnkey system costs for a 25‑MW plant will be under $1,450 per kilowatt, representing a 40–60% reduction versus current market alternatives. The final investment decision for industrialisation at Herøya was taken in December 2025, with production capacity planned to reach 1 GW per year and eventually 4 GW. A next‑generation PEM system is also in the pipeline, targeting a 70% reduction in stack costs, though commercialisation is not expected before 2028 or 2029.

The disconnect between the stock’s momentum and the underlying numbers is stark. Of the 13 analysts covering Nel, seven rate it a sell and six a hold; not a single buy recommendation exists. The 12‑month consensus price target of NOK 2.12 for the Oslo listing implies roughly 45% downside from the current level of NOK 3.85. The share’s 52‑week high of €0.36 — touched in late May — is just 2% above Friday’s close, suggesting the rally may be running out of steam without fresh catalysts.

All eyes now turn to the half‑year report due on 15 July. Investors will be looking for signs that the Samsung partnership and the CompassH2‑A+ have begun converting conference buzz into actual purchase orders. If the order book remains thin, the rally of 2026 could quickly unravel. If it doesn’t, Nel’s cash pile and its new bankability solution might yet buy the time needed for demand to catch up with ambition.