Nel ASA's Sub-$1,450 Alkaline Bet Lures First Utility Buyer as Orders Remain Thin

Nel ASA shares hit 52-week high on new alkaline electrolyser cost breakthrough, but orders collapse 73% and analysts rate it a sell. RSI at 28 muddles oversold signal.

The Norwegian electrolyser maker's shares sealed a fresh 52-week high of €0.33 on Friday, capping a 71% year-to-date advance driven by product news rather than order flow. From a March trough of €0.18, the stock has bounced more than 80%, though the underlying financials remain stretched. The rally has pushed the relative strength index to around 28 — a level that normally signals oversold territory, though the recent surge muddies that reading.

A cost breakthrough eight years in the making

Nel's new pressurised alkaline platform, launched commercially in early May, aims to undercut competing technologies by bringing the cost of a turnkey 25-megawatt installation below $1,450 per kilowatt. That headline figure, the fruit of eight years of development, gives CEO Håkon Volldal a concrete price advantage to take to market. He has positioned the technology squarely in the defence and infrastructure camp, arguing that on-site hydrogen production reduces reliance on centralised grids — a pitch that resonates with policymakers focused on energy security.

The first tangible validation arrived quickly. The Douglas County Public Utility District in Washington state has ordered a PEM electrolyser from Nel — the company's first-ever sale to a public power utility. The plant will use surplus hydropower to generate green hydrogen, with stacks manufactured at Nel's facility in Wallingford, Connecticut. Commissioning is scheduled for the first half of 2027. Separately, Nel booked a second order worth about $7 million from Mesure Process, a subsidiary of Synqo Energies, for containerised PEM units destined for European hydrogen refuelling stations.

The numbers lag the narrative

Yet the gap between strategic ambition and operational reality was stark in the first quarter. New orders collapsed 73% year on year, dragging the order backlog to 1.113 billion Norwegian kroner. Revenue of 148 million kroner slipped 5% from the prior-year period, and while the EBITDA loss narrowed by 15 million to minus 100 million kroner, the bottom line remains deep in the red. Full-year 2025 was weighed down by impairment charges of 799 million kroner, mainly on production assets at the Herøya site.

Cash reserves stand at about 1.4 billion kroner, which Nel says is sufficient to fund operations through end-2026. An EU grant of €11 million is expected in the second quarter to support industrialisation of the alkaline platform. The workforce has been trimmed by 26% from its peak.

Insider conviction meets analyst caution

Board chairman Arvid Moss signalled confidence by buying 100,000 shares at an average price of 2.25 Norwegian kroner in late April — a purchase that contrasts sharply with the view from the City. Not a single analyst on the sell side rates the stock a buy; seven recommend selling. The consensus 12-month price target of 2.12 kroner sits well below the current Oslo listing of 3.22 kroner. RBC Capital Markets maintains a "Neutral" rating, while Berenberg holds at "Hold".

Management is pressing ahead with development of a next-generation PEM platform designed to reduce stack costs by roughly 70%. Volldal has been in discussions with multiple potential customers for projects ranging from 50 to 150 megawatts in Europe and North America. Whether those talks translate into firm orders will become clearer when Nel reports second-quarter results on July 15, 2026. For now, the market is betting on the technology — and the chairman — rather than the backlog.