Nel ASA's Leadership Vacancy Deepens as Hydrogen's Big-Energy Backers Retreat

Nel ASA's order book jumps 224% despite CEO departure and Big Oil's green hydrogen pullback, but shares remain 46% below peak.

The Norwegian electrolyser specialist is navigating a delicate moment. Its chief executive is heading for the exit, the sector's traditional heavyweight customers are slamming the brakes on green hydrogen, and the share price is trading deep in the red relative to its springtime peak. Yet beneath the surface, the order book is telling a surprisingly different story.

Nel ASA closed Tuesday's session at EUR 0.1974, a modest gain of 0.41 percent on the day and 2.49 percent higher on the week. The longer view is less forgiving: the stock has shed 7.54 percent over the past 30 days and now sits 45.99 percent below its 52-week high of EUR 0.3655, reached in late May. The 14-day RSI of 41.1 suggests the recent volatility has cooled, though the price remains below both its 50-day and 200-day moving averages — territory that keeps chart-watchers cautious.

A CEO Departure With a Long Tail

The leadership question has been hanging over the company since mid-June, when Håkon Volldal announced his resignation. Volldal, who took the helm in July 2022 and steered Nel toward a pure-play electrolyser focus, is serving a six-month notice period that runs until roughly the end of 2026. He is departing to lead packaging group Elopak. Board chairman Arvid Moss has stressed that the strategic direction will remain unchanged, but with no successor yet named, investors are left weighing an unwelcome variable.

The timing is awkward. Nel is mid-transformation, having spun off its hydrogen refuelling station business as Cavendish Hydrogen in June 2024. That move left the parent company as a focused technology provider for alkaline and PEM electrolysers — a cleaner investment case on paper, but one that now hinges on an unresolved succession.

Big Oil Steps Back, Niche Demand Steps In

Reports from early August indicate that major energy players such as BP have postponed or shelved multiple green hydrogen projects, redirecting attention to their core operations. For electrolyser manufacturers, that translates into thinner order pipelines for gigawatt-scale developments in the near term.

Nel's response has been to pivot toward smaller, specialised industrial partners rather than banking on a handful of mega-projects. Long-time collaborator H2 Energy placed a firm order in October 2025 to expand hydrogen infrastructure in Switzerland, and deliveries to A.H.T. Syngas continue. While the energy majors hesitate, Nel is filling the gap with targeted industrial demand.

Orders Surge, Losses Persist

The second-quarter figures, covering the period to June 30, 2026, capture the mixed picture. Order intake jumped 224 percent to 230 million Norwegian kroner, while the order backlog climbed to 1.213 billion kroner. Revenue reached 153.41 million kroner.

The bottom line, however, remained firmly in the red. EBITDA came in at minus 155 million kroner, with a one-off settlement in the legal dispute with Iwatani Corporation of America — announced on June 7, 2026 — adding roughly 70 million kroner, or about USD 7.5 million, to the drag.

Cost-Cutting as the Core Thesis

Management's central lever for turning the business around is the new PA-Series pressurised alkaline platform, launched in May 2026. The company is targeting system costs below USD 1,450 per kilowatt for 25-megawatt installations — a figure that undercuts the prevailing industry standard, which has often exceeded USD 3,000 per kilowatt. The implied investment cost reduction for customers is 40 to 60 percent, a step change that could improve the economics of projects that have historically struggled to get off the ground.

Nel carries a cash reserve of roughly 1.3 billion Norwegian kroner into the second half of 2026, providing some runway while the strategy plays out. The next checkpoint arrives on October 21, when third-quarter results are due. By then, two questions will need sharper answers: who will take the CEO seat, and whether European support programmes announced later in the month can inject fresh momentum into a sector that has lost some of its shine.