• Q4 report due Thursday, 13 February
• We cut adj. EBITA 4%/3%/3% on '24e/'25e/'26e
• Share is trading at 9-7x EBITA on '25e-'26e

Q4 expectations

We believe that the positive business momentum has continued for Water in Q4, with 4% organic growth, while we expect Services to deliver negative but improving growth (-7% vs. -13% in Q3), supporting the view that the installation market has likely has bottomed. We see Infra delivering slight negative growth (-3%), although this marks an improvement vs. Q3 (-11%), in part due to the divestments announced on 29 November. We expect sales of SEK 1,183m, -24% y-o-y (-3% organic, 0% FX, -21% structure), with organic growth improving from -9% in Q3. We expect adj. EBITA of SEK 114m, -32% y-o-y whereof ~5-10% to be organic decline, for a margin of 9.7%. Looking into Q1, we expect continued improvements for the installation units and growth in both Water and Infra to lead to slight positive organic sales growth for the group of 2%.

Estimate changes

We cut adj. EBITA by 4%/3%/3% on '24e/'25e/'26e based on: 1) a slightly greater impact from divested units in Infra, and 2) lower margins in Services. Although we expect underlying volumes to improve for Services, we expect an unfavourable calendar and continued impact from lower margin projects initiated in earlier quarters to have a negative effect. However, a positive effect from revaluations of earn-outs supports a relatively unchanged reported EBITA in Q4.

Final thoughts

We argue that the growth in Water (and product companies in other segments) continues to improve the quality of the group, which should also be reflected in a better ROCE from 2025e. Looking ahead, we estimate that Vestum will deliver growth, margins, ROCE and cash conversion roughly in line with key peers, while Vestum is trading at 9-7x EV/EBITA '25-'26e, which is ~10% below key peers at 10-9x.