HKFoods Q4'25 preview: Stable development

Translation: Original published in Finnish on 02/02/2026 at 07:00 am EET

Source: Inderes

HKFoods publishes its Q4 results on Friday, February 13, at around 8:30 am EET. We expect revenue and EBITDA to have improved slightly, but adjusted EBIT to have remained at the level of the comparison period. We estimate that the company has reasonable prerequisites to continue operational earnings growth in 2026. The question is how much further profitability can be improved without major industrial investments. In our estimates, we assume that the largest earnings leaps are already behind, but on the other hand, the company's profitability is still clearly lagging behind its competitors. 

Market demand has been pretty good

We estimate revenue in continuing operations to have grown by 2% y-o-y in Q4, which would imply a positive growth turnaround compared to January-September (revenue -1%). We believe that conditions for growth in Q4 have been reasonably good, as food sales in department store and hypermarket chains have continued to grow by over 3% according to statistics from the Finnish Grocery Trade Association (PTY). There was also a slight improvement in food services in December, although overall market growth in Q4 will be small due to a weak fall. HKFoods' growth may also receive minor support from two investments completed around the summer in the ready-to-eat products and ready meals sector. However, overall growth also depends on the development of industrial sales and exports, which decreased as planned in the early part of the year to strengthen the margin structure. 

Stable operational result and lower dividend proposal expected

We expect HKFoods Q4 EBITDA to increase from the comparison period to 18 MEUR (Q4’24: 17 MEUR), but adjusted EBIT remains fairly stable at just over 10 MEUR due to increased depreciation. The price of beef continued to rise in late 2025, so the margin pressure in this segment is likely to persist as in previous quarters, even though sales prices have also been gradually raised. Otherwise, the cost environment in the food industry has developed quite moderately recently. Our full-year 2025 adjusted EBIT estimate is 33.3 MEUR, growing from the comparison period (2024: 27.7 MEUR) in line with the company's guidance.

We estimate that HKFoods will return to dividend distribution in line with its dividend policy after the company made exceptionally large capital repayments during 2025. We estimate a dividend of EUR 0.07 per share to be paid in 2026 from the 2025 earnings, which corresponds to 66% of our estimated adjusted EPS for 2025 (according to the dividend policy, at least 50% is paid). The company’s balance sheet has strengthened due to the recent earnings turnaround. We estimate net debt to have been 2.4x EBITDA at the end of 2025.

Small earnings growth in the forecasts for 2026

We expect the company to guide for growing adjusted EBIT in 2026. According to our estimate, adj. EBIT would grow by 6% to 35.3 MEUR, which is more moderate than in recent years. Earnings growth will be supported by, for example, growing segments and recently completed growth investments. We also expect measures to improve cost-efficiency to support the margin. The outlook for China exports, which improves the margin structure, is likely more stable for 2026 than before, as the threat of pork import tariffs has, in our view, eased. The company's profitability is still clearly lower than that of its key domestic competitors, but closing the gap would likely require large investments, for which the company is unlikely to have the resources or willingness in the upcoming years. Strengthening of the balance sheet and the decrease in financing costs support the net income outlook in 2026.