Barclays: Fortum Still Poised to Benefit from Datacenter Growth After Q2 Miss

06:08 AM EDT, 07/22/2026 (MT Newswires) -- Fortum's (FORTUM.HE) second-quarter results fell short of expectations but the company remains well-positioned to benefit from datacenter growth, Barclays said in a Tuesday note. "The shortfall was driven primarily by Generation, where comparable operating profit of EUR110m came in below the EUR126m consensus median, reflecting lower generation volumes from nuclear outages and low spring floods, as well as weaker achieved power prices," according to the research firm. "While 2Q26 was soft, we do not think it changes the more important medium-term debate around Fortum's demand exposure, particularly from datacentre growth and do not see this as an issue beyond today." Analysts still see the Nordic energy group as one of the "magnificent eight" companies in the European utilities sector that are viewed as having the "most meaningful" sensitivity to the wider datacenter pipeline in Europe. "Fortum is well placed to benefit given its scalable, low-carbon Nordic generation base and proximity to some of Europe's fastest-growing datacentre clusters," the research firm noted. The stock is rated equal weight, with a price target of 21 euros.