Alma Media Q1’26 flash comment: Excellent profitability development in all segments

Translation: Original published in Finnish on 04/29/2026 at 08:40 am EEST

Source: Inderes & Modular Finance (consensus, 5 estimates)

Alma Media reported its Q1 earnings this morning, which were clearly better than our expectations due to the excellent profitability development of all three segments. Alma Media has guided for stable revenue and growth in adjusted EBIT for the current year compared to the previous year. Based on the Q1 performance, the company is clearly on track with this guidance.

Revenue development was well in line with our expectations

Alma Media's Q1 revenue development was well in line with our estimate, as it grew by 5% year-on-year to 83.1 MEUR. At segment level, Career's revenue grew by 5% (estimate +2%), as classified revenues achieved stronger growth than we estimated. At the same time, Marketplaces' revenue grew relatively as expected by 12% (estimate +10%). Growth was relatively evenly distributed between organic and inorganic growth. News Media's revenue contracted by just under 2%, whereas our estimate expected 1% growth. This development was due to advertising and other revenue developing slightly weaker than we expected.

Profitability at a very good level     

Alma Media posted adjusted EBIT of 20.4 MEUR in Q1, which clearly beat both our and the consensus estimates and grew by almost 19% from the comparison period. This corresponds to an adjusted EBIT margin of 24.5%, which is an excellent level. The earnings beat was driven by better-than-expected profitability development in all segments, as they managed to improve their margins by several percentage points year-on-year due to excellent cost efficiency. The profitability development of the segments buried the Group costs, which rose slightly more sharply than expected. On the lower lines, net financial expenses were clearly lower than we predicted, mainly due to a positive fair value change in the interest rate derivative, which does not affect cash flow. Against this backdrop and the clear operational earnings beat, Q1 EPS of EUR 0.19 clearly surpassed expectations.

The guidance indicating earnings growth was reiterated as expected

Alma Media has issued guidance for 2026 according to which it expects revenue (2025: 327.1 MEUR) to be at the level of the previous year and adjusted EBIT (2025: 82.1 MEUR) to increase from the previous year. Before the Q1 report, our 2026 revenue estimate was 340 MEUR (+4%), and we estimated adjusted EBIT to reach 88.2 MEUR (+7.5%). The corresponding consensus estimates were 338 MEUR in revenue and 89.5 MEUR in adjusted EBIT. According to our preliminary estimate, the strong Q1 report and the rather convincing profitability development of all segments will put upward pressure on our earnings estimates.