Netum - Upgrade to BUY

Investments into growth in H1
Netum had provided preliminary figures ahead of H1 and the earnings report as such held no notable surprises. Net sales grew 47.8% y/y to EUR 15.4m, of which 22.6% was organic growth. The comp. EBITA increased by 14.0% y/y to EUR 1.8m, but the comp. EBITA-margin declined by 4.0%p. The number of employees grew to 263 (H1/21: 171) mainly from successful new recruitments but also the Cerion Solutions acquisition. H1 organic growth was supported by the increased workloads under long framework agreements and the continued high level of demand, while profitability was affected by front-loaded growth investments and increased sick leaves due to the pandemic.

Public sector exposure proving to be beneficial
Demand in the public sector, accounting for the majority of Netum’s net sales, has been and appears to continue to be at a high level, while the private sector has shown some more fluctuation. New recruitments have notedly become more challenging, but with the large number of recruitments made during H1, domestic geographical expansion, and high public sector demand coupled with long framework agreements, the near-term growth prospects remain solid. The wage inflation/customer pricing equation currently appears to be well manageable and although the current environment creates some margin pressure, we expect profitability to remain at healthy levels. We have made limited revisions to our estimates, expecting net sales growth of 42.5% (guidance >30%) and an EBITA-margin of 12.5% (guidance 12-14%).

BUY (HOLD) with a target price of EUR 4.5 (4.3)
Netum currently trades quite in line with peers. With continued confidence in the growth outlook through the public sector exposure, we adjust our TP to EUR 4.5 (4.3), valuing Netum at ~17x 2022e adj. P/E, and upgrade our rating to BUY (HOLD).