Mowi (MOWI)

Business Overview

Mowi, the largest salmon farmer, is the benchmark for reading a farmer's unit economics because it files more of them than anyone else. It harvested 558,870 t gutted weight in FY2025, up 11.4%, from seven countries: Norway, Scotland, Chile, Canada, the Faroes, Ireland and Iceland. It reports in EUR and lists on Oslo Børs in NOK.

The main profit figure is operational EBIT, which leaves out the accounting revaluation of fish still in the sea and so tracks the fish actually sold. Mowi files it per kg for each country on one definition. Norway earned EUR 1.82/kg and the Faroes EUR 1.56/kg; Scotland (EUR 1.49/kg) and Chile (EUR 0.67/kg) sat in the middle; Canada lost EUR 1.09/kg after fish deaths in Canada East. The profit by country guide explains why that order reflects price as well as cost.

Mowi also files a cost per kg, which most Norwegian farmers do not. It calls it cost in box: feed and other costs at sea, plus transport to the processing plant, primary processing, administration and exceptional mortality, the total cost of one kg of gutted salmon packed in a box. It was EUR 5.49/kg in FY2025, down 5% from EUR 5.80, and EUR 5.36/kg in Q4. Feed is the largest part, which Mowi puts at about 40-45%; its FY2025 feed cost was EUR 2.34/kg. Grieg Seafood's filed farming cost stops at the farm, so the two figures measure different things; the cost-per-kg guide sets out each definition.

How the Numbers Read

Group operational EBIT was EUR 726.8m, or EUR 1.30/kg. That includes the margin Mowi's feed and sales businesses earn on its own fish; the farming stage alone earned EUR 0.61/kg. At the 2025 average EUR/NOK of 11.7177 (Norges Bank), EUR 1.30 is about NOK 15.2/kg. Set it only beside another farmer's figure that includes the same downstream margin.

Net interest-bearing debt was EUR 2,654.1m excluding leases (EUR 3,176.8m including them) at 31 December 2025, 3.7 times FY2025 operational EBIT. The debt is fixed while the profit moves with the salmon price, so compare the two across a cycle.

Biology was mixed. Seawater survival, measured monthly, was 99.3%, as in 2024. Incident-based mortality, the cost of fish lost in specific events, told a harder story. In Norway it cost EUR 49.2m, mainly from gill problems and the knock-on effects of lice treatments; in Q4 alone it cost EUR 22.0m across Norway, against EUR 8.8m a year earlier, EUR 18.9m of it in Regions South and West. In Canada it cost EUR 35.2m, mainly after low oxygen in Canada East following a very warm summer. Canada East still harvested 17,199 t over the year, against 8,435 t in 2024. The biological risk guide shows how these costs flow into EBIT per kg.

Mowi does not file a total for its maximum allowed biomass (MAB), the licence cap on live fish in the sea that Norwegian farmers report in tonnes. It gives the book value of its licences, EUR 2,053.5m, and comments on how full they are country by country. Its capacity has to be read from harvest volume and that licence book.

Valuation Framework

A cash-flow valuation of Mowi starts from operational EBIT by country, because each country taxes it differently. Since 1 January 2023, profit from farming salmon in the sea in Norway has carried a 25% resource-rent tax on top of 22% corporate tax, a 47% marginal rate. Mowi's feed, processing and sales businesses, and its other six countries, fall outside it, so the Norwegian farming share of EBIT matters as much as the group total.

Salmon farmers are also compared on enterprise value per kg of harvest. For Mowi the result depends on how much non-farming value (feed, processing, sales) is taken out of EV, and on converting a EUR balance sheet and a NOK share price at the same date. There is no filed figure for either step. The EV/kg guide walks through the definition on a fictional farm.

Revenue moves with the salmon price. The worked examples on this site use an illustrative long-run price of 68 NOK/kg; Statistics Norway's weekly export price for fresh farmed salmon averaged NOK 81.79/kg in 2025 (table 03024). Mowi's reference price for Norwegian salmon was EUR 6.79/kg in Q4 2025. Global supply grew 12% in 2025, which Mowi says reduced prices. The spot price guide explains which price series to use.

What to Watch in the Financials

The loss-making countries. Canada (EUR -39.8m) and Iceland (EUR -10.3m) lost EUR 50.1m in FY2025. Had both broken even, group operational EBIT would have been about EUR 1.39/kg rather than EUR 1.30.

Incident-based mortality. It is charged straight to the income statement, so one bad event shows up in the quarter.

Norwegian growth. Norway grades each production area every two years on how far sea lice from farms harm wild salmon; green areas may grow, yellow are frozen, red are cut. The decision of 19 June 2026 set 3 green, 9 yellow and 1 red area, against 6 green, 5 yellow and 2 red in 2024.

Key Risks

Biology in several countries at once. In FY2025 fish deaths in Canada and gill and lice problems in Norway landed in the same year.

Canada. Its margin depends on both biology and the North American price.

Salmon price. A sustained fall compresses operational EBIT per kg in every country before cost savings catch up.