PostNL Shares Surge on Ambitious 2028 Growth Targets

PostNL shares experienced a significant surge of over 9% on Wednesday, following the Dutch postal operator's unveiling of a new strategy. This initiative aims to drive substantial earnings growth and overcome a recent period of unfulfilled targets. The company has set ambitious financial objectives, targeting annual revenues surpassing €4 billion and normalized pretax earnings exceeding €175 million by 2028. Key components of the plan include annual investments of approximately €150 million, commencing in 2026, to bolster technology infrastructure and network expansion. Furthermore, a strategic restructuring will see the Parcels segment divided to leverage the ongoing growth in e-commerce. Despite the positive market response, the announcement was met with a degree of analyst skepticism. KBC analysts characterized the targets as "ambitious," noting that they exceeded their own projections. Degroof Petercam, a brokerage firm, expressed greater pessimism, cautioning that PostNL has a historical tendency to fall short of its self-imposed expectations and emphasizing that "targets are not yet results."