A Swedish Air Force Saab JAS 39 Gripen jetfighter takes portion successful the NATO workout arsenic portion of the NATO Air Policing mission, successful Alliance members' sovereign airspace connected July 4, 2023.
John Thys | Afp | Getty Images
Shares of Swedish defence giant Saab jumped connected Friday morning, aft the institution reported stronger-than-expected nett and income maturation for the 2nd quarter.
Shares were past seen trading 12.16% higher astatine 3:53 E.T.
Saab's operating income for the 2nd 4th came successful astatine 1.98 cardinal Swedish kronor ($200 million), marking a 49% year-on-year leap and a bushed connected the 1.71 cardinal krona expected by analysts polled by LSEG.
Quarterly income roseate by a better-than-expected 30% year-on-year.
Saab's shares person surged 131% since the opening of the year, according to LSEG data.
The banal is 1 of galore in the European defence abstraction that has benefited from a wide determination propulsion to ramp up information budgets.
On Wednesday, the European Commission unveiled a proposal for a 2 trillion euro fund that would see a important bump successful backing for defense. It comes arsenic portion of what officials person labelled Europe's "era of rearmament," which has already seen the bloc unveil plans to mobilize arsenic overmuch arsenic 800 cardinal euros ($928 billion) to assistance subordinate states hike spending connected nationalist security.
Meanwhile, members of the NATO subject alliance precocious agreed to hike their defence spending targets to 5% of gross home product.
Speaking to CNBC's "Squawk Box Europe" connected Friday, Saab CEO Micael Johansson said enactment successful the European defence marketplace was "really high," but that Saab had "a large portfolio supporting the request successful the market."
"What you spot successful this 4th is that we are ramping up dramatically," helium said. "We person a fig of campaigns going now, there's a large involvement and it's ramped up a spot lately."
When it comes to the determination defence spending boost — which was triggered aft U.S. President Donald Trump pushed for Europe to instrumentality greater ownership of its ain information — Johansson said Europe needed to instrumentality the accidental to bolster its defence sector.
"The U.S. medication rightly is saying we person to measurement up successful Europe and instrumentality a large work for our ain security," helium told CNBC.
"So, galore countries are present boosting their ain defence industries. I bash privation to spot a level playing field, of course, successful presumption of contention successful the market, but I bash deliberation we request to bargain much European arsenic good — adjacent though we request to person a beardown transatlantic nexus … we person to person this beardown European defence concern basal to negociate the assertive neighbour to the eastbound for a agelong clip going forward."
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