Nokia Reports a Loss and an 18 Percent Profit Jump for the Same Quarter — Both Numbers Are Real

There is an investor trap that catches well-informed readers especially hard — because it feels like knowledge: anchoring bias. Someone hands you a big, round number first — "EUR 2.7 to 3.2 billion by 2028" — and from then on your brain measures every new piece of news against that anchor, not against what is actually happening right now. That is exactly what a newsletter did that brought this stock to our desk: "HOT STOCKS EUROPE" issue 24, dated November 28, 2025, calls Nokia Oyj a "base position in Europe's AI cycle" and points to a new corporate target — more on that shortly. The anchor is set. What the newsletter does not show you is the filing Nokia handed the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission nine weeks later. It shows, for the second quarter of 2026, a reported operating loss of EUR 50 million — in the very same report, in the very same table, right next to a "comparable" result of EUR 434 million, up 18 percent. So let's make a deal: before you lean on the 2028 anchor, we read Nokia's own SEC filings together — the annual report (Form 20-F) for 2025 and the report (Form 6-K) for the second quarter and first half of 2026. A filing to the SEC is honest under penalty of law. By the end, you decide which of the two results you trust more.

What Nokia Actually Does — From Phone Giant to AI-Supercycle Network Builder

Nokia Oyj, based in Espoo, Finland, employed about 78,005 people on average in 2025 across roughly 130 countries, and reports to the SEC as a "foreign private issuer" — an annual Form 20-F, an interim Form 6-K, no 10-K and no 10-Q, because U.S. law reserves those forms for domestic filers. In everyday terms: Nokia no longer primarily builds the phones that made it famous 20 years ago (that business was sold off long ago) — it builds the infrastructure behind the scenes, the technology that moves data through fiber, cell towers, and data centers. Since January 1, 2026, Nokia has bundled these activities into two main segments: Network Infrastructure (Optical Networks, IP Networks, Fixed Networks — led by David Heard), positioned for the data-center and AI build-out, and Mobile Infrastructure (core network, radio network, and licensing technology, co-led for now by CEO Justin Hotard; new President Emma Falck, previously of Siemens, takes over September 1, 2026). The most recent quarterly report also shows a smaller third segment, Portfolio Businesses — essentially what remains while it is being sold off (more on that shortly). Through 2025 the structure was different still: four segments (Network Infrastructure, Cloud and Network Services, Mobile Networks, Nokia Technologies). Justin Hotard has been CEO since April 1, 2025, succeeding Pekka Lundmark. That sets up the tension running through this whole analysis: Nokia shows you two versions of the same quarter's numbers — a "reported" figure under IFRS and a "comparable" figure that strips out special items — and both are true, they just answer different questions.

Where This Stock Landed on Our Desk — the Newsletter and the Measured Reality

This analysis did not come through our in-house stock scanner — it came from a reader tip: issue 24 of "HOT STOCKS EUROPE," dated November 28, 2025 (B-Inside International Media GmbH, Freiburg, Germany, author Michael Calivas), an eight-page, twice-monthly newsletter. On Nokia, it wrote, in translation from the German original:

"NOKIA has presented the market with a leaner, AI-optimized corporate vision through 2028 and intends to grow operating profit to a range of about EUR 2.7 billion to EUR 3.2 billion, an increase of up to 60 percent. To achieve this goal, NOKIA will concentrate its structure into two main business segments starting in 2026 and will, alongside mobile networks, focus increasingly on network infrastructure for AI-related data centers. […] NOKIA will increasingly work with customers that operate more and more like hyperscalers and less like traditional telecommunications companies, and it belongs among the base positions in Europe's AI cycle!"

— "HOT STOCKS EUROPE," issue 24, November 28, 2025, page 2 (translated from German)

That is a third party's expectation as of November 28, 2025 — not a company figure, but a framing we now check against what Nokia itself told the SEC. The surprise: in this case, the core claim holds up. Nine days before that issue, on November 19, 2025, Nokia had in fact announced exactly this target at a Capital Markets Day, documented in its own Form 6-K to the SEC:

"Nokia is introducing a new long-term financial target to achieve comparable operating profit of EUR 2.7 billion to EUR 3.2 billion by 2028, an increase from the EUR 2.0 billion generated in the last 12 months (Q4'24-Q3'25)."

— Nokia Corporation, Form 6-K, Capital Markets Day, November 19, 2025

The second half of the newsletter's claim checks out too: the reorganization into two main segments did take effect on January 1, 2026, and the "separation from underperforming business units" is already underway — more on that in the uncomfortable-truths section below. What the newsletter could not say, since it was published eight months before our editorial deadline, is how expensive that transformation already looks in the most recent filing. The newsletter's conflict-of-interest disclosure is worth noting in fairness — on page 8, the publisher acknowledges that the publisher, author, or related parties may hold long positions in stocks discussed and may intend to sell into rising prices (EU Market Abuse Regulation 596/2014). That does not make the newsletter's numbers wrong — but it is one more reason not to take them at face value.

The Numbers Over the Years — Honestly Appraised

First, what genuinely speaks for Nokia. Net sales reached EUR 19,889 million in 2025 (2024: EUR 19,220 million; 2023: EUR 21,138 million) — growing again, modestly, after two lean years. Research and development spending rose to EUR 4,855 million (24.4 percent of net sales), unusually high for an equipment maker this size and a sign of how much Nokia is plowing into the next technology generation. The second quarter of 2026 shows exactly where the growth is coming from: net sales rose 8 percent to EUR 4,815 million (up 9 percent at constant currency), carried by the Network Infrastructure segment, up 12 percent to EUR 2,037 million — driven by Optical Networks (+20 percent) and IP Networks (+16 percent), both directly tied to data-center and AI demand.

The AI story shows up most clearly in order intake. CEO Justin Hotard put it this way in the second-quarter 2026 report:

"In Q2, our AI & Cloud order intake was EUR 2.8 billion, while sales more than doubled year-on-year. The strength was broad-based, as we secured long-term orders in both Optical Networks and IP Networks. We expect around half of these orders to convert to revenue over the next twelve months."

— Justin Hotard, President & CEO, Form 6-K, Report for Q2 and Half Year 2026, July 23, 2026

The capital spending fits the story too: Nokia is expanding its U.S. optical-component manufacturing (a new San Jose fab due to begin ramping in late 2026) and is also acquiring NXP's Chandler semiconductor fabrication campus in Arizona. And in October/November 2025, Nokia landed a headline-grabbing anchor investor: NVIDIA Corporation — whose own balance sheet we broke down in our Nvidia stock analysis — subscribed for $1.0 billion in new Nokia shares as part of a strategic AI partnership (joint development of "AI-RAN," AI-powered mobile networks, with an eye on 6G). That is one side of the coin — real, growing AI-driven demand. The other side only shows up once you read all the way down to the bottom line.

What the Filings Say — the Uncomfortable Truths

Uncomfortable Truth No. 1: A Reported Loss and an 18 Percent Comparable Jump, Same Quarter

This is the heart of this analysis. For the second quarter of 2026, Nokia reports two operating results at once: an IFRS loss of EUR 50 million (margin −1.0 percent, down 430 basis points year on year), and, on a "comparable" basis, a profit of EUR 434 million (margin 9.0 percent, up 70 basis points). Nokia itself names the reason for the gap in the same sentence:

"Q2 comparable operating margin increased 70bps y-o-y to 9.0%. Reported operating margin declined 430bps to (1.0)% due to a faster pace of restructuring."

— Nokia Corporation, Form 6-K, Report for Q2 and Half Year 2026, July 23, 2026

Picture it this way: a contractor is renovating their own workshop right now — new machines in, old ones out, severance for staff no longer needed. The renovation costs very real cash this month, out of the till. The owner still says: "Strip out the renovation, and I'm earning more than last year." That can even be true — but the till itself still shows a shortfall this month. For Nokia, the same math applies at scale for full-year 2025: EUR 885 million reported operating profit versus EUR 2,024 million "comparable" — a gap of EUR 1,139 million, of which EUR 478 million is restructuring, EUR 444 million is amortization from acquisitions (mostly the Infinera deal closed in 2025), and the remaining EUR 217 million is a collection of smaller other adjustments.

Neither number is wrong or improper — "comparable operating profit" is a disclosed, commonly used measure in Europe, and Nokia publishes the full reconciliation in its annual report. But it is also the number that Nokia's own executive pay is tied to, and the one the newsletter's 2028 target is built on. Remember the pattern: when a company frames its future target in an adjusted metric, it pays to check how large that adjustment already is in the most recent filing.

Uncomfortable Truth No. 2: Two Share Counts That Measure Different Things — and a Real Capital Raise From Nvidia

Second trap, smaller but easy to trip over: Nokia's own filing lists two different share counts for the second quarter of 2026 that are easily confused. The balance sheet shows 5,598,645,000 shares outstanding (excluding treasury shares) as of June 30, 2026 — the actual number of shares in the market. For diluted earnings per share, the same filing instead uses a weighted average of 5,801,886,000 shares — a different metric with a different purpose (it includes, among other things, treasury shares earmarked for employee plans). Whoever mistakes the second figure for "the share count" and derives a market cap or a per-share metric from it is off by roughly 200 million shares.

The real reason share count has grown since mid-2025 is simple and genuine: NVIDIA Corporation bought into Nokia. The 2025 annual report describes it this way:

"In October 2025, under the authorization granted to the Board of Directors by the Annual General Meeting 2025, the Board of Directors resolved on a directed share issuance of 166,389,351 new shares to enable NVIDIA Corporation to make a USD 1.0 billion equity investment in Nokia. The new shares were delivered to NVIDIA Corporation in the form of American Depositary Shares in November 2025."

— Nokia Corporation, Form 20-F for 2025, "Shares and shareholders" section

The subscription price was $6.01 per share (EUR 5.16) — net proceeds to Nokia totaled about EUR 850 million. That lifted the share count (excluding treasury) from roughly 5,379 million (June 30, 2025) to 5,583 million (December 31, 2025) — an increase of about 3 percent that did not come from operations, but from a directed capital raise for a strategic investor. In plain terms: existing shareholders' slice of the pie got about 3 percent thinner — in exchange for a headline partner and EUR 850 million in fresh capital. Whether that trade pays off depends on what actually comes out of the AI partnership — a question only future filings can answer.

Uncomfortable Truth No. 3: The "Raised" Guidance Is Half Bookkeeping, Not Growth

In the same second-quarter 2026 filing, Nokia raises its full-year 2026 outlook for comparable operating profit — from EUR 2.0-2.5 billion to EUR 2.1-2.6 billion. That sounds like good news. The reason, though, is not better business performance — it is a reclassification:

"In Q2 2026, Nokia classified its Fixed Wireless Access CPE and Enterprise Campus Edge businesses as discontinued operations. Nokia reached an agreement to sell its Fixed Wireless Access CPE business to Inseego and Nokia also deems it highly probable it will reach an agreement to sell Enterprise Campus Edge business. […] If Nokia had not treated these businesses as discontinued operations in Q2 2026, net sales would have been EUR 66 million higher and comparable operating profit would have been EUR 13 million lower."

— Nokia Corporation, Form 6-K, Report for Q2 and Half Year 2026, July 23, 2026

Nokia itself calls this a "technical revision," not an operating improvement — the same paragraph states the operational outlook is unchanged. This is exactly the "separation from underperforming business units" the newsletter flagged — but it also costs something: full-year 2026 restructuring charges were raised in the same filing to EUR 800 million (cash outflows of EUR 700-800 million), fed by three programs — the ongoing 2023-2026 program, the accelerated integration of the China business (now compressed into two years instead of two to three), and a new, mostly European restructuring program. The order backlog has also fallen, from EUR 22.0 billion (2023) through EUR 20.0 billion (2024) to EUR 19.5 billion (2025) — not an alarm bell on its own, but a counterweight to the pure growth narrative.

Valuation: Expensive by One Number, Moderate by the Other

Nokia shares cost about EUR 8.22 on July 24, 2026, which at 5,582,534,171 shares (as of December 31, 2025, per fundamental data) works out to a market capitalization of roughly EUR 45.9 billion — close to our own balance-sheet cross-check (5,598,645,000 shares as of June 30, 2026 times EUR 8.22 comes to about EUR 46.0 billion, a low-single-digit-percent difference). On a reported-earnings basis the stock looks expensive: a price-to-earnings ratio of roughly 68 (fundamental data, as of July 24/25, 2026) is ambitious for an equipment maker growing sales 6 to 9 percent — but that very P/E is distorted by the EUR 1,139 million of adjustments from Uncomfortable Truth No. 1: a company in the thick of restructuring always looks more expensive on reported earnings than it "really" is. Using enterprise value instead (market cap of EUR 45.9 billion less EUR 2,776 million in net cash as of June 30, 2026, or roughly EUR 43.1 billion) against 2025's "comparable" operating profit of EUR 2,024 million yields a multiple of about 21 — and against the midpoint of the 2028 target (EUR 2.95 billion), about 14.6. Both multiples are orders of magnitude, not precision figures, and both assume Nokia keeps calculating "comparable" the same way going forward. Getting from 2025's comparable level (EUR 2.024 billion) to the midpoint of the 2028 target (EUR 2.95 billion) requires roughly 46 percent growth over three years — while the most recent quarterly filing, on a reported basis, shows a loss. That is achievable, but it is not a given.

Opportunities and Risks at a Glance

What speaks for Nokia:

• Real, broad-based AI demand: EUR 2.8 billion in AI & Cloud order intake in the second quarter of 2026, with sales in that area more than doubling; Network Infrastructure grew 12 percent in the same quarter, carried by Optical Networks (+20 percent) and IP Networks (+16 percent).
• A headline strategic investor: NVIDIA Corporation subscribed for $1.0 billion in new shares in fall 2025 and is a partner on AI-powered mobile networks (AI-RAN) with an eye on 6G.
• A solid balance sheet: EUR 2,776 million in net cash as of June 30, 2026, an equity ratio of about 57 percent, and no single customer above 10 percent of net sales from 2023 through 2025.
• A clear, repeatedly confirmed 2028 target (EUR 2.7-3.2 billion comparable operating profit) and a simplified segment structure since January 1, 2026, with named leadership (David Heard, and Emma Falck starting September 1, 2026).

What speaks against it:

• The reported operating loss in the second quarter of 2026 (−EUR 50 million, margin −1.0 percent) shows the transformation is costing real money right now — full-year 2026 restructuring charges were raised to EUR 800 million (2025: EUR 478 million).
• The gap between reported and "comparable" profit is substantial at EUR 1,139 million (2025, 5.7 percent of net sales), which ties the 2028 target to how that adjustment keeps being calculated.
• Roughly 3 percent more shares outstanding since mid-2025 from the Nvidia capital raise — real dilution for existing shareholders, even with fresh capital and a strategic partner as the trade-off.
• A shrinking order backlog (EUR 22.0 billion in 2023 down to EUR 19.5 billion in 2025) and a reported P/E of roughly 68 — leaving little margin of safety for the roughly 46 percent comparable-basis growth needed by 2028 if the restructuring drags on longer than planned.

A Human Conclusion

Back to the anchoring bias from the opening. The newsletter gave you a number — EUR 2.7 to 3.2 billion by 2028 — and that number even checks out, word for word, in Nokia's own SEC filing. The mistake is not in the number; it is in treating it as already achieved. The most recent filing Nokia has handed the SEC shows a reported loss for the second quarter of 2026 — and in the same breath, a "comparable" result that grew 18 percent. Both numbers are real, both sit in the same document, and both answer a different question: one, how much cash actually stayed in the till this quarter. The other, what the business would look like if you stripped out the transformation currently under way. So the honest question for you is not "do I believe the 2028 target?" but: do you trust Nokia to push through an expensive rebuild — EUR 800 million in restructuring costs in 2026 alone — before investor patience, and the 46 percent of growth still needed by 2028, run out? If yes, you have a thesis that goes beyond the anchor. If you hesitate at the second number, you only had the anchor. What you make of it is your decision. And that is exactly as it should be.

Sources

All original documents used in this analysis — for your own reading:

• Nokia Corporation — SEC annual report Form 20-F for 2025 (filed March 5, 2026)
• Nokia Corporation — SEC Form 6-K, "Report for Q2 and Half Year 2026" (July 23, 2026)
• Nokia Corporation — SEC Form 6-K, "Capital Markets Day" (November 19, 2025)
• Full SEC filing history for Nokia Corporation: EDGAR overview (sec.gov)
• Fundamental data (price, market capitalization, share-count cross-check; data as of July 24/25, 2026), reconciled against the SEC filings.
• Hook: "HOT STOCKS EUROPE," issue 24, dated November 28, 2025, B-Inside International Media GmbH, Freiburg, Germany (author Michael Calivas) — a third party's opinion and expectation, not a source for company figures; the publisher discloses that the publisher, author, or related parties may hold long positions (EU Market Abuse Regulation 596/2014).

Transparency & disclaimer: This analysis is a journalistic contextualization of publicly available information and is not investment advice, not a regulatory financial analysis, and not a solicitation to buy or sell securities. Stock investments carry substantial risk, including total loss. All information is provided without guarantee; data dates are noted in the text. The author holds no position in Nokia stock as of publication.