Danish Ørsted wants to raise 60 billion in new capital – the share price plummets

The Danish state has given its support to the issue. The second largest owner, Equinor, says it will conduct a thorough assessment before making a decision on whether to participate or not.

Danish offshore wind company Ørsted announced on Monday that it will raise up to 60 billion Danish kroner in new capital through a rights issue. In Norwegian kroner, this corresponds to about 96 billion at today's exchange rate and about half of Ørsted's stock market value.

The confirmed capital raising came just a few days after the news agency Bloomberg reported that the company was looking for fresh capital, citing anonymous sources that an IPO or similar was imminent.

– The share issue we are announcing today will strengthen Ørsted's capital structure and provide us with financial robustness until 2027, says CEO Rasmus Errboe in a press release on Monday.

Ørsted shares plunged more than 20 percent on the Copenhagen Stock Exchange on Monday morning.

Equinor CEO Anders Opedal manages a shrinking empire, at least measured in market value.

Billions of dollars for Equinor

A rights issue means that existing shareholders will be offered new shares based on their existing ownership. The Danish state, which is the largest owner in Ørsted with 50.1 percent of the shares, has provided its support for the capital raising and will participate with its pro rata share, it is reported.

Equinor, which is the second largest owner in Ørsted after its acquisition last fall, tells DN that it will conduct a thorough assessment before making a final decision on whether or not to participate in the issue.

– We will now have a dialogue with Ørsted about the capital raising and make a thorough assessment before we make any further comments. When a decision is made, I cannot answer now, says Equinor's Chief Information Officer Sissel Rinde.

Many were stunned when Equinor surprisingly announced that it had secured ten percent of the shares in Ørsted at the beginning of October last year .

In the following months, Ørsted shares have fallen and fallen, and the offshore wind company is down more than 40 percent since Equinor's entry. Equinor stated that the original investment was about 17 billion Danish kroner, at an average price of 398.5 Danish kroner. Ørsted shares are trading at around 237 Danish kroner on Monday morning.

This means that Equinor is about seven billion Danish kroner in the red on the investment, equivalent to around 11 billion Norwegian kroner at today's exchange rate.

In a related investor presentation published on Ørsted's website, the company refers to "significant, negative developments in the regulatory landscape in the US" and that this has made a partial sale and project financing of the Sunrise Wind project impossible.

Central Bank Governor Ida Wolden Bache will present a new interest rate decision on Thursday this week.

Also present quarterly figures

The company also presented results for the second quarter and first half of 2025, which showed a net profit of 8.23 ​​billion Danish kroner in the first half of 2025, up from 931 million in the same period last year.

The total interest-bearing debt at the end of the second quarter was DKK 67.1 billion.

Ørsted says it will take further steps to reduce costs this year and next. The company estimates EBITDA of between DKK 25 and 28 billion for the whole of 2025. In the first half of the year, EBITDA ended at DKK 15.5 billion.