Three did. Two of those were the same bond amortisation at one company, and the third — a take-private crossing 90% — filed in September, after the month it belonged to.

August looked quiet on Nasdaq Helsinki flagging notifications. The shareholder registers moved more than the disclosure feed did. Finland's thresholds start at 5%, and most of the month's largest register moves never touched the ladder.

Here is what moved, what was notified, and what the gap between those two sets says about reading Nordic ownership.

Citycon: the take-private the register sees last

G City Ltd's directly registered stake in Citycon grew from 39.50% to 42.55% during August, a gain of 5.6 million shares. 

In the same window the Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken Helsinki Branch nominee account, which had been holding a large Citycon block in custody, shrank by 4.8 million shares. Citibank Europe's custodial line edged down as well.

That is not buying. It is the shares crossing out of nominee registration into G City's own name as the tender offer settles. G City's flagging notification of 2 September puts its total holding at 91.05%, against a directly registered position of 42.55% at the end of August. Both are correct: the rest still sits in custodial accounts, re-registering in tranches. Read alone, the register would tell you G City owns less than half of Citycon.

G City crossed 90% on 1 September, commenced compulsory redemption of the minority shares and will apply to delist. Our Citycon piece this week has the offer periods, the divestment and the parking dispute.

Faron: a new largest register holder, and no new money

Heights Capital Management, through CVI Investments, crossed a threshold in Faron Pharmaceuticals on 4 August and filed the next day: shares up from 7.99% to 9.41%. The same notification shows its holding through financial instruments falling from 12.53% to 11.30%, and combined exposure barely moving, 20.52% to 20.72%. This is a convertible bond converting under the up-to-€35m arrangement Faron entered with a Heights-managed entity in April 2025 — not a purchase. Faron's own treasury holding fell from 10.97% to 9.37% in the same event, through dilution rather than a sale.

A reverse listing into 3North Partners puts a pre-revenue reactor developer on First North. The board, not the order book, is what investors are pricing.

Steady Energy, the Finnish developer of heat-only small modular reactors, is coming to First North through a share exchange in which investment company 3North Partners acquires all of its shares. Counting the investment commitments and a retail offering of up to €5 million, the company would open at a market value of roughly €345 million, against a share capital valued at about €270 million at listing after dilution from staff options.

The company has not signed a single binding delivery agreement.

Pension capital commits ahead of the first commercial milestone

3NP has secured irrevocable commitments of about €69.8 million in a directed issue. Elo, Ilmarinen and Varma are among the investors, alongside Suomen Teollisuussijoitus (Tesi) and Fortum Energy Holding B.V. The European Investment Bank has added a convertible loan of up to €40 million, its first financing for a small modular reactor project.

The participation of three major Finnish pension insurers adds institutional backing to the transaction, alongside the €115 million financing package.

The board is the instrument doing the de-risking

Pekka Lundmark, former chief executive of Fortum and Nokia, will chair the combined company. Chirayu Batra, Juha Juntunen, Petteri Tenhunen and Timo Ahopelto join him. Behind 3NP are Ahopelto and Lundmark, alongside Juha Hulkko, one of the creators of Bittium, Ilkka Paananen of Supercell and Tero Ojanperä. 3NP's chief executive Tuomo Vähäpassi was involved in taking Canatu to market through a SPAC.

The structure resembles a reverse listing: 3NP acquires Steady Energy and brings the combined company to First North. The transaction also puts a prominent group of technology and business figures around a company that remains in the product-development phase and has yet to sign a binding delivery agreement.

Myyrmanni, Koskikeskus and Trio, classified as a related-party transaction and approved by the independent directors on 12 August. 

On 12 August 2026, Citycon Oyj's board approved the divestment of three Finnish shopping centres — Myyrmanni in Vantaa, Koskikeskus in Tampere and Trio in Lahti — at an appraisal value of approximately €422.6m, based on the 30 June 2026 valuation.

The buyer is Noga Finland Retail Properties Oy, which Citycon's release describes as controlled by the shareholders of G City Ltd. G City and its subsidiary Gazit Europe Netherlands B.V. held approximately 89.68 per cent of Citycon at the time. Citycon classified the transaction as a related-party transaction deviating from the ordinary course of business, and states that the independent board members approved it.

Completion is expected in the second half of 2026, conditional on a public offering of securities in Noga Retail Properties Ltd. and other customary conditions. Citycon may provide vendor financing of up to €84.5m at market terms, and retains asset and property management of the three centres after closing, for which it will receive management and success fees.

The numbers

Governance and ownership

The transaction is the third disclosed related-party item between Citycon and its controlling owner in four months.

• 13 May — Citycon's board approved a mutual on-call loan facility of up to €200m with G City, repayable by 15 February 2028, at interest set on arm's-length terms by an independent pricing agent. The release notes G City is Citycon's parent and a related party, and states the facility was approved unanimously by the independent board members.

• 28 May — Citycon signed a non-binding letter of intent for the divestment of Finnish centres at a book value of around €400m as at 31 March 2026.

• 12 August — The board approved the sale of the three centres at approximately €422.6m, again by decision of the independent board members.

Net-zero alone would not bring temperatures back to 1.5°C before the second half of the 22nd century. The report says most developed countries now need net-negative targets beyond 2050. The Omnibus made having a transition plan at all optional.

The UN Environment Programme published Limiting Overshoot: Navigating exceedance of 1.5°C and pathways towards return on 2 September 2026. Its opening line is a position, not a projection: global warming is set to cross 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, likely within the next few years. Even an optimistic scenario of full implementation of all national climate plans plus additional net-zero targets puts expected peak temperature rise at 1.8°C.

"There are no good outcomes if we remain above 1.5°C," said Inger Andersen, UNEP's Executive Director, on publication.

The best available case and the breaking point are the same number

That 1.8°C appears twice, in two roles. It is the peak under the most optimistic scenario. It is also the level past which the return trip stops working: beyond around 1.8°C, decline to 1.5°C during the 21st century becomes increasingly challenging.

The best case available therefore sits at the threshold where coming back down becomes hard. The report's own verdict: by no means an acceptable or preferred pathway, simply the best remaining option.

Net-zero is a milestone towards net-negative

That is the report's own section heading, and its point is that mitigation policy can no longer be framed solely around reaching zero.

The math here deserves a second read. Global net-zero would produce a temperature decline of roughly 0.3°C per century, so if mitigation stops there, a return to 1.5°C is unlikely before the second half of the 22nd century, even at a 1.8°C peak. Keeping a return within credible reach relies at a minimum on net-negative targets for most developed countries beyond 2050. Every Nordic economy is in that group.

For a Nordic listed company holding a 2035 or 2040 net-zero commitment, the commitment is not what comes under pressure. Its sufficiency as an endpoint does.

The obligation went in March

The Omnibus I Directive was published in the Official Journal on 26 February 2026 and entered into force on 18 March. It removed from the CSDDD the requirement to adopt and implement a climate transition plan. Member states have until 19 March 2027 to transpose the reporting changes, so national law in Helsinki, Stockholm and Copenhagen is still catching up. Under the CSRD a company discloses information about a plan where it has one, and nothing obliges it to have one. Scope narrowed at the same time, to more than 1,000 employees and turnover above €450 million, leaving much of the Nordic mid-cap universe outside mandatory reporting. Outside banking and the Paris conditions on green bonds, the duty is voluntary.

Google will invest at least €13 billion in Finnish digital infrastructure across 2027 and 2028, with data centres and supporting infrastructure in Hamina, Kajaani, Muhos and Vaala. It is the company's largest single investment in Europe. For scale: annual industrial investment in Finland normally totals around €10 billion, and Etla puts the €13 billion at roughly a fifth of all investment flowing into the country in a year. 

Google announced the investment on 9 September. It has operated in Finland since 2009 and is developing new infrastructure in Hamina, Kajaani, Muhos and Vaala 

Fortum has signed a 22-year power purchase agreement with Google covering up to 50% of Loviisa's capacity. Offtake begins in 2028 at a reduced volume and runs at half the plant's capacity from 2030 to 2049. The two parties also signed a memorandum of understanding to explore new flexibility capacity and new generation, including potential new reactors at Loviisa

The political reception 

Every named Finnish voice in Google's release welcomed the investment without qualification: the prime minister, the climate and environment minister, and the municipal leaders of all four host locations. The caution came from outside it.

Prime Minister Petteri Orpo said “Finland is an attractive destination for investments, and attracting further investment remains a top priority". Speaking at Google's announcement event, he took on the question the build raises for households: energy prices will not rise because of the investments. He also said public debate in Finland tends to underestimate data centres, and that the investments mean jobs for Finns.

Climate and Environment Minister Sari Multala tied her support to supply, saying “These investments are very welcome in Finland and demonstrate that it is possible to invest in AI infrastructure in a way that benefits both local communities and the broader energy system, including other energy users. This long-term approach and commitment are exactly what we need to generate value for both investors and Finnish society. A long-term agreement with an energy company helps ensure that new electricity generation capacity is developed to meet growing demand"

The four municipalities emphasised grid position and local business. Vaala's municipal manager Minna Kärkkäinen said the municipality "is located at a key point in Finland's main electricity grid, which makes it an attractive location for industry and energy projects"; Hamina, Kajaani and Muhos pointed to regional economy, jobs and the data economy.

Outside the release, EK director Sami Pakarinen told Verkkouutiset that "this is, if anything, fantastic news for the Finnish economy." 

The market reaction 

Fortum closed at €21.36 on 8 September, a quiet 0.7% gain that left it up 17.5% from the 2025 year-end close of €18.18. The next session was anything but quiet. The stock jumped 15.8% on 9 September to close at €24.74 after the Google nuclear deal, its sharpest one-day gain in at least a year, taking the year-to-date advance to 36.1%

Fortum has said the agreement is expected to raise the group's comparable return on net assets by approximately 1.4 percentage points over time, once half the plant's output is contracted.

What the contract secures

Loviisa's two units are licensed by the end of 2050. The Finnish government granted that extension in February 2023, replacing licences valid to 2027 and 2030. Fortum has a lifetime-extension investment programme of about €1 billion under way — ten portfolios, more than 300 projects and states that without those investments the plant could not continue producing after 2030.

CEO Markus Rauramo said long-term partnerships are essential "especially in today's uncertain market environment characterized by low visibility and highly volatile electricity prices." Loviisa supplies around 10% of Finland's electricity and employs about 580 people.

Oura has filed publicly for a Nasdaq listing in the United States and, according to reporting by The Wall Street Journal, intends to list during September. The Finnish smart ring maker submitted a confidential filing in May. The prospectus arrives with a board reshaped for US public markets, and a Nordic presence now outnumbered on it.

The prospectus filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission shows revenue of $1.21 billion for the nine months ended 30 June 2026, the first three quarters of a fiscal year that ends 30 September, against $697.6 million in the same period a year earlier, a rise of 74%. Full-year FY2025 revenue was $907.9 million, against $406.8 million the year before. The net loss attributable to common shareholders over the same nine months was $924.3 million, compared with $182.8 million a year earlier.

Oura shipped 3.1 million rings in the nine-month period, against 1.8 million a year earlier. Membership revenue reached $240.5 million, up 121%, and paid members doubled to 5 million, the recurring line that will matter most to public-market investors, and the one that turns a hardware company into a subscription business.

The headline loss sits beneath a $985m deemed dividend

Before the deemed dividend attached to preferred shares, Oura's net result for the period was a profit of $60.8 million, against $1.6 million a year earlier. The $924.3 million figure emerges after a $985 million deemed dividend to holders of redeemable convertible preferred shares is deducted. The comparable deemed dividend a year earlier was $184.4 million.

Oura raised more than $1.2 billion privately before this filing. A Fidelity-led round in October 2025 valued the company at $11 billion. The listing could raise up to $3 billion for the company and some of its backers at a valuation exceeding $16 billion, Bloomberg reported on 24 August 2026, a repricing of roughly 45% in under a year. 

The new board adds Robinhood's IPO-era CFO and Wolt's founder

Oura said on 2 September that it will appoint Jason Warnick, Leslie Kilgore, Miki Kuusi and David Sze as directors.

Warnick spent seven years as chief financial officer of Robinhood, where he helped take the company public and through its subsequent life as a listed business. He retired from the role earlier this year and was succeeded by Shiv Verma. Before that he spent nearly two decades at Amazon across finance, investor relations, audit and enterprise risk, and began his career as a CPA at Deloitte & Touche.

Kilgore sits on the boards of Netflix and Pinterest, and has previously served on those of LinkedIn, Medallia and Nextdoor. She was chief marketing officer at Netflix, and held earlier positions at Amazon, Procter & Gamble and Booz Allen Hamilton.

Kuusi co-founded Wolt and led it as chief executive from 2014 until DoorDash acquired the company in 2022. He now oversees DoorDash's international business and serves as chief executive of London-based Deliveroo. 

Sze is a partner at Greylock Partners, where he led investments in Facebook, LinkedIn, Roblox and Pandora. He previously held senior operating roles at Excite and Excite@Home.

The four join Timo Ahopelto, Dennis Durkin, chief executive Tom Hale, Wen Hsieh, Eurie Kim and chairman David Shuman on the board.

"Adding Jason, Leslie, Miki, and David strengthens our board with leaders who know what it takes to build and scale category-defining global businesses," Hale said in the company's statement.

UPM's shareholders approved the WISA Group separation on 31 August. Aspo votes on 7 December. Valmet has not yet approved a plan.

UPM-Kymmene's extraordinary general meeting approved the demerger of its Plywood business on 31 August 2026, seating the board of the new company at the same meeting. WISA Group Plc is expected to complete on or about 31 October and start trading on Nasdaq Helsinki on 2 November. UPM shareholders receive one WISA share for each UPM share held; the Finnish Tax Administration has ruled the demerger tax-neutral, and the Financial Supervisory Authority approved the listing prospectus in July and a supplement in August.

Aspo's board approved its own demerger plan on 3 August 2026. ESL Shipping moves into ESL Shipping Group Plc and the continuing company was renamed Telko Group Plc, on the same one-for-one basis. The extraordinary general meeting is set for 7 December, completion for 31 December, and trading in ESL Shipping Group shares for on or about 4 January 2027. A separate share exchange folds Lighthouse HoldCo's 21.4% direct stake in ESL Shipping into the new company, after which OP Finland Infrastructure LP (about 14.3%) and Varma Mutual Pension Insurance Company (about 10.7%) are expected to be its two largest shareholders.

Valmet is furthest from a vote. Its board announced on 24 July 2026 that it would review separating Biomaterial Solutions and Services from Process Performance Solutions into two listed companies. No plan has been approved. An update is due no later than the full-year 2026 results. 

Where the three stand

Nordea raised its 2026 growth forecast to 1.7 per cent on 2 September. Danske, forecasting in June, has 1.1 per cent. Both keep unemployment above 10 per cent this year, and sit a percentage point apart on the 2027 ECB rate.

Nordea's upgrade took 2026 up from 1.0% and added 2.0% in both 2027 and 2028. Danske has 0.8% for next year, having cut both years from 1.5 and 1.9% on an energy price shock. 

Some of the gap is just timing. Danske's editorial deadline was 2 June, before Statistics Finland's Q2 flash and before the summer run of data that prompted Nordea's upgrade. The energy-driven downgrade Danske made in June has not so far shown up in the output figures.

What has not moved with the data is the labour market call. Both houses put unemployment above 10% this year, and Danske has it still above 10% in 2027.

Nordea forecasts a further year at 2.0% growth in 2028 and unemployment down to 8.0%; Danske's horizon stops at 2027. The 2025 base figures differ slightly, EUR 281.7bn against EUR 280.6bn, so the rates are not measured off the same base.

The rate path is the one split the calendar does not explain

Both houses expect the ECB to raise rates again. They then point in opposite directions.

Nordea forecasts three further 25 basis point moves, taking the deposit rate to 2.75% by year-end and 3.00% in 2027, and says the timing looks wrong for Finland, where consumer price inflation was 2.1% in July with services at 1.7% and goods at 1.1%. Danske forecasts two hikes to 2.50% and then cuts, potentially from spring 2027, back to 2.00% by the end of that year, on the view that the hiking cycle will be much shorter than the last one.

The reasoning behind the shorter cycle is a comparison with 2022. Heidi Schauman, Danske's head of research, argues the starting point is not the same: "This time, the major economies are more balanced". On that reading, price and wage increases are harder to push through than they were four years ago, second-round effects stay modest, and the ECB has less work to do.

That is a full percentage point of difference on the policy rate in eighteen months, and it lands on anyone financing capacity into the recovery. It is also the one line where a June forecast and a September forecast are looking at broadly the same question, because both are calls on what the ECB does next rather than on what Finland did last quarter.

Finnish companies under OP Pohjola's equity research coverage are set to offer an average dividend yield of roughly 6.5 per cent for the 2026 financial year, according to a review published by OP Media on 28 August 2026. For many names on the list, the forecast yield keeps rising through 2027 and 2028.

The top of the list is dominated by Mandatum, with a forecast dividend yield of 12.8 per cent for 2026, settling to 8.0 per cent in both 2027 and 2028. Terveystalo follows at 8.2 per cent for 2026 and 2027, climbing to 10.2 per cent by 2028, then Anora (7.8% → 9.1% → 9.1%) and HKFoods (7.5% → 8.7% → 9.9%).

OP Pohjola's dividend yield forecasts, 2026e–2028e

Justin Hotard arrived from Intel with no history in the Finnish listed market. Investors have just placed him behind only Marimekko's Tiina Alahuhta-Kasko, and ahead of every other leader they rated.

Hotard took over as Nokia's chief executive on 1 April 2025, arriving from Intel with no record in the Finnish listed market. Fourteen months later he entered the chief executive table of Pörssiyhtiöiden Luottamus & Maine 2026 in second place, rated by 9,195 Finnish retail investors.

Pekka Lundmark, the man he replaced, held second place in the same index in 2023. And second again in 2024. Two people have now held that seat, and investors rated both of them second.

Reputation and Trust Analytics conducted the survey in collaboration with the Finnish Stock Exchange Foundation (Pörssisäätiö) and the Finnish Shareholders' Association (Suomen Osakesäästäjät), ranking listed companies and their chief executives separately. This edition appeared on 21 August, with fieldwork from 11 May to 1 June. Marimekko's Tiina Alahuhta-Kasko was named the best CEO for the third consecutive time. Kone topped the company table with a reputation score of 4.15.

Two chief executives reached the top ten from outside the market, one of them in a single edition

Only the top ten is published, so what follows is visible movement rather than a full ranking.

Hotard and Delorme are the clean cases. Neither could have been ranked before arriving, because the index covers chief executives of Finnish listed companies and both were running divisions elsewhere. Delorme reached third in his third edition. Hotard reached second in his first.

Malinen and Manner do not prove the same thing, and it is worth saying why. Both were already running Finnish listed companies, Outokumpu and Finnair, when earlier editions were fielded. Neither appeared in those top tens, but with roughly 180 sitting chief executives, placing eleventh and placing hundredth look identical from outside. Their earlier standing is unmeasured, not absent.

Nokia is ranked 44th, and its chief executive is ranked second

Nokia scores 3.56 and sits 44th on the company table. Its chief executive sits second. Neste sits 27th; its chief executive sits fifth. Same survey, and in both cases the leader is rated far above the company. 

It is tempting to read this as company reputation being slow and personal reputation being fast. The study's own figures refuse that reading. Neste climbed from 71st to 27th in a single edition, gaining 0.47 points, the largest move in the study. Qt Group fell from 21st to 69th, down 0.51. Company standing can move violently inside one year, so the gap at Nokia is not a story about different speeds. It is a gap whose cause is not in the published data.

A third of Finnish listed leadership is being rated on intent rather than record

The Listeds CEO Index, produced in partnership with SAM Headhunting, counts 186 sitting chief executives on Nasdaq Helsinki and First North Finland. Sixty-eight of them, were appointed in 2025 or later. 

Hotard's second place is what that cohort looks like when investors are asked to rate it. He has held the mandate for fourteen months. Whatever the ranking is measuring, in his case it cannot be measuring a record of delivery, because there is not yet much of one to measure.

For a board, a chief executive's placing is the weaker of the two numbers

For a nomination committee that has just appointed, the useful caution is that a new chief executive's high personal rating is not evidence the hire worked. Hotard entered at second within a year of arriving from another market, and Delorme reached third inside three editions. Neither placing can carry information about performance that has not happened yet.

The company table is the harder number, and it does not seem to follow the chief executive.  Kone was already among the leading companies in 2023, under Henrik Ehrnrooth and before Delorme arrived. Nokia's 44th sits underneath a second-placed leader. Neste's 27th rose by 44 places in the year after a change at the top, which is suggestive and nothing more.