UBS favors these European utilities stocks as rally continues By Investing.com

UBS says European utilities have risen 14% year-to-date versus a 5% gain for the Eurostoxx 600, but still sees more upside as earnings growth strengthens and sector multiples recover. The bank is bullish on RWE, Orsted and Grenergy, highlighting 11% EPS CAGR for RWE through 2031 and roughly 40% annual net income growth for Grenergy through 2029. It is most negative on National Grid, Verbund and Drax due to valuation, power-price and cost-pressure concerns.

Analysis

The key read-through is not just “utilities are cheap” but that the market is re-rating optionality inside the sector. The winners are the names with embedded volume growth and merchant-like sensitivity to power volatility; that favors renewables-plus-flexibility models over pure regulated duration. If volatility in power prices stays elevated, balance-sheet quality and asset mix become a bigger driver of earnings convexity than headline beta, which is why the larger, more defensive incumbents can keep lagging even in a strong sector tape.

A second-order effect is that this is effectively a capital-allocation trade disguised as a sector call. Companies with clearer storage, offshore wind, or flexible generation pipelines should attract incremental passive and thematic flows, while network-heavy names become funding sources as investors rotate toward higher growth and higher implied returns. That dynamic can persist for multiple quarters because it is driven by relative earnings revisions, not just multiple expansion.

The contrarian risk is that the crowd is extrapolating a “recovery” in multiples into a regime change in fundamentals. If European power prices soften, subsidy/auction economics normalize, or financing costs stop falling, the fastest growers can de-rate abruptly because their terminal value assumptions are doing more of the work than current cash flow. For the negative names, the pain is not necessarily linear: once investors lose confidence in premium valuation support, the re-rating can happen faster than the earnings downgrade.

On National Grid specifically, the issue is that a premium-to-regulated-asset-base framework only works when rates, policy, and allowed returns are stable. If the market starts to price mean reversion in allowed ROE or higher political scrutiny of utility bills, that premium can compress even without any operational deterioration. In that setup, the trade is less about absolute earnings and more about valuation elasticity versus perceived defensiveness.

Key Decisions for Investors

• Long RWE / short NGG for 3-6 months: express preference for flexible earnings and volatility capture over regulated-duration exposure; target 8-12% relative outperformance if power volatility stays elevated.
• Add ORSTED on pullbacks for 6-12 months: the market appears to be discounting near-term pipeline risk but not the next leg of project optionality; use a 15-20% downside stop if offshore wind sentiment rolls over again.
• Buy GRG on weakness, but size modestly: highest torque to storage adoption and strongest earnings growth profile; risk/reward is attractive only if financing conditions remain benign over the next 2-3 quarters.
• Avoid or short NGG into strength: valuation premium looks vulnerable to any rate-cut disappointment or regulatory headlines; best expressed as a relative short versus renewable-heavy peers rather than as an outright macro utility short.
• If owning the sector basket, rotate from networks/generators into renewables-plus-storage over the next month: the revision cycle is still favoring names with visible EPS upgrades, and that should persist into the next reporting season.