Okay, I hope everyone can see the presentation. Some news regarding the group structure. As you well know, this year, besides the already established group structure, we have Palplast and Freiler Group who joined earlier this year. They are already consolidated in the financial statements for the last quarters. And we have signed during the third quarter an SPA for the acquisition of Optiplast, who's a flexible packaging producer from Croatia. Of course, this acquisition is subject to approval by the General Assembly scheduled in November. A few words about Optiplast. They have been active in the blown film market since 1989, located in Sisak, which is near Zagreb, fairly close to the Hungarian border and to one of our subsidiaries.
They have more than 70,000 sq m of production logistical spaces with an annual production capacity of 5,000 tonnes and a big share of recycled material which is used in their end goods. They are one of the leading players in the Croatian market. Their product portfolio includes garbage bags, shopping bags, and other types of bags and packaging films. They are present in all major retailers in Croatia, both the international key accounts as well as the local modern trade providers from Croatia, and they also have a significant percentage of export, Italy being their major market. We have the General Assembly scheduled for the 14th of November, and considering the CPs in the contract, we estimate that the closing will follow very soon after the approval from TeraPlast General Assembly because this is the major condition precedent for closing the deal. What can I say more about them?
They are a company which has a very long tradition in the market. They have great experience which comes to complement our existing production capacity. We will have a lot of synergies, and we will also learn from their experience and become more effective sooner with our business from TeraBio Pack by this acquisition. Regarding the financial conditions of this transaction, we've negotiated an EBITDA multiplier of 6.5. We will initially acquire 70% from the shares. The founder will be our partner for the near future. The initial payment is going to be somewhere around 85%. The remainder will be parked in an escrow account that will be used in case some price adjustments are needed, and in the second stage, we will acquire the remainder 30% in the same condition based on the same multiplier.
Also, the contract has the usual clauses like call option, put option, tag along, and drag along. If we are to talk about numbers, the price is not fixed, so the exact price is going to be determined at the date of closing. However, if we are to run the pricing formula based on the financial results from the middle of this year, the amount that TeraPlast should pay is around EUR 9.5 million. But again, depending on the cash position, especially on the cash position of Optiplast at the closing date, this might fluctuate to some extent. Okay, besides this continuation of our expansion policy, we have the financial results for the first three quarters, which are somehow below our initial estimates for several reasons.
Third quarter in itself, we saw a slowdown in investments in this quarter, caused most likely by the Romanian government's desire to reduce or to keep in check the budget deficit. We see continuation of the market pressures in Western Europe, which impacts not necessarily the volumes, but more likely the margins of Wolfgang Freiler Group, which fall short of our expectation. However, in Moldova, Palplast has remarkable performances, although the infrastructure projects financed with pre-accession European money have not yet started. Their financial results are quite strong for the first three quarters, driven especially by the private projects that are going on in Moldova, and which we managed to become suppliers of because of the synergies created with their sales force and the enlarged product portfolio. Some of these products manufactured in Romania, we succeeded in gaining a bigger market share.
Other product groups that had positive developments are TeraDuct, which is our fiber optic protection cables. They are getting close to half of the turnover coming from sales outside Romania in the first nine months versus one quarter the same period of last year. Compounds have also drastically improved their performances as the cable market especially becomes more dynamic versus the previous years. On the line that we are less happy about, we have the stretch film, which although has increased significantly its market share due to much higher sales than anticipated. Also, this generated significant loss, much higher than anticipated for the ramp-up period, but enabled us to change pricing policy starting the fourth quarter, and we expect to see a dramatic improvement of financial results.
The good news on the Opal stretch film business is that we have managed to develop the new recipes up to 30% recycled material. They are already in the market, and we also opened an online shop in order to reach a broader customer base directly. TeraBio, although has improvements in their financial results, are still in the negative territory with the profitability, slightly below expectations. Here we also see a slight shift of the customer base. We are switching more and more to export sales. 31% of the sales go outside of Romania. The business segment that has evolved in line with our expectation is the window segment, which has improved dramatically their EBITDA compared to the same period of last year.
It comes after several years of disappointing results, but this year, due to the fact that we changed the customer base from DIY stores to custom-made products either in the renovation market or in the new building market, enabled us to increase profitability dramatically, although the volumes have decreased. But the higher margins per unit allowed us to make more money there. Also, last but not least, we have started in the third quarter of last year a new project, let's say, which is TeraPlast Group's contribution to the restoration of the Romanian Forest Fund. Terav erde Carbon is a company that has been created for some time as an SPV for this initiative.
We hope to bring our contribution to carbon sequestration by reforestation, and we already are underway in implementing a project which covers 30 hectares of damaged lands in Mureș County, financed through the funds available for this type of projects in the recovery and resilience program. These evolutions in the market led to TeraPlast Group having a turnover of RON 681 million, a sharp increase over last year, more than 30%. However, EBITDA is at the same level of last year, in spite of an almost 50% increase in volumes. EBITDA margin, of course, has declined to 6.6%, generated by the 1% decline in the gross margin, as well as an increase in other costs like salaries, logistic costs, and energy costs, and all this impacted the bottom line. We have a net result of minus RON 6.9 million.
Another thing that is added up in this is non-recurring costs due to the transaction and alignment to group policies of the newly acquired subsidiaries. But again, also the suboptimal performance of some of our business segments. Considering this, we forecasted an end of the year some end of the figures, namely, we expect a turnover of almost RON 890 million, which is in line with the initial estimate. However, EBITDA we see somewhere at around RON 56.5 million, only a 10% increase versus last year, an EBITDA margin of 6.4%, and the net result a loss of RON 40 million. Because we don't expect short-term improvements in market conditions, we see we are a little bit more optimistic about next year and the years to come. But this year is unfortunately the market context is not helping our results.
Although TeraPlast, as a standalone company, has delivered to a large extent the initially anticipated results, subsidiaries' non-optimal performance have impacted the consolidated group results. This is why we are deploying several measures to restructure activities, including management changes and cost-cutting measures implemented in several of our companies, especially in the subsidiaries. We have management change in our Austrian subsidiary, which has, again, had a poor performance, and also several cost-cutting measures in the Romanian companies. I will hand it over to Bogdan to go into details on the financials, and then both of us are going to be back for the Q&A.
Hello to everybody. In terms of forecast for the entire 2024, we are presenting a consolidated turnover of 883 million RON, driven mainly by the installation and recycling segment.
The EBITDA shows a level of RON 56.5 million consolidated for 12 months, while the EBITDA margin is 6.4%. Due to the factors presented by Mr. Crăciunaș, the net profit shows the net result shows a loss of RON 14 million. As we can see, the installation segment has a good performance for 12 months. Also, the compounds and the windows and door segment shows good results, but the flexible packaging materials having here BioPac and Opal factories presents a loss of RON 23.8 million. The turnover of TeraPlast Group shows an increase of 31.7% in the first nine months of 2024 compared to the similar period of 2023. The evolution is mainly due to the 25% increase in volumes of the installation segment. The increase in volumes translates into an increase in turnover of almost 17%.
At the same time, the decrease in sales prices in 2024 compared to 2023 generates an impact of 8.6% of the turnover. This decrease in prices is due to the decrease in production costs, mainly the decrease of raw material prices. Considering our main objective of maximizing the use of the production capacity, this cost reduction was transferred into the market through price reduction. At the level of volume variations, we have three main factors. The volumes of BioPac flexible packaging segment remain constant, while the volumes of windows and doors have decreased by 30%. Another significant factor in the growth of the turnover is the volumes of Opal stretch film, an investment that started the production at the end of last year. In the first nine months for Opal stretch film, we exceeded by 3,000 tons the volume budgeted for the entire 2024.
This fact is translated into a 10.5% increase in consolidated turnover. The last significant factor that influenced the evolution of the turnover is the consolidation of the newly acquired companies. I'm talking about Optiplast and Palplast for the entire year, for nine months, and Freiler Group in the period April to September. We move on to the analysis of the results versus the budget, where due to the previously presented factors, namely the increase in volumes of installation segment, Opal stretch film, and the M&A activities, the turnover has a growth of 5% compared to the budget and 32% growth compared to the same period of 2023. The gross margin has increased by 28%. On the expenses side, we present a general increase compared to quarter three 2023, mainly due to the M&A operations by consolidating the expenses of Palplast and the Freiler Group companies.
Expenses with the employees' benefits have increased both due to the increases of salaries in 2023 and 2024, as well as due to the integration of the 130 employees of Freiler Group and 27 employees of Palplast. Considering all this, the EBITDA decreased by 2% compared to 2023. The net result was influenced by the payment of the minimum turnover tax in quarter three 2024, by the increasing depreciation expenses generated by the new investments and by significantly higher financing costs. TeraPlast Group is in a good position at nine months, showing an increase of 32% of turnover. As I previously presented, the reasons are the increase in volumes, the strategic investments. I'm referring to Freiler Group and Palplast, which had a significant positive impact in our financials.
Another positive aspect is the expansion of the export markets, where the sales have doubled compared to a similar period of last year, reaching 25% of the group's turnover. EBITDA remains at the level of the last year, nine months last year, although as a percentage to turnover, it fell to 6.6% from 8.7%, mainly due to the price pressures. Continuing the presentation with the activity segments, it can be seen that the installation segment contributes decisively to the growth of the turnover and the EBITDA, where we have an advance of 1% compared to 2023, up to the level of 9.65%. The evolution is remarkable in the context in which the government financing of the infrastructure projects has slowed down in quarter three, and also, the Western markets are presenting increasing pressures on prices.
The compound and recycling segment presents a solid EBITDA of 10% generated by a growth in turnover of 19% versus the similar period in 2023. In the windows segment, due to the repositioning to non-retail projects, we present a positive significant evolution, generating a positive EBITDA of 5% to turnover. The operational result is a profit of RON 1.1 million in comparison with the RON 700,000 loss incurred in the similar period of last year. In packaging, the evolution is, on one hand, extremely positive in terms of turnover and volumes, but due to this positive evolution in volume in the context of accelerated ramp-up strategy of Opal brand, we present a negative EBITDA of almost RON 11 million. Percentage-wise, we can see a slight improvement compared to 2023. On the balance sheet, the evolution compared to December 2023 is mainly impacted by the consolidation of Freiler Group companies.
Consequently, there is an increase of working capital. In fact, due to this consolidation, TeraPlast Group is presenting an increase on the majority balance sheet line items, while the impact in P&L is covering only six months. A significant factor of the group's evolution in quarter three is the successful completion of the capital increase, by which we absorbed EUR 20 million. Considering all these facts presented, the debt ratio in quarter three 2024 shows a slight increase compared to December 2023, reaching 4.6. Looking at the cash flows, we can see that in 2024, TeraPlast paid RON 79 million for the acquisition of Freiler Group.
Also, out of the RON 64 million budgeted for CapEx this year, we already paid RON 45 million, mainly for the last components of the stretch film factory, for the second line of the stretch film, and the improvement of overall TeraPlast production capacities, and also the photovoltaic power plant project. In terms of subsidies, we already collected RON 16.9 million for the investments in the stretch film factory, and we are going to collect another RON 8 million by the end of the year for the same project. This is it in terms of financial figures. I will hand over to Mr. Crăciunaș for the questions and answers. Hello again. So feel free to ask questions either in chat or just by speaking up. We have the first question. We see our expansion strategy as a long-term strategy, not necessarily a short-term sprint.
We want to create, of course, I think it's clear for everyone that more or less we are on the downward slope of an economic cycle, and markets are underperforming throughout Europe, at least our market segments, of course. I'm not talking about other sides of the market. And this negatively impacts TeraPlast as well, even the newly acquired companies of the group. But we still feel that there's still a little bit more room to expand in order to prepare ourselves for the next growth cycle because the advantage of the downturn Europe is in right now is that prices of assets are fairly low compared to what they used to be three or four years ago.
And I see that this is the distinct advantage that this period brings, and this is why we still feel there is still a little bit room to expand further before switching focus from expansion to consolidation of the existing holding. Any other questions? Well, I think we will be able to discuss more in depth about 2025 perspectives at the beginning of the year when we publish the preliminary results. What we see right now is that if we talk about Romania, we will see a switch from water and sewage networks financing sources from Anghel Saligny, which has been the driver behind the market growth in the first two quarters of this year, to European funds, which we expect to be deployed starting next year in our market.
This has the distinct advantage of also lowering the pressure on the budget deficit for the government because most of the money coming from the EU means that the government has to contribute much less than in the case of Anghel Saligny, which is 100% public funds, government money. For Western Europe, I think that I know that especially in markets like Germany, huge projects of infrastructure are under development, and we hope that they will come into a construction phase starting next year, possibly in order to compensate somehow the decrease in the automotive sector that they are having to somehow balance their GDP this way, but that's just a speculation. So from this perspective, we are not pessimistic. Of course, there are a lot of challenges for next year. We have the uncertainty regarding the war in Ukraine.
We have the uncertainty in the Romanian market of the measures that the new government is going to take after the elections. We have the uncertainty regarding the raw material prices, which way they are going to fluctuate during the next year, but it's somehow natural. This, let's say, uncertainty is part of the game, and it's something that we need to manage basically each budget cycle. If there are any other questions? Okay. If there are no other, yeah. On the plan to reduce debt, the problem with our debt is not the debt itself, but the low profitability, and this is why the leverage is so high. Our major focus is to increase the sales, reduce the costs, and increase the profitability, and to reduce the leverage in this way. We don't see necessarily the debt itself, considering the production capacities in the group as a problem per se.
We can expect a reduction of interest rates for the immediate future, which will somehow decrease the pressure on our cost basis. But if we look at the standalone financial results, TeraPlast, which is the main leader in the group, still fares fairly good, let's say. And this is why I'm saying that what our focus is to increase the profitability of the other of our subsidiaries. If we were to, let's say, have considered the debt reduction approach, then, of course, the easiest way would have been to stop developing and to use the money from the share capital increase towards the leveraging. But the strategy approved by the board still is focused on the continuing development and growth of TeraPlast in the immediate future. Again, there will come a time, and it's not far away, when we will focus on consolidating what we have.
But right now, due to the fairly low multiples in the market, the mission that we have from the board is to continue to expand. Okay. I see no other questions for now. Are there any more questions? Okay then. Thank you very much. And we'll see each other back in something like three months for the full year results and the budget for 2025. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Bye. Bye-bye.