Everyone to the CSN conference call to release results for the fourth quarter 2022. Today, we have with us the company's executive officers. We would like to inform you that this event is being recorded and all participants will be in listen-only mode during the company's presentation. Ensuing this, there will be a question and answer section when further instructions will be given. Should any participant need assistance during this call, please press star zero to reach the operator. We have simultaneous webcast that may be accessed through CSN's investor relations website at ri.csn.com.br, where the presentation is also available. The replay of this serve event will be available as soon as the call ends for one week. Once again, you can flip through the slides at your own convenience.
Please bear in mind that some of these statements made herein are mere expectations or trends and are based on the current assumptions and opinions of the company management. Future results, performance, and events may differ materially from those expressed herein as they do not constitute projections. In fact, actual results, performance, or events may differ materially from those expressed or implied by forward-looking statements as a result of several factors, such as overall and economic conditions in Brazil and other countries, interest rates and exchange rate levels, future rescheduling or prepayment of debt pegged in foreign currencies, protectionist measures in the U.S., Brazil, and other countries, changes in laws and regulations, and general competitive factors at a global, regional, or national basis. I would now like to turn the floor over to Mr.
Marcelo Cunha Ribeiro, the CFO and the IR executive officer, who will present the financial and operational highlights for CSN. Mr. Ribeiro, you may proceed. A good morning to all of you. Thank you for attending our results call for the 4th quarter 2022 for CSN. Before beginning the presentation, I would like to thank all of you for your attendance. The CEO and Chairman of CSN is with us, as well as other executive officers that will participate in the question and answer session. Let's begin with the highlights for the period. The acceleration in our financial results for the 4th quarter. We had important frameworks and some impacts, especially because of the rainfall in mining. We were able to come up with a good response, and we had a speed up in volumes, prices, and costs in mining.
In terms of steel, we had the traditional good performance, which enabled us to increase our EBITDA by 15% at the end of the year, a growth that should increase its pace throughout 2023. Secondly, we highlight the conclusion of the acquisition process of CEEE with the acquisition of 66% of the capital of the company. Also a transaction at the end of the year when we acquired an additional 32% from Eletrobras. We're now owners of 99% of the capital of CEEE, an important player in the electrical sector. It enables us to be self-sufficient, and we can also sell energy at present. The third important impact, a jump in our ESG indicators. Work that has been done by putting in place policies and goals, but also enhancing the disclosure of our historical practices. We have attained two important indicators.
The first, we have been called an Industry Mover, the company that most improved ESG throughout the year. Secondly, Sustainalytics has included us as the fourth best company in the segment throughout the world, thanks to the endeavors and efforts that CSN carries out on that front. We go on to page number 4 and show you our evolution of our EBITDA quarter-on-quarter. Of course, we had volatility throughout the year. We were impacted by the strong prices of iron ore and steel in the first half of the year. We then saw a normalization in the price of these commodities impacting our profitability.
At the end of the year, at operational level, we were able to obtain better margins, 27%, and ended the year with BRL 13.8 million in EBITDA, the second best year of CSN, although it represents a drop of 30% vis-à-vis 2021. We had a growth of 15% in the quarter in the sequential comparison. At the right in the graph, you can see that the great difference lies in the mining sector, where we practically increase the results twofold in terms of prices and volumes as mentioned. Steel also operational, but with a gradual reduction of prices, causing that drop in the EBITDA. We go on to page five, where we will speak about our cash beginning with our investments.
We accelerated our CapEx in the fourth quarter, going from BRL 839 billion to BRL 1.036 billion. Especially investing strongly in segments besides steel and mining. We had some factors that were not part of our initial forecast. The consolidation of Holcim and the rights of use, bringing us a new level of CapEx in the segment of BRL 1 billion. Raising our CapEx of BRL 3.4 million for the year, still below what we expect to do in 2023. Of course, we will have a speed up in the mining sector with the evolution of the P15 sector. In working capital this quarter, we had a very strong demand in our inventories. We had been reducing inventories of raw material because of the normalization of prices abroad.
As you will see in the steel results, we had production. We ended our inventory, which was of course part of our strategy. We increased production and accounts receivable because of the possible evolution of the mining cost. All of this was fully offset with the receivables from suppliers. This led to an increase in our working capital with an impact on our cash flow. In the next page, you can see the volatility that we faced in free cash flow, the operational cash flow that you can see to the left of the page. Ending the year with good operational results, but with a high level of inventories. That is why we have a negative cash flow. We enhanced cash generation and ended the quarter...
Well, we had an EBITDA of BRL 3.4 billion used in these variations of working capital, a higher CapEx, higher interest rate as well, and taxes that seasonally were somewhat higher. 2023, we will stabilize this cash flow. We have a positive result in EBITDA. This will offset the higher investments. A positive cash flow will enable us to reduce our indebtedness that we see in the following page. In page number seven, we observe that this cash flow for the fourth quarter was insufficient to allow us to reduce our indebtedness. Subsequently, it went from BRL 24 billion to BRL 30 billion for very obvious reasons. The acquisition in the electric vehicle sector, an increase of BRL 3.3 million. Besides an important payment that we carried out.
All of this adding up to the totality of our net debt that grew 25% to BRL 30 billion. With this, we ended the quarter with 2.2x leverage pro forma for the prepayment of mining that we announced in the first days of January. In truth, this leverage would have been 2x, which is the range in which we would like to operate for 2023. We will see a sequential improvement of EBITDA and cash flow. Of course, we will tend to fall within that range with minor variations through the coming quarters. On the following slide, our liquidity and our debt amortization, which is quite lengthened. Liquidity remains comfortable at BRL 12 billion. Because of the prepayment of the $500 million, this would be very close to our target liquidity. A good coverage in the short term.
We highlight our activity in the capital market, especially the local capital market. We took advantage of a very sound window. We debentures of more than BRL 4 billion, helping us to lengthen out our indebtedness and making it more efficient. Before, we were working in a more volatile and more expensive capital market than in this quarter. Now, we had debentures in each of the businesses. We had a good year in 2022. Our volumes were very close to 2021, especially in the domestic market. We had a minor drop of 3%, smaller than the drop of the market that was close to 10%, showing our endeavors to conquered the market. We grew in important sectors, in construction and others, more than leveraging what had happened in other sectors, the automotive line, the white line.
We had a quarter with prices that internationally were weakened. Therefore, we were very careful privileging volumes and not prices. We had a slightly higher drop, but better than 2021. Regarding prices, they had a drop of approximately 8% in line with the international prices. The positive issue, as announced, is that the international market has given way for new price increases. As we will see in questions and answers, we have the opportunity of holding new rounds. We still see very high prices, and this should allow us new incursions. We had an EBITDA with a marginal drop, a drop of 13%, despite a good operational performance and drop in prices. On page number 11, as you can see, we had a production of 7% below 2021.
We took the most of some opportunities buying slabs in the international market, taking advantage of the drop in average prices. We also had a drop of 5% in slabs, we had a drop in the cost of the final product, which has enabled us to maintain average prices. The floor of our profitability that would be higher than our historical average, BRL 819, which is above $150, which is the average cost. What we saw in 2022, we intend to improve upon with that attempt of increasing prices and of course, a better quality. In mining on page 13, a very strong quarter from the viewpoint of results and operation. We were able to have an increase of sales for the quarter, which typically is a slower quarter because of seasonality.
We produced somewhat less because of seasonality. We were able to sell more and impact working capital because of the improvement in prices. We began the quarter with low prices. With a price improvement in December, we made the most of this price improvement, sold out our inventory during the period, and we had a slight increase in volume vis-à-vis 2021. Our forecast for 2023 is even better. We will buy from third parties an improvement in the market at higher prices, and we're quite enthusiastic about the margins. In 2023, all of this should speed up to what we saw in the fourth quarter, above 50% and higher EBITDAs that we saw of BRL 1.8 million for the fourth quarter. On page 14, this is an X-ray, a comparison among quarters.
We had an improvement in all of the areas, in volume, in the mix of our own mix vis-à-vis that of third parties, an improvement in prices. Great. With this, we got to attain this growth also bolstered by the provision of what had been sold in previous quarters, leading us to BRL 1.8 billion of EBITDA. To speak about cement on page 16. For the first time, we consolidated LafargeHolcim Brasil, now called CSN Cimentos Brasil. We got to 3 million tons this quarter and ended the year with 7.2 million tons. Of course, if we look at 2023, these are figures that will change quite drastically, as happens every year. We also expect a significant growth in uncertain environment.
At the end of the year, we implemented some actions within our CSN Cimentos plant in Brazil to reconnect capacity, and this led to a slight reduction in margin, the reconnection of some operations. Because of the cost of fuel that is higher, it led to a profitability that is a one-time effect that was somewhat lower. We have prices of coke and oil dropping in 2023. We won't have these reconnection costs. Of course, we have an abundance of synergies to make the most of a control of the LafargeHolcim Plant. That has proven to be better than we had imagined. We have, for example, the cost of our own energy, something we had foreseen for July, we have anticipated to April. We're quite enthusiastic with the cement business in 2023. This ends our presentation of segments. We would now like to speak about ESG.
Good morning, everybody. We are here again to present to you the results for that fourth quarter of ESG. Of course, this is something under constant evolution with the aim of offering you greater transparency in terms of what is done in the company. I'm just going to give you a bird's-eye view in terms of governance, great strides. We concluded the impact and dependency matrix on ecosystem services. We're following the guidelines of TNFD, mapping of risks and opportunities, setting forth some parameters, especially that relate to nature. In April, in our report, we're going to approach all of these topics. We ended the year with CSN Mining with all of its dams renewed. The Vigia Dam has completed, of course, the works and recharacterization. We continue to evolve in terms of our operational performance quarter-on-quarter.
We ended the year of 2022 with a reduction of 25% in our accident frequency rate. Compared with 2021, this is the best result in our historical series. A significant reduction, 19%, in the number of accidents as well with employees and our third parties. Our cement plant began with the ISO 14001 certification. We're working on sewage projects for the reduction in the consumption of water and the emission of CO2. Of course, this has been done for each segment. In steel, -5% versus the baseline in 2018. An improvement of CO2 emissions in cement, -7% versus the baseline in 2020. A slight increase in the emissions of mining. You can see that all of these trends have been carefully forecast segment per segment, and we have mapped out our initiatives through time.
It's also important to mention that we have identified all of the risks in the company, and all of this will be part of the next integrated report of the company. When it comes to diversity in the social area, we have a growth of women in leadership growing year on year. We have had a 50% growth. Of course, we would like to reach 2025 with 28% of women in leadership position. In the social area, we concluded two projects in the last quarter. A partnership with the Getúlio Vargas Foundation and the conclusion of our theory of change, which will enable us a new instrument in terms of social investment.
As has been mentioned, there has been a constant evolution in the company in terms of our main ratings, especially in Sustainalytics, where we had the fourth best score in the segment among 155 companies. We are the only Brazilian company with steel and mining that was indicated into these categories. We are the steel company with the greatest evolution in terms of its ESG practices. Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now go on to the question-and-answer session for investors and analysts. Should you have a question, please press star one. If your question has been responded, you can withdraw from the queue by pressing star two. We request that you please pick up your phones when posing your question to allow for optimal sound quality. Please hold while we poll for questions.
Our first question is from Rafael Barcellos from Santander Bank. You may proceed. Good morning to everybody. Thank you for taking my question. My question refers to steel. We imagine what the purchase of slabs has been quarter on quarter. What you are doing in the first quarter, considering that we're already in March. If you could speak about your priorities at present in terms of your capital spending, what would be ideal for the company at present? Good morning, Rafael. This is Martinez speaking to you. In terms of cost, as mentioned by Marcelo, we had a significant reduction in the cost of slabs in the fourth quarter. Our efforts are strong to continue on with this cost reduction. The first half of the year, we're going to ensure that this cost reduction continues. It's fundamental to preserve our EBITDA margin.
In the fourth quarter, we got to BRL 3,900. We're going to work to reduce this cost even further for slabs. We carried out a strategic acquisition of slabs, approximately 400,000. We have already used up 300,000 tons of slabs. We have 100,000 tons that we can still utilize, and we're also analyzing other possible acquisitions of slabs to balance out the price of slabs at the plants. We have additional efforts to reduce the cost of conversion and manufacture as well in the transition between hot and cold slabs and for upstream products as well for efforts ahead to continue to reduce our costs. Regarding our capital spending, minimum cash was the question. We continue with that vision that because of the volatility in Brazil, it's important to increase cash. The ideal range would be BRL 15 billion.
This is important insurance, of course, in present days. We're making all possible efforts to reduce this, making our fundraising and investments ever more efficient. We're enhancing our facilities to receive that special check, as it is called, to work with lower cash levels. For the time being, these are instruments only available for companies that are investment grade. We have had an investment grade, and throughout 2023, we're going to fix that minimum volume of BRL 15 billion. I hope that has answered your question. Is anything missing? Do you think it's possible to have additional cost reductions here in the first half of the year simply to complete this profile in the first quarter? The cost will become more stable. In the second quarter, we do foresee the possibility of having a greater cost reduction.
I will speak about our price pillar in the first quarter. We do have the ability to improve this. In terms of cost, we will reach stability in the first quarter with a possibility of a further reduction because of the lower cost of acquisition of raw material, which we have already acquired. This has allowed us to reduce our cost for raw materials that are in inventory. We'll have more sales in the second quarter, with the use of slabs, this will offset some variations that we might have in the first quarter. Our acquisitions were quite interesting in terms of cost reduction. Thank you. That was very clarifying. Thank you. Our next question comes from Daniel Sasson from Itaú BBA. Good afternoon to all of you. Thank you for taking my questions. My first question is to Martinez. In Europe, everything is slower.
Last year, they ended at 7.5 million of capacity in terms of steel. It's coming back slowly. The prices are recovering. As a counterpart, situation will be very positive in terms of the demand of rebar. We will need 4 million tons to build this coming from Turkey. When we come to Brazil and we look at the pillars that you are conversing about, coal continues at BRL 375, iron ore BRL 129-BRL 130, exchange BRL 129-BRL 130. With these price levels in Brazil, a BQ at BRL 4,700 and a Chinese BQ at BRL 680, a premium that now will be slightly negative.
The scenario, if we take into account a slightly stronger demand, which I do believe will materialize in March and January and February, the sector was quite well behaved. We saw an improvement in March. We could increase between 7.5%-10% beginning in April, which is possible because of the market dynamic. In the long steel scenario, the premiums are negative. Nowadays, if you look at a Turkish rebar that was the cheapest and no longer exists, the premiums are minus 14%. Summarizing, if the demand begins to increase somewhat with growth as of March stabilizing, and if the market becomes stronger in the automotive sector, in civil construction, in the white line where we observe an improvement, I think that as of April, we could have that increase of 7.5%-10%.
In long steel, the situation is somewhat more difficult because supply and demand is somewhat more complicated. In flat steel, the equation is different. There's a maintenance of some plants, especially our own Usiminas is not a secret. We're remodeling the blast furnaces. We also had some problems in special steel that are being redressed, and everything will have been done as of March. Perhaps the prices will drop a bit more than the market as well as the volume beginning in the fourth quarter. I see that the scenario is very positive. If we look at the world situation, Brazil cannot lag behind. Everything is increasing, and I believe Brazil will accompany the world trends. Brazil has to give itself a chance. The government has to help us, help Brazil, so that it can go back to growing.
They're saying that the growth will be 1.5%-2%. Last year, Brazil had a drop of 10% in flat steel. If we're able to grow 1.5%-2%, we can recover prices and return to historical margins of over 20%. Very approximately, this is the scenario and the cost of slab produced and purchased. In Brazil, the people were exploiting the world market. Yesterday, I was looking at some reports, and there was slabs sold to the U.S. and Mexico in an isolated way at $750-$780. The Brazilian slab producers in a more orderly market were selling at prices below $650. Our normalized slab cost with the cost initiative will be below $700 for sure, and we have to calculate to see if it's worthwhile buying.
We're going to look at this surgically to see if it's the right moment to buy. We're privileging our operational moments and trying to make the best of what we have in the company. We will only make use of opportunities if they're positive for us. I hope to have responded your question. Yes. Yes. Absolutely. That was very good. Thank you, Martinez. Our next question comes from the English room from Mr. Carlos de Alba, Morgan Stanley.
Thank you very much. just wanted to discuss a couple of things on the cash generation, the CapEx and working capital for 2023. I just wanna see, Marcelo, if the CapEx guidance still remains intact for mining and steel and for the overall company this year. Working capital, you alluded to the fact that you want to reduce it. Obviously, the fourth quarter wasn't exactly what the market was expecting. If you can potentially tell us if this is something that the company believes can be achieved already in the first quarter, or if it's gonna take a little bit longer to bring them the working capital, and to what levels, you know, to something that is more comfortable.
If I may ask on the cement profitability, EBIT per ton came down in the quarter. I don't know if this is a result of the consolidation of the Lafarge business or if it is just the market, you know, being a little bit more difficult, more challenging right now. If you can talk about how do you see the profitability of that business in Q1 and maybe in 2023, that would be really useful. Thank you very much.
Well, thank you, Carlos, for the question. We're addressing your question on the CapEx. In the guidance it is BRL 4.4 million with the main use in mining because of the acceleration of the P15 project. The answer is yes. This guidance will not undergo revision, not in mining or in other businesses. It was simply impacted in the fourth quarter because of some issues referring to the segment. Our RTGs, our cranes, the right of use and the acquisition of products in our cement business. These were a one-time effect that ended at the end of the fourth quarter. What we will see in 2023 is an increase in mining, increasing this figure during the year to BRL 4.4, as stated in the guidance.
Regarding our working capital, we ended up with our stocks above BRL 11 billion. We hope for a normalization of the inventories, removing BRL 600 million from that line item and also in the line item of raw material costs. We still have coal and petcoke that are quite expensive. We have inventories of this, so we're hoping to reduce these lines by BRL 2 million throughout the coming quarters. Of course, this won't have a direct impact on cash generation. We have a proportional impact on suppliers, but the cash flow line item, the variation of working capital should be well behaved throughout 2023. We're not expecting the volatility we had in 2022. Regarding the EBITDA per ton of cement and the consolidation of the CSN Cimentos Brasil plants, this will tend to reduce the EBITDA percentage per ton. Yes, because we're speaking of a capacity integrated plants.
What perhaps caused the instability in the fourth quarter was not that consolidation. It was what was mentioned in the presentation, the cost of oil that was higher, the higher cost of fuel, somewhat lower volumes, because of the heavy rainfall with lower volumes and the cost of reconnection of some of our capacity in the plant in Sorocaba, in Barroso. These are one-time costs that increased our fixed costs, reducing the percentage. Now going forward with the integrated company, we think we will be able to navigate above 30%. Go back to the results we had in the past. Thank you, Marcelo. Our next question is from Vanessa Quiroga from Credit Suisse. Hey, good morning and thank you for taking my question. My question is about the cement business.
To speak about synergies, which are the factors that will be able to point to the synergies of this integration. What is the stride that you have made here? If you can give some guidance for the year 2023 in the field of cement. Thank you. Hello, Vanessa. Good afternoon. This is Egivaldo. To speak about the synergies and at CSN Day in December, we presented our expectation for the capture of synergies that was of course much greater than we had imagined originally. These synergies are concentrated in some drivers in the self-production of energy with a reduction in the cost of energy and all of our operations, a better distribution logistic, a more intelligent logistic, more competitive in the market.
We also have a commercial strategy that is historical for CSN, a pulverization of clients. This enables us to capture results on the table. We have synergies in terms of acquisitions. A larger volume of raw material in the shorter term. In the field of operations, a range of opportunities in operations, alternative teams, new capacities, as mentioned by Marcelo in the presentation. We're already working on this. Everything will come into operation in some weeks. Therefore, we have a very broad range of synergies that will fall within that chart that we showed you at CSN Investor Day. We're going to put together 2 companies into a single company with a margin of 30%. Do you believe that for 2023 we will already see this increase in margins? Oh, certainly.
Yes, we will. The results of the fourth quarter was perhaps a one-time effect, but we are going to navigate above 30%. In the last 3 years, CSN has concentrated on that 30%. With the capture of synergies, we will doubtlessly return to that level, and we're working in that direction. Thank you very much. Our next question comes from Thiago Lofiego from Bradesco BBI. Good morning, everybody. My first question, to harp upon the topic of cement still. Which is your outlook in terms of demand and prices throughout the year? It could be a somewhat more challenging market. How are you going to balance out this increase in utilization with a market that is not simple to operate in? As part of cement, Marcelo, what is your mindset once you're operating at an interesting level with margins and synergies?
What's going to happen in terms of your IPO? The second question, to go back to capital allocation, which is the greenfield potential in the United States, which is the type of growth that you're expecting? If we could hear your comments, it would be very appreciated. Good morning, Thiago. This is Martinez. I'm going to speak about cement and the origins when we began the cement business, we have to be prepared for a war. This is what our chairman has always said. When we began in the cement business, we had, this is what we're seeking now with the integration of Holcim Lafarge, is a better cost. This is the best challenge we have when we had CSN business. This cost enabled us to enter the market, participate in a very competitive market with other large market players.
With the acquisition of Lafarge Holcim, besides the excellent surprises we had that Egivaldo can refer to, logistics, cost, the energy issue, which is very important. In the near future, this will be valuated. It will be worth a great deal because of modern techniques and energy. This will be of great value to the company. In the commercial strategy, we have a regional strategy, a strong regional strategy. We have an interesting share in the Southeast in the retail market. We're going to continue to sell more for less, implement the portfolio strategy from Lafarge itself. We have recovered and grown in some markets here in the Southeast, despite the high share. In the Northeast, we also hadg room to occupy the retail market, a fragmented market for construction material, for example. They buy small amounts in a market that was poorly supplied.
There's room to grow there. In the market where Lafarge has the technical cement, which is the great strength, bulk, we're entering very strongly. We have already grown our market share. We have a strong market here in the region we have selected. Of course, the competition is harsher. Last year, we were able to recover 18% of the price throughout the year in cement. The market stands at 2.7, with specificity of some regions. There are some regions where we have been able to work very well. Although the competition was harsher in January and February, the market, in truth, began on March first because of the rainfalls. We see very positive signs in residential construction, in commercial construction, and a carryover of the works that were launched in the past.
We could have a somewhat better market commencing now until the end of the year. We can only grow and occupy new positions. The price position is fundamental. Regarding prices, the greater emphasis now is on cost. The Petcoke has reached very high levels, and we're going to have to work better with the crop of Petcoke throughout the world. The price will not have the same strength it had in last year, as the increases in price were very strong. We're now more concerned about cost and market occupation. This is our strategy. Regarding the IPO. The question on projects in the United States. Our guidance is to look for growth that is profitable and sustainable, always keeping a very prudent leverage. I think this has been sufficiently emphasized. Benjamin was very clear about our priorities on CSN Day.
Working with that IPO would be in accordance with reducing our leverage. In-house, we're doing very well. We not only have growth, we have synergy, we have profitability gains. This is a story that could progress quite well in the market. We know that the market is completely closed at this point in time. We're going to be ready and watchful. Regarding the United States, we would like to continue to make moves in it. This is a strategy because of the geographic location, but we look upon leverage. We have been gauging the definite launch of these projects, ensuring that our capital structure will not go beyond the levels that are both sound and sustainable. We're going to work on that balance in the coming quarters.
Once we're within the range that is expected, once we have sufficient confidence in our capital, we're going to accelerate our organic growth in the United States. Thank you. Thank you very much. Our next question comes from Guilherme Rosito from Bank of America. Good afternoon. Good afternoon. Thank you for taking my question. A question to Martinez. Which is the difficulty of increasing prices here compared to the prices in Europe, United States and China. Now, will the export levels of CSN be higher than they were last year, importing steel from Turkey, for example? Another question to Marcelo regarding capital allocation. Which are your priorities in the coming quarters? Is there room for growth? Is your cash position acceptable? There is a general assembly coming, so what will happen with all this?
Well, Guilherme, in the first quarter, we should have a carryover because we did increase the prices this year between 3%-5%, regarding the fourth quarter, which is already positive. In the case of the price increase for flat steel, what I was saying is that the demand in March has already improved. We have positive signs, and this might improve the environment to increase prices. The premium is negative. In my opinion, with a negative premium, it doesn't make sense. Regardless of the demand, the level of exports is still very high, 18%. Regarding exports from CSN, to give you an idea, last year, we exported to the U.S.A our whole quota, 250,000 tons of galvanized steel. We're thinking of sending 400,000 in 2023.
This is part of the project and the BQ. Of the sunset review, I could send a bit of this. It is more of an advantage at $1,200 instead of sending it here and the laminated steel. There could be greater exports to the U.S.A. In terms of other long steel markets, I would like to have more rebar to sell in the domestic market. We're completely sold out in the Brazilian market, which is quite fragmented. Exports would not make sense. We're going to focus on the domestic market. In terms of capital allocation, we're always in a situation of balance, leveraging, and much more, as Benjamin mentioned on CSN Day. With our leverage at 2 or up to 2.2 times, we're going to keep our eye on generating cash.
The situation is given at the Ordinary General Meeting, the dividends that had already been disclosed in November. That situation is a given, the growth will come about because of a capital allocation we carried out last year in September and December, almost BRL 8 billion invested in Lafarge Holcim and the electrical companies. This will have an impact on the consolidated results in 2023. We hope to deliver all of this deleveraging, dividends and growth. Of course, everything in a sustainable way. Thank you. Thank you very much. That was very clear. Our next question comes from Gaelle Rainer from BTG Pactual. Good day or good afternoon to all of you. A quick question and a follow-up. We have heard from your clients and distributors recently that CSN has delayed some deliveries because of some reported problems, operational problems at Volta Redonda.
If you could clarify this, if there truly was a factor, reducing your delivery rate, impacting your deliveries, if this happened, if it has been resolved, if it could have an impact in the first quarter in the domestic market. A follow-up for Martinez. Martinez mentioned that you expect potentially stable costs in the first half of the year. Is this for the slab that you produce, or would this be the total COGS per ton, including the slabs of third parties that you have been purchasing? Thank you. Well, in truth, it refers to the COGS. That's what we are referring to. The cost of the slabs is more stable at BRL 3,900 per ton presented in the fourth quarter. Regarding the problem, they're true. There's more noise than there should be.
We had one-time problems that had an impact that are being resolved. We did have an impact on the first quarter. In the second quarter, they will have been fully resolved. At the beginning of March, the problem has practically been resolved. We continue forward. It had a greater impact in special steel linked to other markets and not that of distribution. It indirectly impacts distribution, that is a channel, not a market. There are small clients selling to assembly plants, the white line and buildings that did suffer an impact, but the impact was minor. We have redressed the problem and they will be fully solved. Thank you. Thank you very much, Martinez. That informal guidance of cost per COG will extend during the first half of the year despite this minor impact. Yes, all of this has been taken into account. Wonderful. Thank you very much.
Our next question comes from the room in English. Mr. Hallow from Santander Bank.
Hi, good afternoon, and thank you for the call. On a different topic, just looking at balance sheet metrics, and considering, I think, the fact that year to date, you know, the local markets in Brazil have become more credit constrained. Given the amount of amortizations that are, you know, that are scheduled, I guess it's around BRL 8 billion or so between now and the end of next year. Have you changed your thought process in thinking ahead to tackling that? Can you talk a little bit about how you see market access? I believe it's three-quarters bank, one quarter capital markets.
If you could give a bit more detail, given how the market has changed in Brazil, and given it's, you know, to the extent as market access is also not relatively as cheap versus, you know, the international markets as it was, say, last year. Any kind of details there would be helpful and if you're kind of contemplating accessing the dollar market at some point to address this if you've gotten to that stage yet. Thank you.
Thank you for the question, Declan. Regarding market access, it's completely open. We have access to the international capital markets. The good ones are back with a limitation in China. We have a good market here, there's a debenture market as well that will be back now, all of them at a slightly higher level. We're being quite selective. We're not concerned with the amortizations. They have all been fully addressed. We do have special fundraising, specific fundraising for use in our cash for investments in JMP lines, for example. Japanese lines that are our partners in mining, they're going to enable us to complete the P15 project, more than $1 million. We have spoken with multilateral agencies to fund our projects in cement because they have that green characteristic, hundreds of millions of dollars.
For the very long term, we have a more efficient cost. Regarding the capital markets, they're completely open. We're being very selective because at this point in time, the costs are higher.
Thank you for that. That's it for me.
As we have no further questions, we will return the floor to Mr. Marcelo Ribeiro, the CFO and IR Executive Director, for his closing remarks. You may proceed, Mr. Ribeiro. Well, thank you all for the conference. I will give the floor to our CEO and Chairman, Benjamin Steinbruch, for the closing remarks. I would like to thank all of you for your attendance at our fourth quarter 2022 conference call for CSN Mining and CSN. I would like to reiterate the commitments we made formerly regarding leveraging. We're at 2 times, if we consider the prepayment of iron ore and that quest to be at 1.2 times. We have had expressive growth in the last half of the year and the last semester, and we count upon significant synergies that will be proven in our results because of the acquisition.
Along with this, we're also hoping for an opportunity of an eventual capital opening in cements and also in energy and or perhaps a participation as a strategic partner. If there's any other market operation in terms of capital for our new assets, we will have the certainty that everything will go back to normalcy in terms of our leverage. Well, this has been reiterated in the past. It's a commitment of having it stand at one time or two times at the very most. Now, in terms of ESG and technology and the growth of our results, we have had significant evolution in ESG. In fact, we're working strongly on that. We are fully committed to the use of technology as well. We use it broadly. We're working with the green steel that causes less aggression in the production of iron ore, steel and cement.
We had a year of 2022 that, of course, could have been better. We did not make the most of some opportunities. We faced some operational difficulties that were quickly overcome, and in the fourth quarter, we were able to show the improvements and enhancements. We believe that beginning in the first quarter, we will have stronger results because of the synergies that we are capturing in cement and the integration of energy into our units. Along with mining, we will have better prices than those that have been foreseen. Submit the prices are still low in the market, and we have an excellent outlook of results for the second half of the year. Now, the price of raw materials is given. The market prices already are given as well.
We're quite convinced that we will harvest the results of all of the efforts carried out formerly. We overcome the difficulties that exist in the market, attain global profitability as well as local profitability, and we're quite optimistic regarding the year 2023, as all of the necessary measures have been adopted. Our idea at present is to make the most of what has already been done and to work at full steam with margins that have always been our mark, that have set us aside in the market. We hope to be able to show these results very soon, beginning in the second quarter of 2023. We reiterate our commitment with delivering full production in that quest for greater productivity, a commitment with the use of technology, and we're convinced that we're on the right path.
As in a large company, we're moving towards growth in a very complicated market. Everything tends to be somewhat more difficult because of the peculiarities of our day to day. We have gotten it right in terms of acquisitions. Well, if we make minor mistakes in 2023, I'm convinced we will have excellent results. Once again, I would like to thank all of you for your attendance at our conference call. We will very soon be disclosing the results of the first quarter. Thank you once again to all of you. Thank you for attending. Our conference call for CSN ends here. You can now disconnect your lines, and have an excellent afternoon. Thank you very much.