Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Thanks for attending EDP's nine-m onths 2022 results conference call. We have today with us our CEO, Miguel Stilwell d'Andrade, and our CFO, Rui Teixeira, which will present you the main highlights of the nine months 2022 financial performance and an update on strategy execution. We'll then move to the Q&A session, in which we'll be taking your questions, both by phone or written questions that you can insert from now onwards at our webpage. This call should last close to 60 minutes. I'll give now the floor to our CEO, Miguel Stilwell d'Andrade.
Thank you, Miguel. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for attending this results conference call. If we move into the presentation to talk about the first nine months. I think the first thing to highlight is that we had a strong EBITDA performance in this period. We had an increase of around 21% to EUR 3 billion. This is mainly as a result of the wind and solar capacity growth, good resource, so higher wind and solar, and higher selling prices. On the Electricity Networks, given the inflation impact and the tariffs updates and the ForEx in Brazil, there was also a good increase there in EBITDA. We also had an increased thermal activity.
Finally, on a negative note, we had the hydro production continuing very low in the third quarter of 2022, with the hydro shortfall increasing to around 3.3 terawatt-hours versus the expected for this period. At the net profit level, we had a 1% increase year-on-year to EUR 580 million. We saw an increase in financial costs, mostly due to Brazil, just given the interest rate hikes and effects. This was more than compensated by the inflation impact on EBITDA from networks that I just mentioned. Net profit was fully supported by our international operations, with net profit in Portugal staying at negative EUR 181 million in the nine months, strongly impacted by the hydro shortfall that I mentioned.
In the first nine months of the year, they were marked by good investment execution, so ramping up with gross investments amounting to approximately EUR 5.5 billion, out of which 96%, so practically all of it, focused on renewables and Electricity Networks. As of September, we have a record 4.3 GW of capacity under construction in the 15 markets, and we're also investing in networks, as you know, namely with transmission growth in Brazil. If we move on to the second Slide. Just to give you a note about the situation in Portugal in the 2023 electricity regulated tariffs proposal. As you know, this typically comes out mid-October, and then the final approval is in mid-December.
In this case, the regulator, ERSE, presented on the seventeenth of October an increase of just 2.8% for 2023, which given the current market context and energy prices throughout Europe, I think shows that this is an extremely resilient system. It's a moderate increase in tariffs and a reduction in system debt. As you know, the Portuguese system, why is this happening? The Portuguese system has a high penetration of renewables. These are remunerated mostly through a feed-in tariff, a fixed feed-in tariff, which is updated to inflation, and that's around EUR 90 per megawatt hour. Having these stable feed-in tariffs, basically this used to be a additional cost versus the wholesale price. It's now providing a surplus or a discount to the wholesale price.
When the wholesale price is expected to be around EUR 260 per megawatt hour for 2023. The system is in effect buying at EUR 90 per megawatt hour and then selling at 260. It generates tariff surplus to the Portuguese electricity consumers. The stability in the regulated prices for consumers is not being achieved at the expense of the increase in system debt, which as you can see, has decreased this year already from EUR 2.1 billion in 2020 to EUR 1.4 billion in the end of September of 2022. Overall, I think this just shows it's the value of a system with a high penetration of renewables and a stable regulatory framework.
We've actually talked about this, as a case study for many, well, with actually many policymakers throughout Europe, because it shows really the value of locking in these long-term, contracts and the resilience that it gives to the system. If we move on to the next Slide, we can talk about networks and networks in Portugal in particular. The proposal presented by us also discloses an update to the rate of return for the Portuguese Electricity Networks. The regulated revenues should increase around 2% to EUR 1.05 billion based on a preliminary rate of return of around 5%. It's an increase of 33 basis points versus 2022.
However, what I'd like to highlight is that this rate of return is indexed to the average 10-year Portuguese bond yield for the last 12 months until September of 2023, next year. The preliminary rate of return of 5%, 5.03%, considers an average Portuguese bond yield of 1.4%. Well, taking into account that the average bond yield for the first 20 days of October was at around 3.3%, this would result in a rate of return of 5.6%, as you can see on the graph on the right. Clearly room for upside in 2023 here. Finally, it's also worth mentioning that the Regulatory Asset Base and the TOTEX are inflation updated based on the GDP deflator.
For 2023, it was considered the average for the last 12 months, ending in June 2022 of around 1.5%. For the 2024 tariffs, there will be a clear upside since the IMF projects a 7.8% GDP deflator for 2022. Let's talk a little bit about Brazil. Here I'd like to talk about the positive macro trend we're seeing in Brazil. I had the opportunity to be there with the team a couple of weeks ago, and clearly seems to be countercyclical to what we are observing in Europe and the US. The electricity wholesale price, the PLD, has declined to around 60 BRL per MWh, which will have a positive impact on final consumer tariffs, and it reduces the regulatory pressure.
As you know, in Brazil, it's been raining a lot, and that's obviously had an impact on the decrease in the wholesale price. In relation to inflation, the Central Bank of Brazil has intervened in a very quick manner, and so that's. They ramped up their interest rates. That's led to a slight slowdown. We've actually seen deflation in the third quarter of 2022, so inflation seems to be under control now in Brazil. If this decline in inflation is persistent, then that would allow the central bank to start to cutting interest rates by the second half of 2023. Definitely countercyclical to what we're seeing in some of, for example, the U.S. and in Europe.
On our presence in Brazil, we've seen a strong business execution with a total investment of EUR 0.9 billion in the first nine months, focused on Electricity Networks and renewables, and this represents a 75% increase year-on-year. We're reducing our exposure to conventional generation as we're committed to in the Strategic Plan, mainly through the hydro disposal completed in August. We also releveraged, we recapitalized the thermal plant Pecém, which we announced in September, and that creates options to reach the goal of removing coal activity from the EDP Group revenue mix by the end of 2025. Overall, in euro terms, EBITDA in Brazil increased 48% year-on-year, and net profit increased 16% year-on-year. Going on to Slide 8. I'm talking about renewable growth in both Europe and in the U.S.
We've covered already quite extensively these two topics in the EDPR results call just on Wednesday. I'd just like to reinforce the unique long-term growth opportunity that we have because of the approval of the Inflation Reduction Act in the US. That gives us 10 years of visibility on the renewables tax credits framework and allows us to really plan ahead and develop a good, solid pipeline and set of projects. Regarding the REPowerEU, the measures to foster renewable growth, we've already seen developments in some Member States. You know, we talked about Germany, Portugal, Italy, as examples, where we are seeing simplification of some of the bottlenecks that exist to rolling out renewables.
Also in Europe, just to mention that the context of high prices is pushing European governments to take different price stabilization mechanisms and measures. Obviously, the idea is to provide stability of prices to consumers. In some cases, this is done through higher taxation of companies. Other cases it's through caps. I think the important point in which we like to stress and value is that there should be an attempt, and that's what the European Commission is doing, to try and create a transversal regulation, so to avoid fragmentation and to avoid creating more regulatory instability and uncertainty in each of the European countries. Now, obviously, there is an increased political intervention risk. I think we're all seeing that.
In the case of Romania and Poland, there's been some recent legislative drafts on price caps and windfall taxes which have raised some concerns. We hope to see some more balanced final outcomes towards the end of 2022. Again, in relation to Romania, I'd like to think that there would be positive developments there. Poland, I think, is still out in terms of uncertainty, so let's see what happens over the next couple of weeks. Let's go on to Slide 9 and talking about capacity additions. Over the last 20 months since we presented the Business Plan, we've already increased the secured capacity for the 25 period to around 11 gigawatts, 10.8 gigawatts, which represents 55% of the target.
We have 8.1 GW already installed or under construction, which is around 40% of the 20 GW capacity additions target. However, I think we've recognized that there are short-term challenges that mean that some projects are being transferred. Well, quite a few projects have been transferred from 2022 to 2023. On one hand, we have supply chain delays and the regulatory uncertainty in the U.S., which has created challenges for the import of solar panels in particular, and that's moved projects to 2023. Now we're expecting overall globally additions slightly above 2 GW in 2022. On the other hand, we expect that more than 4 GW will be added in 2023, of which 3 GW are already under construction. That's more than 4 GW.
We'll then go on updating over the next years to exactly what that number could be. We also see that the medium long-term renewables growth opportunity for 2024 and 2025 and beyond continues to be supported both by the REPowerEU and by the Inflation Reduction Act initiative. Definitely good for the medium long-term growth perspectives. If we move on to Slide 10. Talking about Asset Rotation strategy. Definitely continues to deliver value. We're talking about EUR 3.4 billion of asset rotation proceeds for the 2021-2023 period, so 40% of our EUR 8 billion target. We sold 2 GW in this period, 2021, 2022 so far, so below the 1.4 GW per year average that we assumed in the Business Plan for 2021-2023.
We've already achieved with that EUR 1 billion of total gains in this period, so an average of around EUR 500,000 per, or half a billion per year. Exceeding the target of the EUR 300 million that we had per year. Good execution there. Overall, we expect a good performance in terms of value creation. We've shown, you know, this time and time and time again, gains per megawatt at around half a million per megawatt, which is more than 2 times the guidance provided in the Business Plan. We're selling fewer megawatts, but over-achieving in terms of gains and in proceeds, which is obviously a good place to be.
As you know, some of those portfolios have been sold very recently, both in Italy and in Brazil, showing you know that clear value creation. Okay, let's talk about Iberia and 2023 and how we see since the electricity prices evolving and that hedging strategy. The first thing I'd like to highlight is that the generation and the energy management businesses were penalized in this first nine months of the year by the hydro shortfall. As you know, it's been very public. We've ended up with a short position in 2022 at a time when wholesale electricity prices were at all-time highs. The hydro shortfall, as I mentioned at the beginning of the call, was around 3.3 terawatt-hours below the long-term average in this period.
That resulted in an over-hedging, which caused higher sourcing costs on the energy management. As you know, the gas markets have also been quite volatile, and gas prices were high in the third quarter of 2022, so this implied an increase in the gas sourcing costs since we had to buy gas in the spot market, given some slightly lower volumes from long-term contracts. On the positive side, I think that's what justifies that we end up being in line with last year's net profit and above in terms of EBITDA. To mitigate the impact of the hydro shortfall in Iberia, and given the energy crisis in Europe, thermal generation has increased around 5.6 terawatt-hours year-on-year.
For this period, or for the next period, 2023 to 2025, we'll optimize the EDP's hedging strategy through a structural reduction of maximum hedged volumes, and so to reduce the over-hedging risks, that could happen. As you can see on the graph, electricity forward prices remain high for this period, 2023, 2024 and 2025. As such, we can expect an average selling price upside in the following years as the hedges roll over and the hedging strategy is optimized. Finally, just before I turn it over to Rui, on ESG, we continue stepping up on the green leadership position. We've had fantastic performance across the different metrics and on the ESG rankings.
In August, we issued our first Sustainability-Linked Loan, in which the cost is impacted by two ESG KPIs, a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions and the percentage of renewables installed capacity. Overall, the Green Bonds already represent 46% of EDP's outstanding bonds, with EUR 2.3 billion of Green Bonds issued just in 2022. In terms of recognition by top-tier institutions, we maintained our position in the top 10 weight of the S&P Global Clean Energy Index. I think that's important given the tighter requirements from that index, which ended up impacting other integrated utilities. We've maintained in the top 5% in the FTSE4Good Index, with an improvement in the score in September 2022. I think these are some of the key issues to highlight.
I mean, we've got other things on the Slides, but, for the sake of time, I'll stop there and turn it over to Rui, and I'll be back at the end. Thanks.
Thank you, Miguel. Good morning to you all. Going into EDP's financial performance for the nine months, I would like you to move to Slide 14, please. Recurring EBITDA increased 21% year-on-year to above EUR 3 billion in the nine months 2022. The recurring EBITDA for the wind and solar platform was up 62%, supported by higher average installed capacity. Of course, the strong recovery of wind resources that were in line with the long-term average and the improved average selling price. In Electricity Networks, recurring EBITDA increased by 20% year-on-year, mainly driven by the growth in Brazilian networks, and due to a positive annual tariff update and significant appreciation of the Brazilian Real. Just finally, on basis, EBITDA from Client Solutions, Energy Management, and Hydro decreased 32%.
This is of course penalized by the 3.3 TWh hydro production shortfall that Miguel already referred to, combined with high electricity Iberian Pool prices that reach an average of EUR 186 per MWh in the nine months this year. This was partly mitigated by a higher thermal generation in Iberia. I was going to explain the wind and EBITDA, sorry, wind and solar EBITDA performance, a 62% increase year on year. And then I was mentioning this is of course driven by the 10% growth in installed capacity in renewables. The fact that we have achieved and recovered the on the resources side, on the wind resources aligned with long-term average.
Of course, the contribution from higher selling prices of EUR 66 per megawatt-hour, that's 29% higher versus last year. Also the fact that we closed 3 deals, Asset Rotation deals in 2022, with an impact of EUR 264 million in gains. Moving to Slide 16, on the networks. The nine months this year continued to demonstrate a very strong performance of our networks platform. Recurring EBITDA increased by 20% year-on-year to EUR 1.1 billion. In Brazil, the EBITDA rose almost EUR 200 million to EUR 465 million. Of course, this is on the back of the inflation update on the tariffs. The electricity demand recovery also with a growing number of customers.
Lower losses from the sale of electricity volumes surplus in the wholesale market and the ahead of schedule integration of EDP Transmissão in our transmission activity in Brazil. Effectively favorable effects, impacts, and of course driven by the appreciation of the Brazilian Real. In Iberia, EBITDA decreased 2%. While in Spain, the positive impact from resilience recovery in the nine months last year was mitigated by the efficiency gains in Spain from the integration of Viesgo. In Portugal, OPEX increased given the recovery in the economic activity post-COVID. If we now move to Slide 19.
From an integrated perspective, Client Solutions and Energy Management and hydro is where we see the impact from the drought in Iberia and the recurring EBITDA decreasing EUR 207 million year on year. In Iberia, the results in these nine months were impacted by the extreme drought. Hydro resources in Portugal being 66% below average, and in a period of very high energy prices. This was partly mitigated by an increase on our thermal generation, that was 5.6 TWh higher, versus last year. In Brazil, EBITDA increased 14% in EUR terms, on a flattish performance in the local currency, but of course, impacted positively by the Brazilian Real appreciation versus EUR. Now on Slide 18, just diving a little bit on the generation and supply business in Iberia.
The third quarter EBITDA from generation and supply business was EUR 69 million. This is slightly higher than the average obtained from the previous two quarters. This was driven by, in one hand, Hydro volumes about 0.5 terawatt-hours below the expected volumes. On the other hand, Thermal volumes with a 2.4 terawatt-hours increase year-on-year, with good spreads both for coal and gas, and some higher thermal costs, namely due to high TTF gas prices, since we had to buy some quantities in the spot market. On Slide 19, as we move now into the financial costs. Excluding FX differences and derivatives, adjusted net financial interest increased EUR 188 million. That's a 55% increase versus last year, resulting in a 100 basis point increase in the average cost of debt.
This is explained by Brazil, which is more than doubling its financial costs to EUR 242 million, given the rising cost of the Brazilian Real denominated debt, which is indexed to inflation and represents 14% of our total debt financing. This increase impacted by inflation and FX first, is more than compensated at EBITDA level, as I mentioned before, after the tariff readjustment. Note that our average cost of debt in Brazilian reais increased from 9.7% to 13%. 9.7% to 13% in the nine months this year. Financial costs, excluding Brazil, increased only 20 basis points from 2.4% to 2.6%. Overall, interest-related costs increase was mainly driven by inflation and FX impacts on the Brazilian Real denominated debt. Now moving to Slide 20, an update on our financial debt.
In 2021 and 2022, EDP issued around EUR 4 billion through Green Senior Bonds and Hybrids, closing significant volumes of long-term financing under very attractive market conditions, which is especially important given today's market environment. In 2021, we issued a EUR 2 billion green hybrid bond at an average of 1.7%. In 2022, we issued around EUR 2.3 billion of Green Bonds, of which 1.8 billion in euros and around $0.5 billion in US dollars. Average cost, 3.3%. As of the nine months, we closed EUR 2 billion of pre-hedge interest rate for 2023 and 2024 refinancing needs. Thus, we are reducing the interest rate risk for these upcoming refinancing in over these two years.
The pre-hedge interest rate was closed at an average of 1.8% for euro and 2.6% for U.S. dollar. Regarding the debt structure, roughly 70% of the debt is contracted at fixed rates, of which 38% represented by Green Bonds and more than 50% of maturities scheduled post 2025. I think this places in a very strong liquidity position, as you can see on Slide 21. As of September, we had EUR 9.3 billion of available liquidity, of which EUR 3.5 billion of cash and equivalents and EUR 5.8 billion of available credit lines.
Additionally, as mentioned in the previous Slide, out of the 2.3 billion issued in 2022, 1 billion was issued in October 2022, 0.5 billion EUR and $0.5 billion, which puts us with EUR 10.3 billion of available liquidity. Through the graph, you can see that on the right-hand side of the Slide, there is this financial position that gives us confidence that our short and medium-term needs are covered beyond 2024. Finally, just a brief note on margin calls. We have been applying a conservative policy, thus reducing the exposure to energy price exchanges and therefore, as of September 2022, EDP has EUR 0.5 billion in cash calls from energy market derivatives.
On the Net Debt on Slide 22, increases to EUR 15.3 billion. This is impacted by a recurring organic cash flow of EUR 1.4 billion on the back of course, a higher EBITDA, but impacted by EUR 1.1 billion of temporary working capital due to higher commodity prices and higher financial costs. Accelerating, of course, the next expansion investments that amount to EUR 2.9 billion, following the growth in renewables and networks, the acquisition of Sunseap, EDP Goiás in Brazil, and investment in offshore through Ocean Winds. This of course also includes the positive impact of EUR 1.5 billion of proceeds from Asset Rotation. Annual dividend paid in April.
Finally, the effect of exchange rates, which has a negative impact of EUR 0.6 billion on the Net Debt due to appreciation of Brazilian Real and US dollar, which is impacting, you know, the end of the period. Just final note on net profit that amounts to EUR 512 million, just above the net profit for nine months 2021. This is mainly impacted by increased financial costs in Brazil, mostly driven by the FX and higher cost of debt indexed to inflation and higher non-controlling interest on the stronger performance, mostly from EDP Renewables. Again, thank you very much for your time today. I would now hand back to Miguel for closing remarks.
Thank you, Rui. Just before going to Q&A, I'd like to give you an update on our expectations for the future. For 2022, and I know this is for sure one of the questions you'd be asking me, so I'll answer it up front. We still expect recurring net profits to be above 2021, and we expect that would be driven by the continued strong performance in renewables, volume growth, good average selling prices, Asset Rotation execution. We expect a good performance also on networks to continue, namely with inflation updates and efficiency and also higher thermal generation. Now, obviously, we are living volatile times, a lot of uncertainty. I think we all know that on this call. There is a certain amount of uncertainty given Hydro volumes for the remaining part of the year.
I think the good news, look outside and it's cloudy, and October has been, I'd say above average, but still, who knows what November, December will be. At least we'll take the rain when it comes. We're assuming rain levels in line with the average for the fourth quarter, but with lower hydro generation versus the average, because we need to refill the current low reservoir levels, okay? One thing is rain, the other thing is generation and also storage. With respect to Business Plan execution, we're on track to deliver the 25 targets for renewable capacity additions. We've talked about this many times, but 55% of the 20 GW goal already committed. On the Asset Rotation, we've been doing particularly well, I think, front loading a good part of that with good execution in 2022.
We've already secured around EUR 3.2 billion, which represents more than 40% of the EUR 8 billion target in the 2021-2025 period. Finally, just to say that we are expecting to come back to the market in March 2023 to host a Capital Markets Day in which we would present updated strategic and financial targets for the periods reaching out to 2027, including, you know, the world has changed dramatically since last year on energy prices, regulatory frameworks, interest rates, FX effects, among others. The idea is to be able to update you and to provide more visibility on how we see the next couple of years going forward. With that, thanks for attending this quarter's results, and we can now move to Q&A. Thank you.
Thank you, Miguel. We go now to Q&A. We can start with the first question from Alberto Gandolfi from Goldman Sachs. Alberto, please go ahead.
Hi. Afternoon. Thank you for taking my questions. I think two out of three are an elaboration of what we discussed a couple of days ago. You know, using Miguel's words, the world has definitely changed an awful lot in the past 12 months. Considering that investments are clearly under acceleration, we can tell from the accounts and your words, the Net Debt/E BITDA on EDPR is actually going to continue to increase. Considering tighter credit conditions, higher cost of debt, how are you thinking about funding the CapEx on an ongoing basis? I know you're going to address that in March, but just like, you know, every day you need to take an investment decision.
I was wondering, is it any cheaper to use some equity right now rather than issuing, you know, 6.5% Green Bonds in the US? If so, would you accept to be diluted, or would you subscribe to? Are you keen, basically, to keep the same stake you have right now in EDPR in the next 12-24 months? The second question is on farm-downs. We have seen lots of capital chasing these assets. You clearly outperform. If we move into a world where cost of capital is 5%-6%, even if you were to achieve 200-300 basis points over WACC, do you worry that the exit multiples on farm-downs may deteriorate? If so, what would be the solution?
To invest a bit less or, you would have to actually, you know, rethink a little bit capital allocation in that case. Last question, just on 2023, because so much is going on between renewables, spreads, supply, energy management, if we assume, can you maybe tell us, give us some indication of unregulated activities. You know, a bit of a guidance on what should be a level for Client Solutions and Energy Management, and if you can drill down to that the achieved price in unregulated, how do you expect for next year. Thank you so much.
Okay. Thank you Alberto for the questions. In relation to the first one, I'd probably just reiterate what we've said. I mean, we, you know, when we went out to the market last year, we had a fully funded Business Plan and we continue to believe that that's the case. We've been doing well on the Asset Rotation, and we continue to execute on the portfolios. As I mentioned, you know, both the Brazilian and the Italian are very recent ones. They're July and, you know, late September. We're talking about portfolios that are already incorporated, not only an increase in interest rates, but also the higher energy prices. That's reflected in the good value creation that was achieved. Asset Rotation is going well. You know, we'd already raised equity last year.
We see higher energy prices going forward, which I think will flow through to the EBITDA and cash flow. I think that will also provide a good tailwind in terms of our ongoing results. I mean, we think that we are good on the balance sheet, and obviously there is short-term volatility on the balance sheet around Net Debt, and we can get more into that. It has to do with FX, it has to do with working capital, margin calls. A lot of these things will work themselves out, and we need to look at the medium-term ratios, and we need to be comfortable that they're there. I'll leave it at that.
Obviously, we will be back in March, and we'll have run a, you know, a more in-depth analysis on updating all of the variables by that time. On the farm-downs, obviously cost of capital goes up, but so do the PPA prices and, let's say, the returns that people are asking for. I think I gave you a couple of data points which are, for me, very interesting because they show in a very clear manner that there is a repricing of PPAs, there's a repricing of the returns to follow the increased cost of capital.
In the latest PPAs that I've been looking at and that we've closed or are closing, we're talking about, you know, still keeping the 1.4x IRR over WACC, and we're talking about, sort of 9% yields, cash yields in the US. We're talking about, you know, pretty rich projects which obviously reflect higher CapEx, they reflect the higher cost of capital. In any case, I think they do give us some comfort that we are continuing to create value with these projects and that we'll be able to do that sustainably going forward. I mean, we're in this to make money. You know, we are certainly repricing. I think the sector is repricing as a whole. I think that's, you know. There is still demand for these assets as we've also seen.
I think, I mean, obviously, we'll continue to monitor the situation. If things change, we'll obviously update you. But as I said, the latest data points that we have are the ones that I mentioned. In terms of 2023, Rui, I don't know if you want to provide some guidance on that.
Thank you, Miguel. Hi, Alberto. I mean, without providing specific guidance, but what would we expect effectively on improvement? I mean, everything else being equal, we should expect an average hydro year. We are seeing, of course, higher energy prices, in, you know, as we think about the hedging position. So we are at this point around 75% hedged, prices above 60, and, you know, we would be exposed to some of the upside, on the power markets. So I would say that, you know, again, on even if you levelize for a normal hydro year, I would expect a positive evolution on the these Client Solutions, Energy Management and Hydro.
Thank you so much.
You're welcome.
We can go to the next question from Arthur Sitbon from Morgan Stanley. Please, Arthur, go ahead.
Hello. Thanks for taking my question. The first one is on FFO to debt. I was wondering where you expect to end the year on that ratio, and how would that compare to the, I think, 19% threshold level that S&P looks at for your current credit rating. If you end the year below that level, I was wondering how fast you would expect to go back above that threshold. My second question is on debt maturity. My understanding is that you have around EUR 6 billion of maturity in 2023, 2024. I understand that you pre-hedged 2 of them. If I understand well, that leaves EUR 4 billion to refinance.
I was wondering how much room for maneuver do you have left to avoid expensive refinancing here on this EUR 4 billion. If you can repay part of that without issuing new debt, thanks to the cash you have on your balance sheet, or if not possible, I don't know, maybe because of the risk of further margin calls, for example. Thank you.
Okay. Thank you for the question. On the, you know, on the ratios, I think that, I mean, on Net Debt to EBITDA, I think that we should be ending slightly below where we are today. FFO to Net Debt, I would expect to see a small improvement. What I'm expecting is that Net Debt by year-end to be around EUR 15 billion. Of course, EBITDA also recovering and FFO also recovering a little bit. I mean, by the end of the year, of course, we are expecting, you know, the execution of the CapEx, the Asset Rotation proceeds, as I mentioned, we're getting cash flow also improving. I'm just considering a stable FX. You know, just from a math perspective, this would impact positively the ratio.
Yeah. I would say round about EUR 15 billion Net Debt and, you know, improvements from the current ratios, both on the Net Debt to EBITDA and the FFO to Net Debt. On the refinancing, I you know with the way we have been approaching this is, as you know, quite conservative. Throughout the year, we you know issue different forms of debt to be prepared for the refinancing needs on the 2023, 2024. And also with this pre-hedging, you know, we effectively locked in the you know the cost of funding for these EUR 2 billion of needs of refinancing. Until the end of the year, we are not expecting to go back to the market.
As we move into 2023, you know, we will see what is, you know, the best moment to go back, and then refinancing. I would highlight still that, yes, I mean, you know, whatever refinancing we may do in 2023 outside of the pre-hedging, there will be an impact from the mid-swap. But from a spread, we actually even saw the last Euro bond that we issued a small compression on the spread. I think that the market is, you know, providing a strong message also to, in what concerns the quality of the portfolio and the strategy going forward.
Okay. We can go to the next question from Jorge Guimarães from JB Capital Markets. Jorge, go ahead.
Good afternoon. I have two questions, if I may. The first one is still related to the cost of debt and related to the cost of the bonds issued in dollars at 6.3%, what would be the rationale of issuing at such a high cost? The second one is related to the evolution of working capital in Q4. I believe probably Rui also answered partially to it now, but what is your expected evolution of working capital in Q4, considering that TTF prices are going down? The final one, it's related to your full year guidance. Looking at the current guidance for EBITDA, financial cost and net income, it seems that you are guiding for close to consensus of EUR 0.86 billion.
Financial cost guidance or final cost consensus, sorry, it's EUR 0.68, and we are at EUR 0.58 currently at nine months. Should we assume that EBITDA should be above EUR 4.1 billion, that financial cost will be above EUR 0.68, and then we reach to the EUR 0.84-0.85 that your guidance is? Thank you very much, and sorry for the long question.
Jorge , thank you for the question. Let me address first the, I mean, the rationale for issuing debt. Again, as I mentioned before, we run this conservative policy that we wanna make sure that we are refinancing ahead, you know, well ahead of the maturity date, so that we don't get into any liquidity squeeze. As I mentioned in the presentation, even if considering also the issuance in October, we have more than EUR 10 billion of liquidity available. I guess that, you know, as we went through this year, we all know the importance of having strong liquidity and therefore be prepared for not only, you know, refinancing needs, cash calls, you know, this working capital impact and so on and so forth.
I just want to highlight the robustness of our position. As we think about issuing in bonds and in euros, I think it's important. I mean, of course, the 6.3% yield that we are paying in or coupon that we are paying in US dollars reflects effectively the mid-swap. I mean, the current US dollar yield. It typically has a slightly higher spread versus a straight euro issuance. But that is also reflecting not only the moment. I think that we were one of the first new issuance in the market after few weeks of being closed.
also the fact that the European entities, when issuing in US dollars, typically have a slightly higher premium. Having said that, it is also important to have a curve with our own data points in US dollars and then not being dragged by, you know, proxies by other issuers. You know, I think it's important to keep this. In any case, again, I highlight that, you know, when we also issue in euros, we have, you know, of course, it reflects the mid-swap, but we had a compression on the spread. Therefore, you know, it shows and our investors are looking to, you know, the robustness of our portfolio.
Okay. Jorge, on the guidance for the year. Yes, we are assuming, and we believe that the consensus EBITDA or our EBITDA for 2022 has room for improvement. I'd say there are a couple of factors there. On one hand stronger FX rates, which should imply a higher EBITDA, but of course, also higher depreciation and financial costs. More limited impact on the bottom line with a strong EBITDA, which then when it gets to the bottom line because of the other effect, is slightly more limited. In any case, we think it does have improvement. I'd say yes is the answer. Oh, yeah, I'm sorry. You had a question also on working capital in the fourth quarter, how we expect that to evolve. Rui, if you want to take that.
Yeah. I mean, we are expecting an improvement on the working capital, so that would have a positive impact on the Net Debt by year-end.
Many thanks.
Thanks, Jorge Guimarães. We have a next question comes from Olly Jeffery from Deutsche Bank. Olly Jeffery, please go ahead.
Thank you. Can you hear me okay?
Yep. Yeah, we can hear you.
Yeah. Great. Two questions from me, please. The first one is on Romania. Just wanting to understand that risk a little bit better. I understand that, you know, the current plan, you think that will change or hope that it would change. I'd just like to understand that based on the current plan, could this be a potentially triple-digit headwind heading into next year, assuming that it doesn't change? If it were to change, and I know it's a very aggressive tax, but do you think it could change because of what you're hearing from the Romanian government or just working under the assumption that it's so aggressive that, you know, similarly to how things changed in Spain, you would expect similar change in Romania?
The second question is just on the long-term contracts you have in the gas sourcing. You mentioned a shortfall on the call. Is this something that could be an ongoing issue, or do you see this as being more of a one-off? Just trying to understand if this is something we should expect to happen in other quarters going forwards or not. Thank you.
Okay. Thanks, Olly. Take the first one, and Rui if you want to take the second. In relation to Romania, what's the issue exactly? They're talking about implementing basically a clawback or extraordinary tax, where they tax 100% above 450 RON per MWh. Up to there, okay, that's fine. I mean, obviously we might not agree with it, but it is what it is. The question is whether it then includes hedges or not in that calculation, in other words, when you do that clawback. Obviously, we have hedges in many different countries. It's the way we manage risk. What the European Commission mentions is that in the implementation of any of these sort of clawbacks or caps or other things, you should take into account the hedges.
The emergency ordinance, which was published in September, did not include the hedges in that calculation, which would mean that we would be taxed on profits which were not effectively being realized. That's basically the description of the risk. They're looking at changing that, and the feedback we've heard from many different stakeholders in Romania. It could be a triple-digit impact were that to occur, you know, where was this change not to happen. But as I say, our expectation at the moment is that it will happen, and they will correct it. But yes, if otherwise, it could be a three-digit impact, which we would need to recognize at some point. Rui, I don't know if you want to comment.
Yeah. On the gas. Yes. Just, yeah, I mean, I think it's public information. Trinidad and Tobago has been experiencing some operational, you know, issues. So the calendar and the volumes, you know, they are not being at 100%. I mean, it's something that then we basically go out and buy spot to make sure that we compensate and we, you know, fulfill our obligations. It. That's it. I mean, it's more operational, really.
Thank you very much.
Just to be clear, I think this is, you know, as I said, it's more operational, and the information that we have is this, you know, not necessarily going to continue over time. Again, it's operational.
Thanks. That's clear.
Okay. Maybe I will take now some questions from the web. The first one from José Ruiz from Barclays. Newsflash that you pulled out of selling Jari and Cachoeira Caldeirão in Brazil. What are your intentions around the generation assets in Brazil?
Okay. In relation to generation, the hydro, as we mentioned in Brazil, we would look at exiting at some point. That's been clear. We already announced the sale of Mascarenhas at the end of August. There are two other hydro plants where we own a 50% stake, which is Jari and Cachoeira Caldeirão, and we are studying the best form of divestment of those two plants. To continue with the strategy of reducing the hydro portfolio there. We want to do it obviously in the right conditions and with an adequate profitability and remuneration for those assets. As I said, Mascarenhas is done. That was one that we controlled fully.
The other two are 50%, or we have 50% stakes, and we'll be looking to do it in the right conditions.
Okay. We have also a question from Ahmed Farman from Jefferies. Please, could you remind us on your 2023, 2024 and 2025 hedging positions in Iberia, either in percentage terms or maybe even in volumes hedged?
Okay. I n relation to this, I'd say that, and I think this is information we've sort of provided, 75% of the base load volumes are currently hedged for 2023 at a price above 65 EUR per MWh. For the period 2024-2025, it's much lower percentage that's hedged, it's 35% at around 65 EUR per MWh. 2023 above that. For 2024, 2025, around that 65.
Okay. The other questions, most of them have already been answered, so I'll pass now to Miguel for closing remarks.
Perhaps I'd just say the following. It's obviously been a tough year in many respects, you know, with the hydro shortfall and the coal. But on the other hand, I think we've had a absolutely fantastic performance on, certainly on the renewables front, on Brazil, on the networks. And that really has allowed us to more than mitigate the impact. We end up actually with an increase in EBITDA, which as I mentioned a little while ago, we expect will continue to, you know, to grow up to the end of the year. I think strong performance this year, strong EBITDA performance. And over the three quarters, we started off, as you remember, with the relatively bad first quarter, but we've managed to recover that and are actually slightly up on last year for net income.
I'd just like to highlight the investment program. We are accelerating the investment program in line with our Business Plan. Almost 100% of that in renewables and in distribution, so very much focused on the energy transition. We are doing particularly well, I think, on the Asset Rotation strategy, and that gives us good confidence in terms of the financing of our Business Plan. In any case, we will be coming back to the market in a couple of months. We are looking at all the different variables, all the different parameters to put together, let's say, some new guidance and new estimates for this next period, 2023 to 2027. I'd say the tailwinds are definitely very positive.
I mean, we look at the Inflation Reduction Act, we look at the REPowerEU, that's all, let's say, providing a good support to the sustained growth. We are seeing the repricing of projects to take into account the higher CapEx and the higher cost of capital, so the higher energy prices are definitely very supportive of the continued investment in that. It's obviously very important to have regulatory stability and to have clear rules. I think the U.S. has that. There are still issues around transmission, et cetera. You know, for sure it will be a bumpy ride, but we can see some good prospects there. In Europe, I think there are also good prospects here. I mean, we need to simplify the licensing and permitting, but that said, structurally, things are very much heading in the right direction.
Looking forward to speaking to you again in a couple of months and giving you more visibility on how we see the next couple of years. Thank you. Take care.