Hello everyone. Welcome to UPM quarters 3 2025 results webcast. I'm Massimo Reynaudo, I'm the CEO of UPM and here with me today is Tapio Korpeinen, the CFO. The third quarter brought some temporary clarity to the terms of the international trade, but significant uncertainty remained and consumer demand stayed subdued. Our businesses in Advanced Materials and in the Decarbonization Solutions segment improved their third quarter performance compared to the previous year. On the other hand, the Renewable Fibers and Communication Papers businesses were impacted by the unusual volatility in their operating environments. In quarter three, comparable EBIT was EUR 153 million, up 21% compared to the previous quarter, but down 47% compared to last year's corresponding period. The EBIT margin was 6.7%. During the quarter, we continued to take decisive actions to further strengthen our competitiveness.
Our focus has been and is on improving performance, cash flow generation, and the strength of our balance sheet. I will come back and tell you more about these actions during the presentation. First, let's look at the macroeconomic environment we operated in in quarter three and let's look at Renewable Fibers to start with. As you may remember, the pulp market prices decreased during the peak of the trade uncertainty in quarter two and starting from China in quarter three, pulp sales prices remained low, impacting our quarter three earnings. As a positive sign during the quarter, the pulp demand normalized in China and hardwood pulp prices increased somewhat from the bottom. In Finland, wood costs reached their highest level in quarter three when then wood market prices started eventually to show the first signs of decline.
Communication paper markets remained weak in Europe and in North America, the demand in Europe in quarter three was 7% lower compared to one year before. In the U.S., the new import tariff levels were finally set during the quarter, bringing some clarity and allowing the customers to properly plan their needs again and for us, restoring the possibility to properly plan and optimize production and shipments. Having said that, the general uncertainty continued to weigh on the business sentiment and ultimately on the level of the demand. Turning the page, in the Advanced Materials segment, the demand of labeling materials remained relatively resilient. In the adhesive materials specifically, the demand was seasonally low, lower than quarter two. When we look at the full year base, the market continued to grow even though some signs of a slowdown were visible. In the U.S.
the demand for Plywood was stable and I will tell you some more about this business shortly in Decarbonization Solutions. The market situation in general improved when it comes to the energy business. In fact, the electricity consumption in Finland continued to be robust and the electricity prices increased from the comparison quarters. In the same way, the prices of renewable fuels continue to recover, supported also by an improving demand. At this point, I will hand it over to Tapio for some more analysis on our results.
Thank you, Massimo. Let's start here with our results by the business area. Fibers and Communication Papers were the business areas that reported a lower EBIT compared to last year, whereas Adhesive Materials, Specialty Papers, Plywood, Energy, and Biofuels all improved their EBIT year-on-year. First on Fibers. As Massimo said, pulp prices were very low in the third quarter, decreasing 11% sequentially from the second quarter or 23% from last year's third quarter. Price development resulted in a significantly lower EBIT than last year and slightly lower EBIT compared to the second quarter at the cycle low prices. Fibers South, the competitive pulp platform of ours in Uruguay, reported an EBIT of EUR 80 million, which is equal to an EBIT margin of 22%.
Fibers North, that is the pulp and timber operations in Finland, reported an EBIT loss of EUR 37 million in the third quarter, during which the Kaukas pulp mill was down for maintenance and for extended production curtailment. The impact of this was approximately EUR 30 million on the quarter. This means that at cycle low pulp prices and peak level of wood costs, UPM Fibers North was slightly negative in EBITDA and positive in EBITDA excluding the Kaukas shutdown. Communication Papers deliveries were stable from the second quarter, but 13% lower than last year. In the third quarter, the average paper price in euros decreased by 1% compared to the second quarter and 6% year-on-year. Fixed costs decreased in Communication Papers. EBIT decreased from last year but improved slightly from the second quarter. Sequentially, Adhesive Materials and Specialty Papers achieved increased deliveries and lower costs compared to last year.
Both increased their EBIT year-on-year and showed resilient performance from the previous quarter. Plywood reported solid results with normal production now and increased deliveries. Energy had a good quarter, benefiting from increased electricity market prices and from successful production optimization in the volatile electricity market. Our average sales price for electricity increased 17% from last year or 12% from the second quarter. On this page, you see our EBIT development by earnings driver. As you can see here, the main headwind in the third quarter were the sales prices on the left-hand side. Lower sales prices impacted the third quarter results by about EUR 190 million compared with last year. Sales prices decreased most notably in Fibres and Communication Papers. Lower variable costs had a significantly smaller positive impact. Changes in delivery volumes were neutral on group level.
While deliveries increased for pulp, adhesive Specialty Papers, Plywood, and pulp at higher fuels, there was a decrease in deliveries in Communication Papers. Fixed costs increased mainly due to the maintenance shutdown at the Kaukas mill. On the right-hand side, sales prices had a negative impact also compared with the second quarter mainly due to the low pulp prices. Variable costs decreased for most categories compared to the second quarter, but wood costs still increased. However, following the earlier wood market price development with the usual lag, fixed costs decreased from the second quarter due to lower maintenance activity and also due to seasonal factors. Our operating cash flow was EUR 218 million in the third quarter and our net debt decreased by EUR 92 million from the second quarter and was EUR 3.218 billion in total. At the end of the quarter, net debt/EBITDA ratio was 2.36x .
While we see our financial standing as solid, this is somewhat above our policy limit of 2x net debt/EBITDA and therefore obviously we aim to bring the net debt/EBITDA back to below 2x level in a timely manner. Massimo will shortly discuss the various actions we are taking to improve our profitability. In addition, we are pursuing working capital release and improving our cash conversion working capital efficiencies to support our cash flow. Our outlook is unchanged from the previous quarter. We expect our second half 2025 comparable EBIT to land in the range of EUR 425 to EUR 650 million. Our fourth quarter performance is supported by the timing of the annual energy refunds in Communication Papers. The amount of refunds is likely to be similar or slightly smaller than last year.
It is also likely that there would be a forest fair value increase in the fourth quarter which could be of a similar magnitude or smaller than what we had last year. Fibres performance in the short term continues to be impacted by pulp prices in the fourth quarter. We have actually already completed in the month of October the plant maintenance shutdown at our Fray Bentos mill in Uruguay which will have an impact on the quarter result of similar magnitude or scale as was the case in Kaukas, about EUR 30 million in Advanced Materials, businesses, and energy. We expect resilient performance to continue. I'll hand back over to Massimo for some comments on our actions and direction from here.
Good, thank you Tapio. We continue to take decisive actions to improve our competitiveness and performance. As I said earlier, most of our businesses have a significant organic growth potential that can be captured with targeted, limited, and CapEx-efficient investments. That's what we will be looking into. Finally, or in parallel, we continue to develop a portfolio of world-class businesses. Let me illustrate now the most characterizing initiatives we are implementing segment by segment. Let's start with Communication Papers. In this business, efficient capacity utilization is critical, and in a weaker market, we plan to close down paper production at the Kaukas mill in Finland and at the Ettringen mill in Germany by the end of the year. Together, these two closures will reduce our paper capacity by 570,000 tonnes, or 13% of our current capacity.
This initiative will lead to a combined reduction in annual fixed costs of EUR 70 million. With these measures, we will maintain our competitiveness and future performance. In October, we also sold the earlier closed down Plattling paper mill site in Germany, and this will contribute to Communication Papers cash flow in quarter four. Let's move to UPM Fibres now. Tapio has anticipated it, but given the significance of the UPM Fibres business and the distinct characteristic of the business in Finland and in Uruguay, we have decided to provide some additional transparency here. We introduce today the notion of Fibers South to refer to our fibers platform in South America and Fibers North to refer to the fibers platform in the Nordics. As a first step, today we indicated the EBIT level for the two parts.
Next, we will start providing additional financial information for the two parts on a regular basis starting in quarter one next year. Meanwhile, when it comes to Fibers South, 2025 is the first full year of production at nominal capacity for the Paso de los Toros pulp mill and also the first full year of operating at full capacity for the supporting logistic network. The pulp prices are very low, as Tapio mentioned earlier. Despite that, Fibers South reported an EBIT of EUR 80 million during the quarter and a margin of 22%, which is indicative of the competitiveness of this platform. Despite the weak market conditions for year on, improvements will continue. By 2027, the expanded plantation areas we have in Uruguay will increasingly reach our vesting maturity, enabling us to optimize the wood sourcing and the inbound logistics.
Further, self-sufficiency will increase and inbound transportation distance will decrease, therefore reducing cost. To give it a scale, in the beginning of this year, 2025, we envisioned a cost reduction of some $25-$30 per ton compared to 2024 in Uruguay. We are well on track to achieve this this year, but we believe that thanks to this further and ongoing optimizations, we will be able to provide roughly a similar improvement by 2027, of course, all the rest remaining equal. Beside that, we will continue to pursue growth in a CapEx efficient way to further the bottlenecking when it comes to the other platform and in Finland, Fibers North was in a slightly negative EBIT territory in quarter three. Excluding the Kaukas shutdown, wood costs reached their highest level in the summer before starting to decrease.
Pulpwood market prices on average decreased some 5% in quarter three compared to quarter two. In this situation, we took measures to adjust the Finnish pulp operations to the market situation. We took two months of downtime at the Kaukas mill during quarter three and we will take two weeks of downtime at the Pietarsaari mill in quarter four. These measures will allow us to optimize our wood sourcing and avoid the most expensive wood. The benefits of these actions will be fully visible in the P&L when the purchased wood volumes will be consumed, which means during quarter four or the early part of next year. Another significant action we implemented in this space is the long-term strategic partnership we agreed with Versowood and that we announced in September. Versowood is the largest private producer and processor of sawn timber in Finland. The deal is beneficial for both parties.
For us, it will strengthen the supply of pulpwood and chips and improve the cost efficiency of our wood sourcing. Moving to another segment in Advanced Materials, as we have characterized it before, our performance as being resilient during 2025, Adhesive Materials has reduced fixed costs and streamlined its product portfolio significantly. Earlier we announced the closure of the Kaltenkirchen factory in Germany and the relocation of the production to lower cost locations. In quarter three, we announced plans to discontinue the production in Nancy in France in order to increase further production efficiencies and competitiveness. At the same time, and in line with the strategy communicated earlier on, the business continues to seek focused growth in higher margin and higher growth areas. In this direction go the investments announced in the US, in Malaysia, and in Vietnam.
In parallel, the business continues to build its positions on the graphic space following the recent acquisitions. When it comes Specialty Papers, there too, efficiency measures have been implemented aimed at reducing cost in China and protecting the competitiveness in that area. From a commercial standpoint, the business continued to develop solutions being paper-based and alternative to plastics for the growing segment of flexible packaging end users. In Plywood, we initiated a strategic review to assess options for maximizing the long-term potential of the business. The review includes a range of possible outcomes, including potential separation from UPM through a divestment, a partial demerger, or an initial public offering. The aim is to determine the best path forward for the business and for the value creation for UPM's shareholders. Let me spend a couple of minutes to tell you a bit more about this business.
First of all, Plywood is a very good business. It has a strong market position in the mid to high end market segments where it operates in Europe, and in the liquid natural gas segment it holds a market leading position globally. The business success is built on a number of specific strengths: a competitive premium offering generated from four spruce mills and three birch mills, the top tier quality of the products manufactured there, a strong and reliable customer base, a strong brand, extensively recognized in the industry, and unmatched service capabilities. Thanks to six warehouse hubs and more, the Plywood business has successfully provided good profitability and cash flow in all the different economic cycles of the past.
On the other hand, despite all of these, and despite the fact the UPM Plywood business is the scale of a mid-sized company in Finland, it is the smallest of the UPM businesses and as such it competes for focus and resources with much larger businesses. For these reasons, we want to assess whether on a different setup, acting on a standalone base or being part of another entity will enable even better results. Therefore, this is the rationale for the strategic review, and this review is expected to be conducted and concluded by the end of 2026. Finally, we come to the Decarbonization Solutions, and here we have unique solutions, all offering our customers ways to decarbonize their businesses in energy.
We have 12 TW hours of CO₂-free electricity, which make us the second biggest producer in Finland, consisting of reliable base load of nuclear power and flexible supply of hydropower. This mix allows us to maximize the value on a highly volatile, weather-dependent electricity market. On the other dimension of growth, we have the capability to supply CO₂-free electricity to a market where the demand is growing due to the electrification of the industrial production, heating, moving away from biomass use, and numerous data center related projects and road transportation in biofuels. Our short-term focus has been on improving performance and getting it back to profit after a challenging 2024. Here, we have made good progress this year in terms of growth. We are planning CapEx-efficient debottlenecking at the Lappeenranta refinery. Simultaneously, we are proceeding with the qualification of sustainable aviation fuels.
Last but not least, the startup of our groundbreaking biochemical refinery in Leuna, in Germany, is proceeding in the first of its three core processes. We have successfully achieved stability after having started production during the summer, and the production levels are now on an industrial scale. The sale of the first commercial products, which are industrial sugars and lignin-based products, are expected to start during quarter four, followed by glycol sales in the first half of 2026. In line with earlier indications, full production and positive EBIT is expected during 2027. To sum up, the market environment during the third quarter has proved to be challenging, but in this environment, our differentiated business portfolio has ensured resilient performance. Our Advanced Materials and Decarbonization Solutions improved our performance compared to one year before. Fibres and Communication Papers were impacted by the unusual volatility in their business environment.
Most of the business have a growth profile and significant growth potential that can be captured with targeted investment and limited extra CapEx needs. This includes but does not limit to the entry in the new promising Biochemicals business. While we work to capture this potential, we continue to work on actions to improve profitability, cash flow, and the strength of our balance sheet. This ends the prepared part of the presentation and we are ready for your questions.
If you wish to ask a question, please dial key five on your telephone keypad to enter the queue. If you wish to withdraw your question, please dial six on your telephone keypad. The next question comes from Ioannis Masvoulas from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.
Yes, hello, Massimo and Tapio. Thank you very much for the presentation. Two questions from my side, the first on UPM Fibres. You talked about the Nordic mills being EBIT negative in the quarter even if we adjust for the Kaukas maintenance? Given this weak profitability and market backdrop, would you consider more drastic measures that could perhaps include permanent curtailments? Are you looking to wait for a recovery in the cycle, especially now that the pulpwood costs have started to come down? The second question related to the above, can you give us an indication on the tailwind you expect from the lower pulpwood prices in Q4 this year and Q1 next year? If you can also remind us on earnings sensitivities around wood price changes, that would be much appreciated. Thank you.
Okay, I'll pick the first part of your question, Ioannis, and leave the other part to Tapio. As it was commented during the earlier part of this call, we had a negative EBIT in quarter three in Finland, but there are a few elements to be considered there, or three main elements. One is the impact of the maintenance shut and then the additional shut we had on top of that. The other element is that wood prices were at their peak and pulp prices were very low. Time will tell if it's a bottom, but they were surely very low. There was a very specific coincidence of elements all impacting the profitability.
As we have commented on a number of occasions before, our Finnish operations have always been profit positive so far and time will tell in the future, but we run very efficient assets and the actions we have taken during the quarter, namely prolonging the stop of the mill in Kaukas to avoid buying more expensive wood, but also to improve wood availability into the next quarter, is definitely going to be benefiting the performance going forward. The same way, the agreement reached with Versowood will aim to improve on another of the critical elements about wood in Finland, which is availability. As part of the deal, we will be providing Versowood logs and capacity. That is what they are interested in. We're going to be receiving more pulpwood and chips, which is what we are in demand of.
On the base of this, we are working to maintain and improve the profitability of the current platform, and the current platform has always been delivering performance across the cycle. On such base, any stop or discontinuation of capacity will just have a negative impact on results. That's the plan we have been working upon. Of course, in the future, the situation will depend on the circumstances in the future, but we are working hard on the circumstances we control through what I said.
Maybe if I'll comment on your sort of second question. As Massimo already pointed out, we saw pulpwood prices peaking during the summer and a notable drop in the market price taking place. Having said that, it's good to note that there is a certain sort of seasonality in the sort of market prices typically for wood in Finland. It's perhaps early to directly sort of extrapolate too much from this sort of shorter term movement here. I would say that against the backdrop of what is happening in the Nordic markets in general, this is perhaps an indication in a sense that we have seen the kind of a peak in the trend, so to speak. There is a lag given the sort of cycle in our sourcing of wood, the mix of wood, including pulpwood that we need for operations in Finland.
Therefore, would not expect any material impact yet of these kinds of movements in the fourth quarter, nor really yet in the first quarter in any big way. Typically there's about a six months time period before this sort of market price changes start to materialize in the cost of wood consumed in the pulp mills in a bigger way.
Thank you both, that's very clear. Just to follow up, anything you could provide on sensitivities for EBIT or EBITDA on a, let's say, 10% Change in wood prices?
That sensitivity we don't have.
Okay, thanks again. Thank you.
The next question comes from Lewis Merrick from BNP Paribas, please go ahead.
Hi, thanks for taking my questions. Leuna Biochemical refinery project concluding, do you expect CapEx to be lower in 2026? Can you give a rough indication of what you expect at this stage? I've just got one more follow up.
Yes, definitely CapEx will be lower in 2026, maybe in 2027 as well. We have commented also in the past that after a big investment cycle, now it is the time to focus on extracting the value from these investments, whether it is Paso de los Toros or Leuna. At this point in time we do not have any other significant project that will require CapEx on a larger scale for the next couple of years. When it comes to the CapEx needs for next year, we have not defined them yet. Just to give you a broad indication, our, let's say, maintenance CapEx level in normal condition is in the EUR 250 million per annum level. You can put few tens of millions for potentially, let's say, efficiency improvement, margin enhancement initiatives on top of that. That would be, broadly speaking, the scale going forward.
For more accurate indications you need to wait the beginning of next year.
That's crystal clear. Thank you. Just on bridging items into Q4 to sort of reach or surpass your H2 guidance, you mentioned the forestry revaluations similar to prior. Can you just put some numbers to that, and then similarly on the energy refunds and any other sort of moving parts from Q3 into Q4? Thank you.
As mentioned, basically this forest asset value change here in Finland primarily, then last year we had a bit more than EUR 100 million and I said we obviously will see the exact figure as we sort of run the numbers during the remaining months of the year, remaining quarter. Anyway, at the scale or below what we had last year would be a likely outcome from that. Energy refunds again, a bit similar comparison there, that we have had these energy refunds in the fourth quarter of the Communication Papers as we did last year as well. This year is likely to land slightly below the level of last year.
Are there any other items to call out?
Nothing else other than I pointed out that we have the maintenance shutdown that was planned and actually has been completed as planned in Fray Bentos mill in Uruguay, and that was done in the month of October.
Thank you very much.
The next question comes from Linus Larsson from SEB, please go ahead.
Many thanks for taking my questions to everyone. Maybe a follow up on the previous question on the Q4 Q3 bridge on fiber. Specifically, what's the aggregate impact of maintenance and market related downtime in the fourth compared to the third quarter? Is that pretty much the same? Is it easing or is it worsening in your opinion?
As I said, similar in a sense that the Fray Bentos shutdown is about, let's say, same scale, EUR 30 million. That's what we had from the Kaukas shutdown in the third quarter.
Sure. If you add to that the market related downtime at Kaukas and Pietarsaari respectively, is it pretty much the same Q4 as in Q3 altogether,
Nothing to add.
Okay. Moving on to biofuels, I didn't see you disclosing the split of other operations. Maybe you did and I missed it. Could you maybe help us pinpointing biofuels even in the third quarter and maybe if you have any guidance on the fourth quarter as to where biofuels.
What we did point out when commenting, the second quarter result was that we had a breakeven result as far as biofuels is concerned during the quarter from our own kind of actions, from the cost and efficiency volumes side, and support from the market. We continued at the same level of profitability now in the third quarter, breakeven, and again working on our own efficiencies. As you perhaps have seen, market prices are recovering in the biofuels market, and that's a short-term sort of market situation tightening. We would expect some support from there. Obviously, not happy at that level as such. Look to improve further into next year. Again, one factor that will impact demand, especially for the kind of advanced biofuels that we are producing, is the country-level implementation of the RED III Directive .
Excellent, that's very helpful. Maybe one final question, and we touched upon it already in the call, but when it comes to Fibers North operations in Finland, you made a loss of EUR 37 million. To what extent did you have support help included in that? Negative EUR 37 million from positive revaluations.
There are no revaluations in the Fibers North because, as perhaps you remember, the Finnish forests are included in our Other segment in terms of our reporting segments.
Perfect. Thanks for clarifying that. Thanks.
The next question comes from Robin Santavirta from DNB Carnegie. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much. Two a bit more technical questions for me. First of all, in terms of the revaluation of the Finnish forest assets which you book in the other operations, it looks like they will be quite sizable again this year. I guess the gross impact will be more than EUR 150 million on an annual basis in 2025. As I understand there's three components here. There's interest rates, there's net growth, and then the price of wood raw material. The key point now probably is the higher wood raw material prices, that is supporting material, the adjusted EBITDA and the Forest Revolution 2025 as it did in 2024 and going into 2026. A bit color would be appreciated to understand how you look at the forest revaluation of the Finnish for because now we have the pricing coming now quite, quite clearly.
Should we expect the revaluation gain to be much smaller? A bit smaller, same level? Any color on that would be appreciated.
Yes. Of course, let's say time will tell, and of course you have to kind of remember in a sense that on one hand the result and the value of our forest has been supported by the price increase here in Finland. Obviously, it has been a headwind for our pulp mills and sawmills here in Finland. If that kind of tide turns, it will work the other way around. Perhaps then the result, obviously, because everything is done on a market price basis for the forest operation, then will be impacted if market price is lower for wood, but then it's for the benefit of the sawmills and the pulp mills here in Finland. Obviously, that's how it works in our business model on the price impact.
It is correct to consider in a sense what is happening in the wood market in the short term when setting the price expectations in the valuation model. What we have in there to begin with is a sort of management view on kind of the longer term trend since we are running the valuation model for multiple decades here. In that sense, there is a kind of level change as such, but the assumption in terms of what is the direction of sort of wood price in our model than otherwise is kind of assessed separately. Meaning that if wood price goes up, it doesn't mean that we assume that it goes up from here to eternity and vice versa. There will be some change obviously if this trend sort of starts to go to the other direction, perhaps not as dramatic as one might think. As you said, this sort of other factors, the growth in the forest vis-à-vis harvest levels, interest rates, will sort of play a role as well. Early to sort of anticipate anything there.
Yeah, there is. I obviously understand that what you lose there on price of wood you gain in the industrial operations. That I appreciate. It's just that it's quite sizable, more than EUR 150 million positive. If it would only be, say, $50 million positive or EUR 25 million positive in 2026, it's quite a big delta. Perhaps you get a bit more color as well when you guide then for next year. The other question I have is related to Leuna and again a technical question. I'm just keep pushing on the depreciation estimate because it's still EUR 1 billion in investments of quite sizable depreciation. I can only see in the other, other segments, low depreciations, even lower than last year. Is this something that we should expect now as of Q4? Is it as of next year? Any color on the size of those?
Thanks. Basically, when we start, I mean whether it's this plant or pulp or otherwise, when we have finished an investment project, we start commissioning and eventually when we start to have deliveries to customers, then the depreciation starts. Not meaningful this year yet, but will then start in the beginning of next year when now the customer deliveries are starting to take place.
Tapio, can I just try. Is it EUR 40 million a year or something in lines of that? The line of depreciation ?
In that scale yes.
Thank you very much.
The next question comes from Andrés Castaños-Mollor from Berenberg. Please go ahead .
Hi. Hello. My first question is on the strategic partnership with Versowood. It sounds very promising because we're putting together the largest consumer with one of the largest solo consumers. Financially, what do you expect to get in terms of synergies? What do you think is a reasonable assumption here? Also, operationally, can you help me visualize how and why the synergies are generated?
I risk here to repeat myself a little bit, but when it comes to the financials, we don't disclose them. When it comes to how the benefits will materialize in this exchange of things, which one as in excess and the other is in need of, it's what I was saying before, thanks to DSDL, which by the way is subject to merger control authorities and still needs approval just to line things properly down. Should that happen, we will be having access to more wood chips and pulpwood. To remember the importance of that, we have quoted it a number of times, the situation in Finland to be made challenging for pulp making because of wood prices. Also, prices don't solve the problem of insufficient wood available. Through this deal we will have more access to something which is key and critical for our operations.
That is the value that comes from this deal. Yeah. Beyond the numbers. Don't know if I have answered your question.
It is helpful. Thank you. Can I ask a couple of more clarifications, please? Did you say that the time for the end of the review, strategic review for Plywood, was 2026? End of 2026. Did I get that right?
Yes.
Thank you. Okay, clear. The other one is for Leuna. Right. You mentioned industrial sugars, and I was wondering if industrial sugars is a product that you would aim to sell in the future or if this is something that you're just selling temporarily as you're not finalizing the whole process to generate alcohols. Thank you.
Yes, it's a very good question and it's a very good observation as well. This is most of an intermediate product that we are getting, which has some market value. The full value capture imagined in the business case will come when the plant will be in full operation and these intermediate products will be turned into finite products, being either functional fillers or glycols or products in this family. There is some value in this, but the full value capture, and we'll start to capture it, to be clear, by the end of this year. The full value capture will start with the plant in full operation.
Ofcourse, that's helpful. Thank you very much.
You're welcome.
The next question comes from Cole Hathorn from Jefferies . Please go ahead.
Good afternoon. Thanks for taking my questions. I'd just like to start with Communication Papers and Specialty Papers. I'd just like to understand the key deltas into 2026. If you were to talk about what could be the positives into 2026, could you talk me through the moving parts of how you see it? If I think about Communication Papers, it's the EUR 70 million fixed cost savings from capacity closures in Specialty Papers. I'm just wondering how you see that market considering Asia Fine Papers is quite challenging and the release liner and labels businesses, there seems to be some smaller players out there challenging. I'm just wondering what are the moving parts into 2026 that you see? Thank you.
Okay, let me try to answer the question, but let me separate it in two because the two businesses are pretty different profiles. If we start with Communication Papers first, one element is represented by the market and we don't know what will be the level of the market demand next year. Nobody knows it, but in this market, demand has declined for the last 20 years. We can expect the decline continuing next year. That is a negative if you want. At the same time, the market this year or in the first part of this year has been heavily disrupted by the uncertainty that came as a consequence of the trade war. Let's not forget there's been significant uncertainty, for example in the U.S. around whether there were tariffs, who was hit by the tariffs, the amount of the tariffs, when they would apply and so on.
That has made it extremely difficult for the players there to properly plan ahead and that had impact across the entire value chain. Last but not least, again in quarter two, the demand of certain types of grades in the U.S. dropped down significantly during the period of the strongest tensions between the U.S. and China because imports from China were basically stopped and, you know, catalogs were not printed and so on and so forth. What I'm just trying to say is that if we want to compare 2026- 2025, which I believe is what you are kind of trying to get some color about, it's probably fair to assume a demand decline.
It's also probably fair to assume, at least if things stay as they are right now, some stabilization of the flow of the products which will allow the industry to operate in a better way because operational efficiency is important. This is about talking about the market. When we talk about ourselves, yes, you pointed it up. The actions we are taking and reducing capacity significantly, 13% of our capacity, will deliver direct fixed cost saving improvement but also indirect benefit from improved operating rate.
So yeah, those are some elements to consider for Communication Papers when it comes to Specialty Papers. Yeah, the situation in China is, I wouldn't know to characterize it, but surely the demand for those products not being strong leads to some pressure. As for how this will play into next year, it is way too soon to try to extrapolate. A lot will depend on the downstream of businesses and ultimately how consumer demand will evolve. It has been pretty muted during quarter three as we have indicated. Let's see. Maybe let's also see in quarter four, which is typically a seasonality quarter for that business. That will give us a better sense and feel about the trend we will enter into next year with.
On the specialty, kind of the release liners and the label side, there have been some smaller players that have been under pressure. I'm just wondering how your business is positioned into 2026 as a larger producer.
I think I commented on the fact of the muted demand during quarter three, and that clearly creates pressure. Then the rest depends on your competitiveness. We run large assets, well-maintained , and I would say that also through the results that you can see, we have been performing pretty well in a challenging market. In 2026, we will see later on. In the current situation, I think we are holding up pretty well with the pressure.
Thank you. Just one final clarification. You mentioned some reduction in the Uruguay platform on the costs as you continue to ramp up the efficiencies. I think you gave a number. I just misheard that earlier. I wonder if you just repeat that. Thank you.
Sure. I'll give you the precise number. Basically, the scale I gave for the savings still to be captured, let's say directionally in the next couple of years, is probably $25-$30 million. $25-$30 per ton. $25-$30 per ton, which is the same scale of the savings we are capturing this year. 2025 versus 2024.
Thank you.
You're welcome.
The next question comes from Joni Sandvall from Nordea. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thanks. A couple of quick questions. Tapio mentioned working capital release or you are aiming to release working capital. What should we expect? Does Leuna ramp up have any impact here?
Of course, the ramp up of new production does have some impact or has had some impact, I would say already during the year as we have been preparing. Still, let's say typically we do release cash from working capital at the end of the year. Don't have a number to give guidance on that, but I would expect that we will see that this year kind of seasonally as well. On top of that, we are obviously looking to improve our efficiencies otherwise.
Okay, thanks. Second question relates to biofuels. It has been some while when you put the SAF application in, so could you give any update on that, when you are expecting to receive the approval for the SAF?
Actually it's a long process and it's not under our control. That is what makes it difficult to make a prediction about that. We filed it last year, so let's see what happens next year. I wouldn't go any further than that because of what I said, it's outside our control.
Okay. Okay. Your product has been tested, so any early indications of those?
Absolutely, absolutely. It's been tested, has been even utilized in a pilot case, not blended, but pure. We have all the confidence that the product will go through the process. There are a number of, I don't know how to call them, administrative steps it needs to go through before the process is concluded. You can imagine this is a priority for us. This will open up, beside the biofuel or fuel for transport, ground transportation, the sustainable aviation market, which is not only getting bigger in the future, but will give further opportunity to diversify and maximize profitability. Surely something which we treat with the highest priority.
Okay, thanks. That's all from me.
Okay, very good. We have also used the type plan for this call. I take the opportunity again to thank everybody for your participation and in the case for your questions and see you sometime during the next quarterly call, if not before. Cheers. Have a nice day.
Hello everyone. Welcome to UPM quarters three 2025 results webcast. I'm Massimo Reynaudo. I'm the CEO of UPM and here with me today is Tapio Korpeinen, the CFO. The third quarter brought some temporary clarity to the terms of the international trade, but significant uncertainty remained and consumer demand stayed subdued. Our businesses in Advanced Materials and in the Decarbonization Solutions segment improved their third-quarter performance compared to the previous year. On the other hand, the Renewable Fibers and Communication Papers businesses were impacted by the unusual volatility in their operating environments.
In quarter three, comparable EBIT was EUR 153 million, up 21% compared to the previous quarter, but down 47% compared to last year's corresponding period. The EBIT margin was 6.7%. During the quarter, we continued to take decisive actions to further strengthen our competitiveness. Our focus has been and is on improving performance, cash flow generation, and the strength of our balance sheet. I will come back and tell you more about these actions during the presentation. First, let's look at the macroeconomic environment we operated in in quarter three and let's look at Renewable Fibers. To start with, as you may remember, the pulp market prices decreased during the peak of the trade uncertainty in quarter two and starting from China in quarter three, pulp sales prices remained low, impacting our quarter three earnings.
As a positive sign during the quarter, the pulp demand normalized in China and hardwood pulp prices increased somewhat from the bottom. In Finland, wood costs reached their highest level in quarter three when then wood market prices started eventually to show the first signs of decline. Communication paper markets remained weak in Europe and in North America, the demand in Europe in quarter three was 7% lower compared to one year before. In the U.S., the new import tariff levels were finally set during the quarter, bringing some clarity and allowing the customers to properly plan their needs again and for us, restoring the possibility to properly plan and optimize production and shipments. Having said that, the general uncertainty continued to weigh on the business sentiment and ultimately on the level of the demand.
Turning the page in the Advanced Materials segment, the demand of labeling materials remained relatively resilient. In the adhesive materials specifically, the demand was seasonally low, lower than quarter two. When we look at the full year base, the market continued to grow even though some signs of a slowdown were visible. In the U.S. the demand for Plywood was stable and I will tell you some more about this business shortly in Decarbonization Solutions. The market situation in general improved when it comes to the energy business. In fact, the electricity consumption in Finland continued to be robust and the electricity prices increased from the comparison quarters. In the same way, the prices of renewable fuels continue to recover, supported also by an improving demand. At this point, I will hand it over to Tapio for some more analysis on our results.
Thank you, Massimo. Let's start here with our results by the business area. Fibers and Communication Papers were the business areas that reported a lower EBIT compared to last year, whereas Adhesive Materials, Specialty Papers, Plywood, Energy, and Biofuels all improved their EBIT year-on-year. First on Fibers. As Massimo said, pulp prices were very low in the third quarter, decreasing 11% sequentially from the second quarter or 23% from last year's third quarter. Price development resulted in a significantly lower EBIT than last year and slightly lower EBIT compared to the second quarter at the cycle low prices. Fibers South, the competitive pulp platform of ours in Uruguay, reported an EBIT of EUR 80 million, which is equal to an EBIT margin of 22%.
Fibers North, that is the pulp and timber operations in Finland, reported an EBIT loss of EUR 37 million in the third quarter, during which the Kaukas pulp mill was down for maintenance and for extended production curtailment. The impact of this was approximately EUR 30 million on the quarter. This means that at cycle low pulp prices and peak level of wood costs, UPM Fibers North was slightly negative in EBITDA and positive in EBITDA excluding the Kaukas shutdown. Communication Papers deliveries were stable from the second quarter but 13% lower than last year. In the third quarter, the average paper price in euros decreased by 1% compared to the second quarter and 6% year-on-year. Fixed costs decreased in Communication Papers. EBIT decreased from last year but improved slightly from the second quarter. Sequentially, Adhesive Materials and Specialty Papers achieved increased deliveries and lower costs compared to last year.
Both increased their EBIT year-on-year and showed resilient performance from the previous quarter. Plywood reported solid results with normal production now and increased deliveries. Energy had a good quarter, benefiting from increased electricity market prices and from successful production optimization in the volatile electricity market. Our average sales price for electricity increased 17% from last year or 12% from the second quarter. On this page, you see our EBIT development by earnings driver, and as you can see here, the main headwind in the third quarter were the sales prices on the left-hand side. Lower sales prices impacted the third quarter results by about EUR 190 million compared with last year. Sales prices decreased most notably in Fibres and Communication Papers. Lower variable costs had a significantly smaller positive impact. Changes in delivery volumes were neutral on group level.
While deliveries increased for pulp, adhesive Specialty Papers, Plywood, and biofuels, there was a decrease in deliveries in Communication Papers. Fixed costs increased mainly due to the maintenance shutdown at the Kaukas mill. On the right-hand side, sales prices had a negative impact also compared with the second quarter mainly due to the low pulp prices. Variable costs decreased for most categories compared to the second quarter, but wood costs still increased. However, following the earlier wood market price development with the usual lag, fixed costs decreased from the second quarter due to lower maintenance activity and also due to seasonal factors. Our operating cash flow was EUR 218 million in the third quarter and our net debt decreased by EUR 92 million from the second quarter and was EUR 3.218 billion in total. At the end of the quarter, net debt/EBITDA ratio was 2.36x.
While we see our financial standing as solid, this is somewhat above our policy limit of 2x net debt/EBITDA and therefore obviously we aim to bring the net debt/EBITDA back to below 2x level in a timely manner. Massimo will shortly discuss the various actions we are taking to improve our profitability. In addition, we are pursuing working capital release and improving our cash conversion working capital efficiencies to support our cash flow. Our outlook is unchanged from the previous quarter. We expect our second half 2025 comparable EBIT to land in the range of EUR 425 to EUR 650 million. Our fourth quarter performance is supported by the timing of the annual energy refunds. In Communication Papers, the amount of refunds is likely to be similar or slightly smaller than last year.
It is also likely that there would be a forest fair value increase in the fourth quarter which could be of a similar magnitude or smaller than what we had last year. Fibres performance in the short term continues to be impacted by pulp prices in the fourth quarter. We have actually already completed in the month of October the plant maintenance shutdown at our Fray Bentos mill in Uruguay, which will have an impact on the quarter result of similar magnitude or scale as was the case in Kaukas, about EUR 30 million. In Advanced Materials businesses and energy. We expect resilient performance to continue. I'll hand back over to Massimo for some comments on our actions and direction from here.
Good. Thank you, Tapio. We continue to take decisive actions to improve our competitiveness and performance. As I said earlier, most of our businesses have a significant organic growth potential that can be captured with targeted, limited, and CapEx-efficient investments. That's what we will be looking into. Finally, or in parallel, we continue to develop a portfolio of world-class businesses. Let me illustrate now the most characterizing initiatives we are implementing segment by segment. Let's start with Communication Papers. In this business, efficient capacity utilization is critical, and in a weaker market, we plan to close down paper production at the Kaukas mill in Finland and at the Ettringen mill in Germany by the end of the year. Together, these two closures will reduce our paper capacity by 570,000 tonnes, or 13% of our current capacity.
This initiative will lead to a combined reduction in annual fixed costs of EUR 70 million. With these measures, we will maintain our competitiveness and future performance. In October, we also sold the earlier closed down Plattling paper mill site in Germany, and this will contribute to Communication Papers cash flow in Q4. Let's move to UPM Fibres now. Tapio has anticipated it, but given the significance of the UPM Fibres business and the distinct characteristic of the business in Finland and in Uruguay, we have decided to provide some additional transparency here. We introduced today the notion of Fibers South to refer to our fibers platform in South America and Fibers North to refer to the fibers platform in the Nordics as a first step. Today, we indicated the EBIT level for the two parts.
Next, we will start providing additional financial information for the two parts on a regular basis starting in Q1 next year. Meanwhile, when it comes to Fibers South, 2025 is the first full year of production at nominal capacity for the Paso de los Toros mill and also the first full year of operating at full capacity for the supporting logistic network. The pulp prices are very low, as Tapio mentioned earlier, but despite that, Fibers South reported an EBIT of EUR 80 million during the quarter and a margin of 22%, which is indicative of the competitiveness of this platform. Despite the weak market conditions for year on, improvements will continue. By 2027, the expanded plantation areas we have in Uruguay will increasingly reach our vesting maturity, enabling us to optimize the wood sourcing and the inbound logistics.
Further, self-sufficiency will increase and inbound transportation distance will decrease, therefore reducing cost. To give it a scale, in the beginning of this year 2025, we envisioned a cost reduction of some $25-$30 per ton compared to 2024 in Uruguay. We are well on track to achieve this this year, but we believe that thanks to this further and ongoing optimizations, we will be able to provide roughly a similar improvement by 2027. Of course, all the rest remaining equal. Beside that, we will continue to pursue growth in a CapEx efficient way to further the bottlenecking when it comes to the other platform. In Finland, Fibers North was in a slightly negative EBIT territory in quarter three. Excluding the Kaukas shutdown, wood cost reached their highest level in the summer before starting to decrease.
Pulpwood market prices on average decreased some 5% in quarter three compared to quarter two. In this situation, we took measures to adjust the Finnish pulp operations to the market situation. We took two months of downtime at the Kaukas mill during quarter three and we will take two weeks of downtime at the Pietarsaari mill in quarter four. These measures will allow us to optimize our wood sourcing and avoid the most expensive wood. The benefits of these actions will be fully visible in the P&L when the purchased wood volumes will be consumed, which means during quarter four or the early part of next year. Another significant action we implemented in this space is the long-term strategic partnership we agreed with Versowood and that we announced in September. Versowood is the largest private producer and processor of sawn timber in Finland. The deal is beneficial for both parties.
For us, it will strengthen the supply of pulpwood chips and improve the cost efficiency of our wood sourcing. Moving to another segment in Advanced Materials, as we have characterized it before, our performance as being resilient during 2025, Adhesive Materials has reduced fixed cost and streamlined its product portfolio significantly. Earlier, we announced the closure of the Kaltenkirchen factory in Germany and the relocation of the production to lower cost locations. In quarter three, we announced plans to discontinue the production in Nancy in France in order to increase further production efficiencies and competitiveness. At the same time, and in line with the strategy communicated earlier on, the business continues to seek focused growth in higher margin and higher growth areas. In this direction go the investments announced in the US, in Malaysia, and in Vietnam.
In parallel, the business continues to build its positions on the graphic space following the recent acquisitions. When it comes Specialty Papers, there too, efficiency measures have been implemented aimed at reducing cost in China and protecting the competitiveness in that area. From a commercial standpoint, the business continued to develop solutions being paper based and alternative to plastics for the growing segment of flexible packaging end users, and in Plywood, we initiated a strategic review to assess options for maximizing the long term potential of the business. The review includes a range of alternative outcomes. Possible outcomes include potential separation from UPM through a divestment, a partial demerger, or an initial public offering. The aim is to determine the best path forward for the business and for the value creation for UPM shareholders.
Let me spend a couple of minutes to tell you a bit more about this business. First of all, Plywood is a very good business. It has a strong market position in the mid to high end market segments where it operates in Europe, and in the liquid natural gas segment it holds a market leading position globally. The business success is built on a number of specific strengths. A competitive premium offering generated from four spruce mills and three birch mills, the top tier quality of the products manufactured there, a strong and reliable customer base, a strong brand, extensively recognized in the industry, and unmatched service capabilities. Thanks to six warehouse hubs and some more, thanks to that, the Plywood business has successfully provided good profitability and cash flow in all the different economic cycles of the past.
On the other hand, and despite all of these, and despite the fact the UPM Plywood business is the scale of a mid sized company in Finland, it is the smallest of the UPM businesses and as such it competes for focus and resources with much larger businesses. For these reasons we want to assess whether on a different setup, acting on a standalone base or being part of another entity will enable even better results. Therefore, this is the rationale for the strategic review and this review is expected to be conducted by or concluded by the end of 2026. Finally, we come to the Decarbonization Solutions and here we have unique solutions all offering our customers ways to decarbonize their businesses.
In energy we have 12 TW hours of CO₂-free electricity which make us the second biggest producer in Finland, consisting of reliable baseload of nuclear power and flexible supply of hydropower. This mix allows us to maximize the value on a highly volatile weather-dependent electricity market. On the other dimension of growth, there we have the capability to supply CO₂-free electricity to a market where the demand is growing due to the electrification of the industrial production, heating moving away from biomass use, and numerous data center related projects and road transportation in biofuels. Our short-term focus has been on improving performance and getting it back profit after a challenging 2024. Here we have made good progress this year in terms of growth. We are planning CapEx-efficient debottlenecking at the Lappeenranta refinery. Simultaneously, we are proceeding with the qualification of sustainable aviation fuels.
Last but not least, the startup of our groundbreaking biochemical refinery in Leuna in Germany is proceeding in the first of its three core processes. We have successfully achieved stability after having started production during the summer and the production levels are now on an industrial scale. The sale of the first commercial products, which are industrial sugars and lignin-based products, are expected to start during quarter four followed by glycol sales in the first half of 2026. In line with earlier indications, full production and positive EBIT is expected during 2027. To sum up, the market environment during the third quarter has proved to be challenging, but in this environment our differentiated business portfolio has ensured resilient performance. Our Advanced Materials and Decarbonization Solutions improved our performance compared to one year before. Fibres and Communication Papers were impacted by the unusual volatility in their business environment.
Most of the business have a growth profile and significant growth potential that can be captured with targeted investment and limited extra CapEx needs. This includes, but does not limit to, entering the new promising biochemicals business. While we work to capture this potential, we continue to work on actions to improve profitability, cash flow, and the strength of our balance sheet. This ends the prepared part of the presentation and we are ready for your questions.
If you wish to ask a question, please dial on your telephone keypad to enter the queue. If you wish to withdraw your question, please dial six on your telephone keypad. The next question comes from Ioannis Masvoulas from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.
Yes, hello, Massimo and Tapio. Thank you very much for the presentation. Thank you. Two questions from my side. The first on the UPM Fibres. You talked about the Nordic mills being EBIT negative in the quarter, even if we adjust for the Kaukas maintenance. Given this weak profitability and market backdrop, would you consider more drastic measures that could perhaps include permanent curtailments? Are you looking to wait for a recovery in the cycle, especially now that the pulpwood costs have started to come down? The second question related to the above, can you give us an indication on the tailwind you expect from the lower pulpwood prices in Q4 this year and Q1 next year? If you can also remind us on earnings sensitivities around which price changes, that would be much appreciated. Thank you.
Okay, I'll pick the first part of your question, Ioannis, and leave the other part to Tapio. As it was commented during the earlier part of this call, we had a negative EBIT in quarter three in Finland, but there are a few elements to be considered there, or three main elements. One is the impact of the maintenance shut and then the additional shut we had on top of that. The other element is that wood prices were at their peak and pulp prices were very low. Time will tell if it's a bottom, but they were surely very low. There was a very specific coincidence of elements all impacting the profitability.
As we have commented on a number of occasions before, our Finnish operations have always been profit positive so far, and time will tell in the future, but we run very efficient assets and the actions we have taken during the quarter, namely prolonging the stop in Kaukas to avoid buying more expensive wood but also to improve wood availability into the next quarter, is definitely going to be benefiting the performance going forward. The same way, the agreement reached with Versowood will aim to improve on another of the critical elements about wood in Finland, which is availability. As part of the deal, we will be providing Versowood logs and sawing capacity. That is what they are interested in. We are going to be receiving more pulpwood and chips, which is what we are in demand of.
On the basis of this, we are working to maintain and improve the profitability of the current platform, and the current platform has always been delivering performance across the cycle. On such a basis, any stop or discontinuation of capacity will just have a negative impact on results. That's why that's the plan we have been working upon. Of course, in the future, the situation will depend on the circumstances in the future, but we are working hard on the circumstances we control through what I said.
Maybe if I'll comment on your sort of second question. As Massimo already pointed out, we saw pulpwood prices peaking during the summer and a notable drop in the market price taking place. Having said that, it's good to note that there is a certain sort of seasonality in the sort of market prices typically for wood in Finland. It's perhaps early to directly sort of extrapolate too much from this sort of shorter term movement here. I would say that against the backdrop of what is happening in the Nordic markets in general, this is perhaps an indication in a sense that we have seen the kind of a peak in the trend, so to speak. There is a lag given the sort of cycle in our sourcing of wood, the mix of wood, including pulpwood that we need for operations in Finland.
Therefore, would not expect any material impact yet of these kinds of movements in the fourth quarter, nor really yet in the first quarter in any big way yet. Typically there's about six months time period before this sort of market price changes start to materialize in the cost of wood consumed in the pulp mills in a bigger way.
Thank you both, that's very clear. Just to follow up, anything you could provide on sensitivities for EBIT or EBITDA on let's say 10% change in wood prices?
That sensitivity we don't have.
Okay, thanks again. Thank you.
The next question comes from Lewis Merrick from BNP Paribas.
Please go ahead. Hi, thanks for taking the question. Leuna Biochemical refinery project concluding, do you expect CapEx to be lower in 2026, and can you give a rough indication of what you expect at this stage? I've just got one more follow-up .
Yes, definitely CapEx will be lower in 2026, maybe in 2027 as well. We have commented also in the past that after a big investment cycle, now it is the time to focus on extracting the value from these investments, whether it is Paso de los Toros or Leuna. At this point in time we do not have any other significant project that will require CapEx on a larger scale for the next couple of years. When it comes to the CapEx needs for next year, we have not defined them yet, but just to give you a broad indication, our, let's say, maintenance CapEx level in normal condition is in the EUR 250 million per annum level. You can put few tens of millions for potentially, let's say, efficiency improvement, margin enhancement initiatives on top of that. That would be, broadly speaking, the scale going forward.
For more accurate indications you'll need to wait the beginning of next year.
That's crystal clear. Thank you. Just on bridging items into Q4 to sort of reach or surpass your H2 guidance, you mentioned the forest asset revaluations similar to prior. Can you just put some numbers to that? Similarly, on the energy refunds and any other sort of moving parts from Q3 into Q4. Thank you.
If I take that, as mentioned, basically this forest value change for assets here in Finland primarily, then last year we had a bit more than EUR 100 million, and I said we obviously will see the exact figure as we sort of run the numbers during the remaining months of the year, remaining quarter. Anyway, at the scale or below what we had last year would be a likely outcome from that. Energy refunds, again, a bit similar comparison there, that we have had these energy refunds in the fourth quarter of the Communication Papers as we did last year as well, and this year likely to land slightly below the level of last year.
Are there any other items to call out?
Nothing else other than I pointed out that we have the maintenance shutdown that was planned and actually has been completed as planned in Fray Bentos mill in Uruguay, and that was done in the month of October. Now.
Thank you very much.
The next question comes from Linus Larson from SEB, please go ahead.
Many thanks for taking my questions to everyone. Maybe a follow up on the previous question on the Q4 Q3 bridge on fiber. Specifically, what's the aggregate impact of the maintenance and market related downtime in the fourth compared to the third quarter? Is that pretty much the same? Is it easing or is it worsening in your opinion?
As I said, similar in a sense that the Fray Bentos shutdown is about, let's say, same scale, EUR 30 million. That's what we had from the Kaukas shutdown in the third quarter.
If you add to that the market related downtime at the Kaukas and Pietarsaari respectively, is it pretty much the same Q4 as in Q3 altogether
Nothing to add.
Okay. Moving on to biofuels, I didn't see you disclosing the split of other operations. Maybe you did and I missed it. Could you maybe help us in planting biofuels even in the third quarter and maybe if you have any guidance on the fourth quarter as to where biofuels may end up.
What we did point out when commenting on the second quarter result was that we had a breakeven result as far as biofuels is concerned during the quarter from our own kind of actions, from the cost and efficiency volumes side, and modest support from the market. We continued at the same level of profitability now in the third quarter, breakeven, and again working on our own efficiencies. As you perhaps have seen, market prices are recovering in the biofuels market and, short term, the market situation is tightening. We would expect some support from there. Obviously, not happy at that level as such, we look to improve further into next year. Again, one factor that will impact demand, especially for the kind of advanced biofuels that we are producing, is the country-level implementation of the RED III Directive.
Excellent. That's and then maybe one final question. We touched upon it already in the call, but when it comes to Fibers North operations in Finland, you made a loss of EUR 37 million. To what extent did you have support help included in that negative EUR 37 million from positive forest asset revaluations?
There are no revaluations in the Fibers North because as perhaps you remember the Finnish forests are included in our Other segment in terms of our reporting segments.
Perfect. Thanks for clarifying that. Thanks.
The next question comes from Robin Santavirta from DNB Carnegie. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much. Two a bit more technical questions for me. First of all, in terms of the revaluation of the Finnish forest assets which you book in the other operations, it looks like they will be quite sizable again this year. I guess the gross impact will be more than EUR 150 million on an annual basis in 2025. As I understand, there's three components here. There's interest rates, there's net growth, and then the price of wood raw material. The key point now probably is the higher wood raw material prices, that is supporting material, the adjusted EBITDA and the forest revaluation 2025 as it did in 2024. Going into 2026, a bit of color would be appreciated to understand how you look at the forest revaluation of the Finnish forest because now we have the pricing coming now quite clearly.
Should we expect the revaluation gain to be much smaller, a bit smaller, or the same level? Any color on that would be appreciated.
Of course, time will tell. You have to kind of remember in a sense that on one hand the result and the value of our forest has been supported by the price increase here in Finland. Obviously, it has been a headwind for our pulp mills and sawmills here in Finland. If that kind of tide turns, it will work the other way around. Perhaps then the result, because everything is done on a market price basis for the forest operation, will be impacted if market price is lower for wood, but then it's for the benefit of the sawmills and the pulp mills here in Finland. That's how it works in our business model on the price impact. It is correct to consider in a sense what is happening in the wood market in the short term when setting the price expectations in the valuation model.
What we have in there to begin with is a sort of management view on the longer term trend since we are running the valuation model for multiple decades here. In that sense there is a kind of level change as such. The assumption in terms of what is the direction of wood price in our model is assessed separately. Meaning that if wood price goes up, it doesn't mean that we assume that it goes up from here to eternity and vice versa. There will be some change if this trend starts to go to the other direction, but perhaps not as dramatic as one might think. As you said, other factors, the growth in the forest vis-à-vis harvest levels, interest rates will play a role as well and it is early to anticipate anything there.
Yeah, there is. I obviously understand that what you lose there on price of wood you gain in the industrial operations. That I appreciate. It's just that it's quite sizable, more than EUR 150 million positive. If it would only be, say, $50 million positive or EUR 25 million positive in 2026, it's quite a big delta. Perhaps you get a bit more color as well when you guide them for next. The other question I have is related to Leuna and again a technical question. I'm just keep pushing on the depreciation estimate because it's still EUR 1 billion in investments or quite sizable depreciation. I can only see in the other segments low depreciation, even lower than last year. Is this something that we should expect now as of Q4, is it as of next year, and any color on the size of those? Thanks.
When we start, I mean, whether it's this plant or pulp or otherwise, when we have finished an investment project, we start commissioning and eventually when we start to have deliveries to customers, then the depreciation starts. Not meaningful this year yet, but will then start in the beginning of next year when now the customer deliveries are starting to take place.
Tapio, can I just try. Is it EUR 40 million a year or something in lines of that? The line of depreciation ?
In that scale? Yes.
Thank you very much.
The next question comes from Andrés Castaños-Mollor from Berenberg. Please go ahead.
Hi. Hello. My first question is on the strategic partnership with Versowood. It sounds very promising because we're putting together the largest pulpwood consumer with one of the largest solo consumers. Financially, what do you expect to get in terms of synergies? What do you think is a reasonable assumption here? Also, operationally, can you help me visualize how and why the synergies are generated?
I risk here to repeat myself a little bit, but when it comes to the financials, we don't disclose them. When it comes to how the benefits will materialize in this exchange of things, which one is in excess and the other is in need of, it's what I was saying before, thanks to DSDL, which by the way is subject to merger control authorities and still needs approval just to line things properly down. Should that happen, we will be having access to more wood chips and pulpwood. To remember the importance of that, we have quoted it a number of times, the situation in Finland to be made challenging for pulp making because of wood prices, but also prices don't solve the problem of insufficient wood available. Through this deal we will have more access to something which is key and critical for our operations.
That is the value that comes from this deal. Yeah. Beyond the numbers. Don't know if I have answered your question.
It is helpful. Thank you. Can I ask a couple of more clarifications, please? Did you say that the time for the end of the review, strategic review for Plywood, was 2026? End of 2026. Did I get that right?
Yes.
Thank you. Okay, clear. The other one is for Leuna, right? You mentioned industrial sugars, and I was wondering if industrial sugars is a product that you would aim to sell in the future, or if this is something that you're just selling temporarily as you're not finalizing the whole process to generate alcohols. Thank you.
Yes, it's a very good question and it's a very good observation as well. This is most of an intermediate product that we are getting, which has some market value. The full value capture imagined in the business case will come when the plant will be in full operation and these intermediate products will be turned into finite products, being either functional fillers or glycols or products in this family. There is some value in this, but the full value capture, and we'll start to capture it, to be clear, by the end of this year. The full value capture will start with the plant in full operation.
Got you. That's helpful. Thank you very much.
You're welcome. The next question comes from Cole Hathorn from Jefferies.
Please go ahead. Good afternoon. Thanks for taking my questions. I'd like to start with Communication Papers and Specialty Papers. I'd just like to understand the key deltas into 2026. If you were to talk about, you know, what could be the positives into 2026, could you talk me through the moving parts of how you see it? If I think about Communication Papers, it's the EUR 70 million fixed cost savings from capacity closures in Specialty Papers. I'm just wondering how you see that market considering Asia Fine Papers is quite challenging and the release liner and labels businesses, there seem to be some smaller players out there challenging. I'm just wondering what are the moving parts into 2026 that you see? Thank you.
Okay, let me try to answer the question, but let me separate it in two because the two businesses are pretty different profiles. If we start with Communication Papers first, one element is represented by the market, and we don't know what will be the level of the market demand next year. Nobody knows it, but in this market, demand has declined for the last 20 years. We can expect the decline continuing next year. That is a negative if you want. At the same time, the market this year or in the first part of this year has been heavily disrupted by the uncertainty that came as a consequence of the trade war. Let's not forget that there's been significant uncertainty, for example, in the U.S. around whether there were tariffs, who was hit by the tariffs, the amount of the tariffs, when they would apply, and so on.
That has made it extremely difficult for the players there to properly plan ahead. That had impact across the entire value chain. Last but not least, again, in quarter two, the demand of a certain type of grades in the U.S. dropped down significantly during the period of the strongest tensions between the U.S. and China, because imports from China were basically stopped and, you know, catalogs were not printed and so on and so forth. What I'm just trying to say is that if we want to compare 2026- 2025, which I believe is what you are kind of trying to get some color about, it's probably fair to assume a demand decline.
It's also probably fair to assume, at least if things stay as they are right now, some stabilization of the flow of the products, which will allow the industry to operate in a better way because operational efficiency is important. This is about talking about the market. When we talk about ourselves, yes, you pointed it up. The actions we are taking and reducing capacity significantly, 13% of our capacity, will deliver direct fixed cost saving improvement, but also indirect benefit from improved operating rate. Those are some elements to consider for Communication Papers. When it comes to Specialty Papers, the situation in China is, I wouldn't know how to characterize it, but surely the demand for those products not being strong leads to some pressure. As for how this will play into next year, it is way too soon to try to extrapolate.
A lot will depend on the downstream of businesses and ultimately how consumer demand will evolve. It has been pretty muted during quarter three, as we have indicated. Let's see, and maybe let's also see in quarter four, which is typically a seasonality quarter for that business. That will give us a better sense and feel about the trend we will enter into next year with.
On the specialty, kind of the release liners and the label side, there have been some smaller players that have been under pressure. I'm just wondering how your business is positioned into 2026 as a larger producer.
I think I commented on the fact of the muted demand during quarter three, and that clearly creates pressure. Then the rest depends on your competitiveness. We run large assets, well maintained, and I would say that also through the results that you can see, we have been performing pretty well in a challenging market. In 2026, we will see later on. In the current situation, I think we are holding up pretty well with the pressure.
Thank you. Just one final clarification. You mentioned some reduction in the Uruguay platform on the costs as you continue to ramp up the efficiencies. I think you gave a number. I just misheard that earlier. If you just repeat that. Thank you.
Sure. I'll give you the precise number. Basically, the scale I gave for the savings still to be captured, let's say directionally in the next couple of years, is probably $25-$30 million. Sorry, $25-$30 per ton. Sorry. Okay, $25-$30 per ton, which is the same scale of the savings we are capturing this year. 2025 versus 2024.
Thank you.
You're welcome. The next question comes from Joni Sandvall from Nordea. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thanks. A couple of quick questions. Tapio mentioned working capital release or you are aiming to release working capital. What should we expect in Q4, and does Leuna ramp-up have any impact here?
Of course, the ramp up of new production does have some impact or has had some impact, I would say already during the year as we have been preparing. Still, let's say typically we do release cash from working capital at the end of the year. Don't have a number to give guidance on that, but I would expect that we will see that this year kind of seasonally as well. On top of that, we are obviously looking to improve our efficiencies, otherwise.
Okay, thanks. My second question relates to biofuels. It has been some while since you put the SAF application in. Could you give any update on when you are expecting to receive the approval for the SAF?
Actually, it's a long process and it's not under our control. That is what makes it difficult to make a prediction about that. We filed it last year. Let's see what happens next year. I wouldn't go any further than that because of what I said, it's outside our control.
Okay. Okay. Your product has been tested, so any early indications of those?
Absolutely, absolutely. It's been tested, has been even utilized in a pilot case. Not blended but pure. We have all the confidence that the product will go through the process. There are a number of, I don't know, to call them administrative steps it needs to go through before the process is concluded. You can imagine this is a priority for us. This will open up, beside the biofuel or fuel for transport, ground transportation, the sustainable aviation market, which is not only getting bigger in the future, but will give a further opportunity to diversify and maximize the profitability. Surely something which we treat with the highest priority.
Okay, thanks. That's all from me.
Okay, very good. We have also used the type plan for this call. I take the opportunity again to thank everybody for your participation and in the case for your questions, and see you sometime during the next quarterly call, if not before. Cheers. Have a nice day.