Good morning, everyone. I'm Roy-Tore Rikardsen, CEO of Kaldvík, and I'm pleased to welcome you to the presentation of our first- quarter results for 2025. Joining me today is our CFO, Róbert Róbertsson, and together we'll walk you through the key highlights and developments from the past quarter. After the presentation, we'll open the floor for questions, and as before, you're welcome to submit them by email. You all know this. Please take a moment and read through. We go to the agenda. We'll begin with some key highlights from the first quarter, covering operational performance, financial results, and a few strategic updates. We will look ahead with a brief outlook and summary before wrapping up with a Q&A session.
In the first- quarter, we harvested 6,383 tons, delivering solid operational performance with an EBIT of EUR 1.54 per kg and an average price achievement of EUR 7.44 per kg. Looking ahead to 2025, we're maintaining our full-year harvest guidance of 21,500 tons, with around 1,200 tons expected in the second quarter, and we plan to release 7.5 million smolt to support future growth. On the financial side, a process initiated to finance the company with a long-term financing package of EUR 230 million. Strategically, we have taken important steps forward with the acquisition of key assets, and when it comes to the new licenses in Seyðisfjörður, which are still pending approval, Róbert will come back to this and the financial updates later.
Our farming operation on land, as we move into the spring season, we are seeing record-high numbers and biomass at our land-based facilities, and that is putting us in a strong position to meet our 2025 target of releasing 7.5 million smolt. Over 60% of these smolt are scheduled for an early transfer, and that means before August, and it will help us to optimize the growth cycles. A key milestone this year was the successful launch of our new grow-out facility in Lennart, Rifos, which became operational in the first quarter. Overall, production performance remains strong, with year-over-year mortality rates reduced by more than 30% in recent years, reflecting ongoing improvements in fish health and operational efficiency. In Q1, we harvested 6,383 tons at the sea, exceeding our guidance mainly due to early harvesting caused by winter wounds in the 2023 generation.
This contributed to a year-over-year increase in harvest volume and was supported by strong harvest weight. During the quarter, we completed the harvest of both the autumn 2022 and the spring 2023 generation, and they are marking key operational milestones. We remain on track to meet our 2025 target of releasing 7.5 million smolt, and it is worth noting that sea temperatures began to normalize toward the end of the quarter, which is a positive sign for biological condition going forward. We have started to transfer the 2025 generation of smolt to sea in this quarter, in the second quarter. For the biological outlook for Q2 2025, we expect to harvest approximately 1,200 tons and continue with the autumn 2023 generation. Overall, we remain on track to reach our full-year harvest target of 21,500 tons.
We also, as mentioned earlier, plan to release 7.5 million smolt for the year, which will support future production and long-term growth. When it comes to sales and harvesting in the first quarter, we achieved a price of EUR 7.44 per kg, despite a lower superior share that was 62%, and 25% of our sales was secured through fixed-price contracts, and it was helping us to manage pricing stability. Our newly formed sales and trading organization has been actively focused on developing new markets, while we also see a strong potential in value-added products and the logistics. The integrated box factory is now fully operational, and we expect to see a full impact of reduced packing costs starting in the second quarter.
Additionally, with the full ownership of our harvesting facility, we have gained greater operational flexibility and control, which support both efficiency and responsiveness in our supply chains. That concludes the operational update, and now I'll pass it over to Róbert, who will walk you through the financial performance.
Good morning. Thank you, Roy. Here we have the highlights from the quarter, where we saw strong revenue growth, improved price achievement, and healthy EBIT per kg. Revenues saw a significant increase, reaching approximately EUR 48 million, up from EUR 31 million in the same quarter last year. This growth was primarily driven by higher harvest volumes and solid price achievements, despite some production challenges and lower share of superior-grade products. The average price per kg rose slightly to EUR 7.5 compared to EUR 7.4 in the first quarter last year. We also achieved a notable reduction in cost levels during the quarter. This was partly due to scale advantage with increased harvest volumes, as well as harvesting from one of our better-performing sea sites, contributing positively to our bottom line, where operational EBIT reached nearly EUR 10 million, with an EBIT per kg of EUR 1.5.
Over to the financial summary, total assets increased by EUR 14 million during the quarter. This was primarily driven by the acquisition of the new box factory and a higher cost balance resulting from the utilization of a short-term bridge facility. The book value of biological assets decreased by approximately EUR 20 million. This decline reflects a reduced fair value, high harvesting volumes, and low biological growth during the quarter. Liabilities rose by EUR 26 million, mainly due to the utilization of the short-term bridge facility and purchase price payables related to the box factory acquisition. These payables were settled in the second quarter with shares in Kaldvík. The equity ratio remains healthy, amounting to 52% at the end of the quarter. Here we can see high-level analysis of the net interest-bearing debt, which decreased by EUR 8 million during the quarter. EBITDA amounted to EUR 12.7 million.
Net investment in working capital were EUR -10.5 million, primarily due to high harvest volumes and low biological growth. Total CapEx for 2025 is estimated at EUR 18.5 million, and during the first quarter, CapEx investment totaled at EUR 4.6 million. Financial items amounted to EUR 3.8 million, where finance cost is the main contributor, and the net increase in net interest-bearing debt due to the box factory acquisition was approximately EUR 7.1 million. At the end of the quarter, the syndicate loans totaled EUR 155 million out of a total facility of EUR 180 million. We were in breach of certain loan covenants in the first quarter but successfully obtained a waiver from our financing partners, ensuring continued support and stability. We are pleased to share a significant milestone in Kaldvík's financial journey.
Kaldvík has successfully entered into a new agreement with our bank syndicate to amend, increase, and extend our existing debt facilities. The total financing packages amount to EUR 230 million, whereof EUR 20 million are financed through lease basket agreements. This agreement reflects the continued confidence and support from our financing partners, where the packages include a relatively light covenant structure for the first two years, along with a 21-month installment holiday, providing us with valuable financial flexibility in the growth period ahead. In connection with the refinancing, it's a condition that the company raises EUR 45 million in new equity, and we are in the process of launching such an equity raise with strong backing from our biggest shareholder, Øster Holding.
The new capital structure significantly strengthens Kaldvík's financial position, and it lays a solid foundation for our next phase of growth, unlocking profit potential by scaling operations on our existing fixed-cost base. Over to strategic update. Kaldvík has a vertically integrated value chain, which we have been building up through substantial investments in recent years, where our main focus has been on increasing quality and capacity in our land facilities with good result. Today, we have a production capacity of stable 30,000 tons annually, which is the first milestone that we are working towards. We see that this milestone is within reach in the next couple of years. Today, we have a production license in four fjords. Kaldvík is in the process of obtaining additional fjords in our license portfolio, Seyðisfjörður.
The license portfolio would then increase to around 54,000 tons, split between five different fjords, where 41,000 tons is fertile license and 12,800 tons is sterile license. As previously communicated, Kaldvík acquired a box factory during the first quarter of this year, which is conveniently located next to our processing facility in Djúpivogur. We simultaneously increased our stake in our processing facility, and now we own the processing facility 100%. This provides us with full flexibility in utilization and future development in terms of capacity and quality to handle all harvesting volume in-house. Additionally, the acquisition of the box factory is expected to provide approximately EUR 3 million in annual cost savings, or around EUR 0.14 per kg. This directly increases our margin and improves our overall profitability.
Briefly on the license status in Seyðisfjörður, as I mentioned earlier, we are in the process of obtaining new license in Seyðisfjörður, which includes a total capacity of 10,000 tons MAB. This is divided into 6,500 tons of fertile license and 3,500 tons of sterile. This is a long process and has been a long process. We started the application process back in 2016, but we feel that we are on the home stretch now. This new production area presents a significant strategic opportunity for us, increasing our overall capacity and allowing us to meet growing demands and provides us with increased flexibility in our operations. More importantly, this new area will help reduce biological risk at sea, contributing to sustainability and health of our operations. In conclusion, the new license in Seyðisfjörður is a major step forward for the company, enhancing our capacity, flexibility, and reducing biological risk.
That's all for me for now. Thank you. Back over to Roy.
Thank you, Róbert. Kaldvík's potential. We see significant potential beyond milestone one through several key initiatives, and the Kaldvík team is focused on producing larger smolt, which will shorten the seed production cycle and reduce biological risk, though achieving a consistent two-year cycle will require additional capital investment. Starting in 2027, we plan to start utilizing our sterile licenses, which is expected to yield an annual production of 3,000 tons-4,000 tons. We are also progressing toward 10,000-ton licenses in Seyðisfjörður, as Róbert mentioned earlier, with the hope that this has been finalized in the summer. In parallel, we are working on optimizing our production areas to maximize the use of our MAB. Altogether, this effort points to a total production potential of up to 45,000 tons. Kaldvík is well positioned for enhanced profitability.
In the early days, we laid the groundwork by building a completely new salmon farming industry on the east coast of Iceland through Ice Fish Farm and Laxar, establishing the foundation and proving the regional potential with strong early results, such as EUR 1.5 per kg in EBIT and 92% superior share in 2020. The second stage marked a period of consolidation and recovery as we merged with Laxar and navigated challenges like ISA and winter wounds while focusing on establishing operation and rebuilding biomass. Today, in stage three, we are scaling up with a fully developed value chain and over 7.5 million smolt to be released, moving toward milestone one of 30,000 tons. This growth is happening on a fixed cost base and unlocking the real earning potential with milestone number one, 30,000 tons, and requiring only limited investment.
We see a long-term potential to reach 45,000 tons by fully utilizing our license capacity and making targeted investments across the value chain. Looking ahead, we see strong global demand for premium salmon, with particularly promising opportunities in the U.S. and the Asian markets. Our harvest outlook remains positive, supported by planned smolt output, as we mentioned many times earlier, 7.5 million smolt in 2025, and with a total production capacity in the company of 8 million smolt. On the financial side, a process was initiated to finance the company with a long-term financing package of EUR 230 million. Strategically, we are awaiting approval for the 10,000-ton licenses in Seyðisfjörður. In addition, we acquired key assets, including a box factory in Djúpivogur and a one-third stake in Búlandsstindur harvesting station, with a total purchase price of EUR 19 million.
With that, we are concluding, and we are open for questions.
Yes. If you have any questions, please send it to robert@kaldvik.is. We've had questions here. You're wondering about the smolt release this year. We have a question here. What week is the last one you will release smolt to sea this year?
I know that we will transfer fish in October, a small amount. I guess it's the first or second week in October.
You are wondering about the contract share for the year 2025. We are anticipating 20% of fixed contracts in 2025. Regarding the in-house sales organization, the sales up until last year, we have been in cooperation with external sales organizations, Seabourn, and we are very happy with that cooperation. We will keep that cooperation for some time, at least. We are slowly but surely building up our in-house sales organization. It is hard to say when the in-house sales organization will take a bigger portion of sales, but this is an ongoing process. Please feel free to send questions to robert@kaldvik.is. If there are no more questions, I guess we will just stop for now. If you want to raise some questions afterwards, please feel free to reach out to robert@kaldvik.is, and I will try and come back.
Can I have one?
Surely. Yeah, shortly. Thank you.
Okay. Thank you.