Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to this first quarter 2020 presentation of Norske Skog's financial results. Our EBITDA ended at NOK 379 million, which is a relatively strong quarter, even though it's somewhat less than the fourth quarter of last year at NOK 560 million. This is because the fourth quarter included some one-off gains. So all in all, we are relatively happy with the EBITDA. Also, as previously guided, a strong cash flow from operations, we came in at NOK 470 million, partly reflecting the fact that we did get CO2 compensation in Norway in the quarter, and also that the Albury transaction, the asset proceeds were included in investing activities.
The financial net loss for the period is NOK 374 million, which is to a large extent due to financial items, which again is because the Norwegian currency weakened during the quarter, and unrealized currency losses had to be taken through the P&L. Also, negative effects from derivatives and other fair value adjustments, which is mainly related to our power contracts. Our AGM was held as scheduled on the sixteenth of April, and the AGM approved a dividend of total 6.25 NOK per share. 3.25 NOK to be paid now on the twenty-fourth of April, while the board of directors have an authority to decide on the payments of the remaining 3 NOK and the timing of such payments. Obviously, the COVID-219 pandemic is a significant event also for Norske Skog. The main impact is on the demand of paper.
Our big markets in continental Europe, Germany, France, Italy, and also to a certain extent, Spain, are heavily affected, and one of the more important newsprint markets in Europe, and the U.K., is also clearly affected. Also, Down Under and in Asia, we have issues related both to physical lockdowns in our production sites and also to the demand, which is very challenging indeed. Just looking briefly at the figures, I'm not going to go through all the figures, but we can see that the EBITDA underlying is also quite strong, and on comparative levels to the last two quarters of 2019 at NOK 317
A margin of 12%, which is above the 10% that we think is sort of the bottom of the cycle in our industry, and what we should be able to do. Net interest bearing debt is approaching zero, and as guided, that we had pro forma for the Albury transaction, very little debt at the end of the year as well. The bridge from fourth quarter 2019 to first quarter 2020, there is clearly a price effect. The pricing went down. If you look at market prices, probably a price effect of around 5%. Cost improvements, both the direct costs and also indirect costs, were positively affected.
Some positive effects from forex in the quarter, not as large as the currency losses should indicate, but over time, a weaker Norwegian currency is positive for the competitiveness of our business. So all in all, NOK 379, a relatively strong quarter. Cash position, as mentioned, quite strong. We had cash flow from operations and from investing activities, and at the same time, we have also net negative cash flow from financial activities. All in all, a strong cash balance, which, as I said, has almost zero net interest bearing debt at the end of the quarter. Investing activities in the quarter also a little bit higher than normal due to the power plant that we are building in Bruck, which are now starting to consume cash.
Very, very briefly on the COVID-19, we have updated the market on a regular basis, and obviously, our top priority, as everyone else's, is to ensure the health of our own employees and their families. We have fortunately had very, very few incidents of illness in our production facilities and in our sales offices, partly because we have taken care of this and partly because of local restrictions which have been enforced. We have been able, by and large, to keep the production units running with some exceptions, and today the main exception is New Zealand. We also have a temporary curtailment in Norway, which is due to market rather than physical lockdown. This COVID period will clearly impact the second quarter and the third quarter. I will come back to it a little bit more during the outlook.
However, our strategic initiatives are still progressing unaffected of the COVID-19 virus. Again, to remind everyone about the strategic ambitions and imperatives, it is still to improve and optimize cash flow from our publication paper core business. We are progressing the studies into conversion of selected paper machines in Europe to packaging, and we also still work on bioenergy, fiber, and biochemicals to diversify the portfolio going forward. If we look at the segments briefly, the European quarter was quite strong, on par with the quarters 2, 3, and 4 in 2019. Despite the price fall, which means that we had some relief from lower energy prices and from lower recycled paper prices. Also, currency, as mentioned, is favorable, particularly towards the end of quarter one for the Norwegian mills.
There's also been some sale of emission allowances, particularly in Norway in the first quarter, which were sold at a good time, considering the volatility also in that market. The European market has experienced price falls around 5% from the fourth quarter 2019 to first quarter 2020, across all grades, and this is clearly as a weakening of the market balance. We had a good market balance in 2018, so price improved from 2017 to 2018. From 2018 into 2019, there was still a good market balance. That market balance has deteriorated as there has been less closures compared to the market demand. Going forward, the need for closures is still there, and obviously, will be exacerbated by the COVID-19 virus. In terms of CO2, I've mentioned that we have two important CO2 elements in our business.
One is the emissions we are allocated under the EU trading system, which is seen here on the left side of the chart, is significant for all. I should mention that Bruck also has a power plant, so net Skogn, Saugbrugs, and Golbey have an important position, and we have indeed sold most of the Norwegian allowances in the first quarter. And you can see the price here also has a great deal of volatility during the financial crisis. The price collapsed and did not really recover until 2018, 2019, but now this is an important part of our business.
Also, going forward, we need to improve our competitiveness still, and we have announced in the quarter that we will do an energy improvement project at the Saugbrugs mill in order to further improve both our thermal energy consumption and electricity consumption. Total investment of NOK 165 million, where the Norwegian government under two various schemes will contribute about a third of the investment, leaving us with a net investment of around NOK 100 million, which is an initiative to support the Saugbrugs mill in a time where the SC market is relatively weak. We need to demonstrate that we still have room to improve our competitiveness. Speaking about competitiveness, also the Bruck boiler, which we have announced before, which most people are familiar with, is still going according to plan.
There is no surprises, still CapEx of about EUR 72 million, still high level of local funding at EUR 54 million at competitive terms, and we are progressing both physically and in the planning of the project is all going according to the plan. Timeline also today looks okay, but clearly, the COVID-19 virus could affect the timeline, partly because we have to relate to authorities, which more or less have shut down shop, and partly because also our vendors face constraints in time of lockdown. In France, there is also the Green Valley Energy, where we are together with Veolia, building also boilers, in order to improve Golbey's competitiveness and possibly pave the way for a conversion project, and this is also going ahead.
In the fourth quarter of 2019, we announced that GVE, the Green Valley Energy, had indeed been selected in the national tender to be part of the French energy system CRE5, and we expect to make a final decision together with our partners in the second half of 2020. That could allow for a startup of a new biomass boiler in early 2023. If we look at the segment Australasia, the underlying performance in the first quarter has been quite poor. The underlying EBITDA is approximately zero. It's actually NOK 1 million, down from between NOK 20 million and NOK 28 million in the last few quarters of 2019.
This is now without the Albury mill, which ceased operations on the fifth of December of last year in a weak environment, price-wise, both internationally and also with weakness in the Australian domestic demand. Fourth quarter of last year was positively affected by other items in, on the EBITDA, so the comparison is a little bit difficult on the reported one. We still think that this region should generate a reasonable EBITDA, and that will be our focus going forward on the remaining facilities. Positively, the Nature's Flame pellet business is starting to contribute to EBITDA gradually. We have, in Australia, done the Albury transaction, as most people have now seen, and we also concluded the forest assets that we do own, the plantations in the island of Tasmania.
We have agreed to sell to New Forests, which is an Australian-based forest manager and investment manager into forests, where we expect the transaction to close in the second quarter of 2020, and the cash, approximately NOK 400 million, to be received in 2020. I just briefly mentioned Nature's Flame, which has now been ramped up to 85,000 tons. Due to the COVID lockdown in New Zealand, there is some present operational problems to run the mill. However, on an annualized basis now, we have a rough earnings potential of NZD 5 million EBITDA, which should also help the local business in Australia and New Zealand.
Then, to remind you all that Norske Skog still is a front runner in the circular economy, despite the COVID-19 virus and all the effects of that, the circular economy is still ongoing. The EU is reconfirming its Green Deal, and sustainability is obviously part of our business. We do source our wood sustainably. We are using certified wood, and we are obviously a big user of recycled paper. All we do are basically recovered, recycled, and everything is a usable product, and clearly energy efficiency and CO2 reductions. If we talk about CO2, over time, we have a very impressive reduction of CO2. This is per ton of paper produced, including all effects of CO2, and you can see that from 2009, we're coming a long way down to 500 kilos per ton in 2019.
Following the Golbey and the Bruck boiler, we are even down to 200 kilos, which indicates a reduction between 60%-70% per ton. To finalize with the outlook, it's absolutely clear that the publication paper markets are lower in April and beyond because of the COVID-19 restrictions. In general, we could say that if we see a very weak GDP in Europe, as some analysts are thinking about a 10% decline, it's clear that publication paper demand will decline more than the structural declines. We could probably see the full year up to 20% decline in volumes. There is some uncertainty on raw materials. Today, we have the main problem around recovered paper to the Golbey mill in France. It could also affect other raw materials, although today there is less problems on other areas.
This means that we, as a management team and as a company, we need to be vigilant. We need to be able to take measures in order to cope with this, both operationally and on the liquidity side, depending a little bit on how this crisis is unfolding and how the lockdowns will gradually be eased. What is absolutely certain is that Norske Skog remains committed to a strategy. Asset conversion in Europe into higher growth markets is absolutely essential. We're working hard on it. There is no delay as of yet because of the COVID-19 on our projects. We will come back more in detail through the summer to what that actually means in more detail. We do have some work to be done in the Australasian region.
Despite the fact that we are streamlining, there is still work to be done in order to make that a sustainable business unit with a strong profitability. We do have the balance sheet to do all of this, and we will maintain a strong balance sheet. Finally, the dividend target and the dividend policy that we have communicated remains unchanged. We still think that is a fundamental premise for the way we have financed the business and the way we run the company. On that note, I would like to thank you all for your attention and wish you a very good day. Thank you.