Welcome to this presentation of Rana Gruber's results for the first quarter of 2024. My name is Gunnar Moe, and I'm the CEO of Rana Gruber. With me today is our CFO, Erlend Høyen. We will now take you through our operational and financial performance, and you are welcome to send us questions during our presentation by using the Q&A feature. Questions will be answered at the end of the session. Let's start with the highlights for the first quarter. First quarter is normally a good and stable production period, despite harsh winter condition. This was also the result for the first quarter of 2024. Both in the mines and in the processing plant, our employees have executed the operation efficient, and by the same time, produced a product with even higher quality than last year.
Total concentrate production ended at 470,000 metric tons, compared to 434,000 metric tons last year. This is a significant improvement and a solid platform for further development of our production. From historical high prices at the end of 2023, the iron ore prices fell during the first quarter. This impacted our revenues negatively through the final settlement of shipments done in fourth quarter and the provisional pricing of shipments done in the first quarter. At the end of the quarter, we had some issues related to capacity at the port of Mo i Rana due to the Easter holiday, and therefore had to push one shipment to the second quarter. This resulted in an inventory buildup that we expect to reduce in the upcoming quarters.
Despite some headwind from external factors, the board of directors decided to pay out a quarterly dividend of NOK 1.29 per share for the first quarter of 2024. This is the 13th quarter in a row with dividend since we became public. Now, some words about people and environment. Unfortunately, this period we had an incident that resulted in a short absence from work. Fortunately, the person affected that has returned to work after a short period. We will, of course, continue to improve our standard, and safety remains always our top priority for our employees. In March, Rana Gruber published its annual environment and sustainability report. From 2022, we reduced our carbon emissions with 15% to 77.17 kg per ton concentrate produced.
This improves our position and supports our ambitions to be one of the first carbon-free iron ore mines in the world. After the end of the quarter, we received positive feedback from the Norwegian Railway Directorate related to the electrification of Nordlandsbanen. This will be a significant step to reduce our carbon emissions even further. As mentioned, we continued the strong production trend from the previous quarters, with 477,000 metric tons concentrate, up from 434,000 metric tons in the first quarter of 2023. We are satisfied with being able to slowly increase the iron content in our concentrate, and we are now in a phase where we are doing the final planning of our annual maintenance stop in June.
This will be one of the most extensive annual maintenance stop executed since Rana Gruber became public, and with strategic importance for the Fe65 and M40 project. As communicated last quarter, we are experienced a weak market for the Colorana product due to the reduced activity in the construction sector. We are closely monitoring the market and are considering further actions. Now, I will leave the word to our CFO, Erlend Høyen.
Thank you, Gunnar. As you can see, our revenue for the first quarter of 2024 declined both compared to last quarter and the corresponding quarter in 2023. The revenue ended at NOK 285 million, compared to NOK 493 million last year. The decline is explained by several reasons, but the first and the most significant reason is related to the drop in market prices during the first quarter. This affects both the settlement prices from previous shipments made in Q4, as well as the preliminary pricing for the shipments done in the first quarter. The shipments from the first quarter will be settled in the second quarter and thus is affected by market development going forward. As previously announced, the shipping volume of hematite in Q1 is also quite moderate compared to other quarters.
Foreign exchange and shipping costs, on the other hand, contributes positive compared to the first quarter of 2023. Regarding prices, this quarter also highlights the difference between the two main products that we have, hematite and magnetite, as they are sold in different markets and at different price mechanisms. You can see that in the graph in the middle. Our cash cost increased to NOK 270.5 million, which corresponds to 573 NOK per metric tons produced, or roughly approximately around $53 per ton. Regarding costs, besides the general hit from inflation, the increase is mainly due to the normalization of the company's power cost, which was highly favorable in 2023, given our financial hedges.
There has also been very high activity in the mining operations in the first quarter, both in the underground mine and in the open pit, as well as work that has been done on the strategic projects. For more details regarding mining volumes and waste rock removal, please take a look at the interim report. And as you can see, from the illustration in the middle, mining and processing, as well as R&D, IT, and administration costs, are still the main cost components in our cost base. A lot of figures here, but some comments on some of them. EBITDA declined to NOK 55.7 million from NOK 226 million last year, mainly due to the decline on the revenue.
In the first quarter, the pre-tax profit was adjusted with negative NOK 84.6 million, related to unrealized changes in the company's hedging portfolio, resulting in an adjusted net profit of NOK 68.2 million, down from NOK 151.4 million last year. This gives us an adjusted EPS of NOK 1.84, compared to NOK 4.08 last year. By following the dividend policy, the board decided to pay out the NOK 1.29 in dividends per share for the first quarter. Let's have a look at cash flow. The total net cash flow from operations in the first quarter amounted to positive NOK 182 million.
CapEx for the period was NOK 64.4 million, NOK 57.5 million of this was development CapEx related to our new mining level, as well as assets to be used in Fe65 project and the increased magnetite production project. The remaining NOK 7 million of the CapEx is related to scheduled investments in machines, building improvements, et cetera, classified as typical maintenance CapEx. Of financial activities, NOK 158 million was payout of dividends for the fourth quarter of 2023, and approximately NOK 11 million was payout of the principal portion of the lease liabilities. All in all, that gives us a negative change in cash of NOK 52 million for the first quarter. Let's have a look at, shortly a look at our financial position. Regarding the financial position, we still considered it to be strong.
After the dividend distribution for the fourth quarter of 2023, our equity ratio was 50.3%. And by the end of the first quarter, the total cash holding was NOK 252 million. Regarding cash, note that during the second quarter of 2024, the company's cash holdings will be affected by a larger tax settlement of approximately NOK 50 million related to an ongoing discussion that we have with the Norwegian tax authorities. For more details regarding the tax issue, please see the interim report, as well as note 922 in the annual report for 2023. Then I think that concludes the financial section, and I will leave the word back to Gunnar for his final, final remarks.
Thank you, Erlend. We have now given you an overview of our performance in the first quarter. To sum up, the quarter was characterized by high product quality and high production, both in mine and in the processing plant. Headwinds from external factors were decline in iron ore prices from strong levels in fourth quarter, and delayed shipment at the end of the quarter affected the revenue negatively. The board of directors decided to pay out NOK 1.29 in dividend for the first quarter, which means 13 consecutive quarters in a row since we became public. We are optimistic and excited to continue creating value to our shareholders, employees, and the local community going forward. This concludes our presentation. Now, over to our investor relations, who will take us through the Q&A session.
Thank you, Erlend and Gunnar. I will stop sharing here now and try to find the questions. I will start with one question to Gunnar, and that's related to the production impact and the maintenance stop now in June. What impact can we expect on production due to the planned maintenance stop in second quarter? And when can we expect to see the effects on Fe65?
The planned maintenance stop will, of course, affect the volume of produced, both ore and, concentrate. We have a stop of, around 12 days in production. This is planned for a long time, and it extremely important due to the uplift of quality that has, been announced up to Fe65. So, so that will, of course, affect the volume. Regarding the uplift of Fe65, we still announce that we are on track with that, but of course, the, the installations in this summer will be important for, for the result, at the end of the year. But we are, optimistic that we will reach our goals, that has been announced, all the time.
Thank you. Next question, I think you, Erlend, could take that. It goes on price stability and Q2 results. If prices remain at current levels, can we expect a similar increase in the second quarter result as the negative effect observed in this quarter?
I don't think I'll give a short yes or no answer to that, but what I can say is that prices have increased going into the second quarter, and obviously, dollar to dollar, if the difference is actually the same, the positive effect will be the same as the negative effect going into the first quarter. So, and that's due to the lag effect that we have on shipments that is being settled the quarter after they leave our harbor. So given an uplift, they will be settled at higher prices than they have been provisionally booked by the end of the first quarter, which was the negative effect that we got from the fourth quarter into the first quarter with the declining market. So in an increasing market, obviously, there will be a similar positive effect.
Thank you. Electrification timeline. I think, Gunnar, could you provide more details about the timeline for the electrification of the railways?
Yes. Regarding the railway electrification, we had some positive signal from the Norwegian authorities that has planned their plans, waiting for political settlement on that. But the signals are very positive that the stretch that from where down up to our mines will be fully electrified. That will, of course, be very positive for us in our CO2 two through to a zero emission from our operations. It will take somewhat more longer time than anticipated, but the positive outcome of this is that we will our CapEx need for this operation will be reduced, and so we are very happy for that.
Thank you. The last question I have gotten is related to the increased cash cost. Erlend, can you say something about the reasons behind the increased cash cost compared to the same period last year?
Sure. I've touched a little bit upon it on the presentation, but I'll give a little bit more detail and a bit more detailed breakdown, I guess. So if you look at the absolute delta between the first quarter of last year and this quarter, roughly 50% of the increase is due to the normalization of the power cost that we have. We had a highly favorable hedging positions on electric power in 2023, giving us a lower cash cost. So 50% of the increase is related to the normalization of that, and we also saw quite high power cost as a standalone in Q1. 25% , roughly, of the remaining 50% of the delta is related to the mining activity.
We had a favorable, conditions in the open pits and in the underground mine. In the first quarter, so we moved a lot of rock, due to the situation. And then the remaining 25% of the delta is due to the strategic initiatives, the, the projects that we have, the activities on those, planning to the maintenance stops, Easter holiday, and, and cost related to that, and as well, are partially related to inflation and wages and stuff like that.
Thank you. That was all the questions for today. Our next report will be 27th of August. And if you have any further questions, please send us an email at ir@ranagruber.no.