Good morning, and welcome to this presentation of SCA's year-end results for 2022. With me here today, I have President and CEO, Ulf Larsson, and CFO, Andreas Ewertz, to go through the results and take your questions. Over to you, Ulf.
Thank you, Anders, and good morning also from my side. Warm welcome to the presentation of the results for the full year, but also for the fourth quarter, 2022. When I summarize last year, I can state that we have delivered the best year ever. We reached SEK 10.2 billion on EBITDA level, and by that, the 49% profit margin. We have had a strong demand and high prices for all our products in combination with good cost control. We have also benefited from a high degree of self-sufficiency in wood, energy, and logistics. Together, this has created a strong cash flow from which we have been able to finance all investments, including strategic.
Our two major investment projects in Obbola Ortviken have both started up during last year, approximately 1 quarter ahead of plan, and we are now in an exciting startup phase. The new OCC line, which is needed to reach full capacity in Obbola, is scheduled according to the original plan and will be up and running during the 1st half of this year to meet the planned startup curve. In addition, I can also mention that our reinvestment in a new grading mill at Bollsta Sawmill is finalized, and the trimming phase has started according to plan. Sorry. From 1st of January this year, we will start to disclose our new segment, Renewable Energy. The reason behind this is that we already today have a leading producer of renewable energy, and we annually produce 12 terawatt hours of bioenergy.
We have 20% of installed capacity of wind power on SCA land. We have a big ongoing investment in biofuels that will start up Q4 this year. As we've said earlier, we have the ambition to grow this segment further. We also recently announced that we have acquired our first wind farm in the northern part of Sweden. The capacity today in Skogsberget, which is the name of the wind farm, is approximately 200 gigawatt hours. After repowering, we expect the capacity to double or triple.
The price level of forest land has continued to rise. When we follow our described model based on transaction prices in our region for setting the market price, we can state that the total value has increased from SEK 84.5 billion, December 31, 2021, to almost SEK 98 billion, same date, 2022. Finally, EBITDA increased 12% in comparison with last year due to higher selling prices and a stable cost base. Sales increased during the same period by 10% due to higher prices. Turning over to some financial KPIs related to the full year 2022. As just mentioned, our EBITDA increased by 12% in comparison with last year and reached SEK 10.2 billion for 2022. That corresponds to a 49% EBITDA margin.
Our industrial return on capital employed came out on 40% for the full year 2022, which is 7 percentage points higher than 2021. The leverage is stable at 1, despite our almost finalized large ongoing investment projects in Obbola, Ortviken, and Bollsta, and so on. We continue to finance all our investments, including strategic projects, with our operating cash flow. The proposed dividend for the AGM to decide is 2.50 SEK per share, and this is in line with our aspiration to give a stable and increasing dividend. Last year, we gave 2.25 SEK as an ordinary dividend and then an extra dividend of 1 SEK. Last but not least, the earnings per share went up by 14% in comparison with 2021 to 9.61 SEK per share.
This slide will give you an overview of KPIs for the fourth quarter 2022. When we compare quarter-on-quarter, we can note that our EBITDA reached close to SEK 2 billion during the fourth quarter 2022, which is 29% lower in comparison with a very strong Q4 2021. This gave us an EBITDA margin of 41% and an industrial return on capital employed of 24%, calculated as the average for the last 12 months. The leverage is, as already mentioned, stable at 1. I will make some comments for each segment, starting with the forest. During the fourth quarter, we have had a stable supply of wood raw materials to our industries.
In general, and also in our region, we can note a high demand of wood raw materials, and by that, also increasing wood prices, as you can see in the graph in the bottom left. When we compare the fourth quarter 2022 with the same quarter 2021, pulpwood prices have increased by almost 20%, and corresponding figure for sawlogs is around 15%. On the other hand, we can see that pulpwood prices in the Baltics have now started to come down from an all-time high level. When we compare quarter-on-quarter, EBITDA has decreased 15%, that is mainly driven by lower revaluation effect of biological assets. We have also seen cost inflation in transportation and harvesting, that is driven by high fuel prices.
On the positive side, we can note a high harvesting level in our own forest. Finally, we can note the continued high interest of purchased forest land in Sweden and in the Baltics. Andreas will come back to some data around that. Turning over to business area wood, in general, we have seen a low global demand during the fourth quarter last year. Anyway, in most markets, customers have finalized destocking and started to buy again. Building activities remained on a more or less normal level, but housing starts decreased during the end of last year. For SCA, we have maintained normal deliveries during the fourth quarter. Price levels for solid-wood products, as expected, hit the bottom in several markets during the fourth quarter last year.
I did communicate the price drop of 25% between Q3 and Q4, and that was also realized. As you can see in the graph, bottom left, prices on solid-wood products have come down substantially, while on the other hand, sawlog prices have gone the other way. My best guess for the coming quarter is that we will see more or less unchanged prices. Sales and EBITDA was substantially down due to price and cost of wood raw material when we compare quarter-on-quarter. Today's stock level of solid-wood products in Sweden and Finland is, in relation to the average for the last five years, described at the top left on this slide, and we note that inventory volumes are on a somewhat high level.
SCA, as mentioned, has maintained normal deliveries during the fourth quarter, and by that, we have a balanced stock at the end of the year. As can be seen in the diagram to the bottom left, the Swedish and Finnish sawmills production has been on the low side. Most producers in Scandinavia also announced production curtailments during the fourth quarter. When looking at the diagram to the top right, we can see that the price peaked in the third quarter 2021, and that was on a historically high level. Prices have come down substantially since then, and as I mentioned, at the same time, prices for sawlogs has increased with a major negative effect on the profitability. Some words about pulp.
Comparing quarter-on-quarter, all fundamentals like price and currency were better in the fourth quarter 2022 in comparison with the fourth quarter 2021. The result for the fourth quarter 2022 was up 36%, but it was negatively impacted by a planned, but also an unplanned production stop, which reduced both the volume and the energy production during the period. The estimated impact on EBITDA level is approximately SEK 260 million when we compare quarter-on-quarter. SEK 138 million out of that is related to the unplanned stop, and we will have a negative impact from this unplanned stop also in the first quarter this year, ascending to approximately another SEK 140 million.
The reason for the unplanned stop is significant disturbances in the fiber line and the recovery boiler at Östrand. There have been difficulties with the process conditions in the boiling process, which in turn has caused instability and leakage in the recovery boiler, which led to this unplanned stop. Now we are up and running again. The CTMP line at Ortviken is now on the ramp up, one quarter ahead of plan. We have, of course, a lot of fine-tuning left, but our goal is that the production shall reach at least 150,000 tons during this year. Full capacity achieved in 2025 will be closer to 300,000 tons. We see a weakening demand in the pulp market, mainly in Europe and also in China.
The European PIX price peaked in September, October last year, and that was close to $1,500 per ton. Since then, we have seen declining prices on all markets, and the price for deliveries to Europe in January is $1,410 per ton. One need to keep in mind that discounts in Europe have increased by approximately 2%-3%, while on the other hand, discounts in U.S. is on an unchanged level in comparison with last year. Today, we have a better net price in the U.S. in comparison with Europe and China. One reason might be that we note the weakening supply from competitors in Canada.
We have seen announcements of curtailments. That is mainly due to lack of fiber, also the cash cost situation for Canadian mills. Inventories for both hardwood and softwood pulp is, as you can see in the graphs, on a rather normal level. Finally, containerboard and the new Kraftliner paper machine in Obbola has started ahead of the time schedule in the last quarter last year. The successful startup was affecting the production volume and the costs negatively in the fourth quarter in comparison with the fourth quarter 21. Of course, long term, this will create a good foundation for a highly successful project.
As mentioned before, overall, this is a unique project, also based on the fact that we have delivered a strong cash flow throughout the whole project since it started. The new recovered fiber line, which is a necessity to reach full capacity in Obbola, is progressing according to plan, and that one is planned to be ready in first half of 2023. As earlier communicated, we expect to reach full capacity in Obbola in 2026. Sales was up quarter on quarter due to high prices, while EBITDA was down by 13%, mainly due to the effects of an early start up causing lower production and delivery volumes for Q4 2022. Of course, higher energy costs had a negative impact on the result for container board.
After a long period of increasing prices for Kraftliner with a peak in Q3 last year, we have now started to see decreasing prices. One can note some reasons for that. If we start with the demand, it has declined in the fourth quarter, mainly related to lower retail sales, which has led to lower demand of boxes. Europe is facing a double-digit inflation, and that will of course lead to reduced purchasing power. Deliveries of Kraftliner have decreased significantly, 8%, in the fourth quarter 2022 compared with the fourth quarter 2021, and that is by otherwise similar to the box demand. Secondly, natural gas prices have come down sharply from the peak in August 2022, and that released the cost pressure for Testliner producers.
At the same time, availability of OCC is good and demand lower due to reduced production of Testliner. Availability of OCC will gradually decline when lower box consumption is translated into less availability of OCC. Today's price for OCC is around EUR 65 per ton, and that is more or less EUR 120 per ton lower than the peak price in July 2022. The price for unbleached Kraftliner has decreased by EUR 90 per ton in Q4 2022. Testliner prices have decreased somewhat more, and the price gap between Kraftliner and Testliner today is around EUR 155 per ton, which I think is a rather normal gap. During the same period, the price for Kraftliner White Top has decreased with EUR 30 per ton.
Despite the lower demand, inventories have been kept on a stable level during the fourth quarter by producers reducing supply. We would estimate production to be around 10% lower in the fourth quarter 2022 in comparison with the fourth quarter 2021. By other words, inventories of container board are still on a high level, no doubt about that, but they have not increased more than according to a normal seasonal effect due to the mentioned production curtailments. By that, I hand over to Andreas.
Thank you, Ulf, and good morning, everybody. I will start off with the forest valuation. Forest prices in Northern Sweden continue to increase. In the graph, we have the development of forest prices in SCA's region according to Svefa and Ludvig & Company. The prices have increased over SEK 400 per cubic meter. In SCA's forest valuation, we used a three-year average price, which has increased by 13% to SEK 366 per cubic meter. The valuation of SCA's forest increased by over SEK 13 billion to SEK 98 billion in 2022. The increase was driven both by the price increase of 13% and the increase of standing volume by 2% to 267 million cubic meters, approximately SEK 1.8 billion and through the P&L.
We move on to the income statement and focus on the full year to the right, net sales grew by 10% to SEK 20.8 billion, mainly driven by higher prices. EBITDA increased a record high of SEK 10.2 billion, corresponding to a margin of 49%. The EBIT margin increased to 42% and financial items totaled SEK -39 million. We had an effective tax rate around 20%, bringing net profit to SEK 6.8 billion or 9.6 SEK per share, which is the highest ever. You look at the fourth quarter to the left, EBITDA declined to just below SEK 2 billion, corresponding to a margin of just below 41%.
The decrease was mainly driven by lower prices in wood and the production stopped at Östrand, which impacted results with SEK 138 million. Net profit for the quarter, total SEK 1.2 billion, SEK 1.76 per share. Looking at the dividend, we have proposed dividend of SEK 2.5 per share, a 25 odd increase compared to the ordinary dividend last year, which is line with our target to have a stable and increasing dividend over time. On the next slide, we have the sales bridge for the full year. Prices increased 12%. Record high prices in pulp and containerboard were partly offset by lower prices in wood. Volumes declined 3%, mainly driven by a weaker wood market and the start-up of the new paper machine in Obbola.
Currency had a positive impact of 4%. Exit publication paper had a negative impact of 3%. Moving on to the EBITDA bridge, price mix had the biggest impact of SEK 2.3 billion, driven by higher prices in pulp and containerboard. Volumes had a negative impact of SEK 340 million, driven by a weaker wood market and a start-up of the new paper machine in Obbola. Higher cost of wood, raw material, and chemicals had a negative impact of SEK 980 million, while higher energy costs had a neutral impact, which really shows our high sales efficiency post-exit publication paper. We had a positive impact from currency and a negative impact from higher fuel prices. In total, EBITDA increased 12% to approximately SEK 10.2 billion, corresponding to a margin of 49%.
On the next slide, we have the financial development by segment. Start with the forest segment to the left. Net sales increased to SEK 6.7 billion, and EBITDA increased to SEK 2.7 billion, mainly driven by higher pulpwood and sawlog prices, which was partly offset by increased fuel costs. In wood, we had another strong year with an EBITDA of SEK 2.1 billion, corresponding to a margin of 31%. EBITDA was driven by a very strong first 6 months, while the market deteriorated during the second half of the year, with prices going down 20% in Q3 and another 25% in Q4, as Ulf mentioned. In pulp, we had a record high year where net sales increased to SEK 7.2 billion and EBITDA increased to almost SEK 3 billion, corresponding to a margin of 41%.
In the fourth quarter, we had the unplanned production stop at Östrand, which impact results with SEK 138 million in lower volume and reduced energy production. The stop will impact Q1 with a similar amount, as Ulf mentioned. In containerboard, we had a record high EBITDA of almost SEK 2.9 billion, corresponding to a margin of 42%. This is despite having lower volumes and start-up costs relating to the ongoing ramp-up of the new paper machine. On the next slide, we have the sales bridge between Q4 last year and Q4 this year. Prices decreased 5%, lower prices in wood was offset by higher prices in pulp and containerboard. Volumes increased 1%, where higher volumes in wood and pulp was offset by lower volumes in containerboard due to the start-up of the new paper machine.
Lastly, currency had a positive impact of 7%. Look at the EBITDA bridge for the fourth quarter, starting to the left, price mix had a negative impact of SEK 330 million, mainly driven by lower prices in wood. Higher volumes in wood and pulp was offset by lower volumes in containerboard, again, due to the start-up of the new paper machine. Higher cost for wood, raw material, and chemicals had a negative impact of SEK 400 million, and higher energy cost had a negative impact of SEK 70 million, mainly relating to lower electricity production at Östrand due to the production stop. We had a positive impact from currency and a negative impact from higher fuel prices and start-up costs in CTMP, where we now had a full organization in place.
In total, EBITDA decreased to just below SEK 2 billion, corresponding to a margin of 41%. We had another year with strong operating cash flow, almost SEK 5.7 billion in 2022, compared to SEK 5.2 billion in 2021. This means we're continuing to fund our strategic investments with operating cash flow. In the quarter, we had several large strategic CapEx payments, Obbola investment of around SEK 800 million, acquisition of the wind farm in Markbygden of SEK 800 million, forest land in the Baltics of SEK 400 million, and a CTMP investment of SEK 300 million. Looking at the balance sheet, the value of the forest asset increased to SEK 98 billion. Working capital increased to SEK 4 billion due to higher prices. Total capital employed increased to SEK 106 billion, and net debts to SEK 10 billion, 1x EBITDA.
Equity increased to SEK 96 billion. Net debt to equity was 10%. Renewable Energy will be reported as a new segment in 2023. On this slide, we have the EBITDA impact on each segment for 2022. Starting with forest segment to the left, unprocessed biofuels and wind power leases will be reported in Renewable Energy. The pro forma effect for 2002 was approximately SEK 90 million. In wood, pellets will be reported in Renewable Energy, which had an impact of approximately SEK 130 million. Pulp and containerboard sell tall oil for a fossil-based price to Renewable Energy, was responsible to maximize the value of the green premium. The impact was around SEK 80 million in pulp and SEK 60 million in containerboard. In total, Renewable Energy had a pro forma EBITDA of SEK 355 million.
From January, our new wind farm will be included, and from late next year, also our investment in liquid biofuels. Thank you. With that, I'll hand back to you, Ulf.
Thank you. If I try to give it a short version, I mean, 2022 has been the best year ever, SEK 10.2 billion, 49% EBITDA margin. We have been able to finance our ongoing investment projects by our operating cash flow. Our two major investment projects, they are now up and running. Of course, we still need to do some fine-tuning and so on, but nevertheless, producing prime products for the market. From this year, we will start to disclose Renewable Energy as a separate segment, which is interesting. We also announced end of last year that we have taken the first investment decision in our own wind power capacity in Markbygden. Last but not least, we see a substantial increase of the value for forest land. By that, I think I open up for questions, please.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, if you wish to ask a question at this time, please signal by pressing star one. Please make sure the mute function on your phone is switched off to allow your signal to reach our equipment. Again, it is star one to ask a question. The first question comes from Robin Santavirta from Carnegie. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much. Hello to everybody. My first question is related to the wood segment and to pricing out there. I guess you call for unchanged prices of sawn timber now in Q1, Q2 after the declines we had last year in H2. Is this now in your view, the bottom of this cycle? When should we expect the prices to increase? What is the best leading indicator for us to look at for the pricing? Those in wood segment.
Yeah. It is hard to say, really. I mean, yes, I think we have reached the bottom. I thought that already in the third quarter, and the estimation at that time was that we should the price should decrease by 25% from the third quarter to the fourth quarter, and that came through. The best guess we have now is that we will see unchanged prices for the first quarter next year, this year. I think that we might see an upward trend in the second quarter, but that is too early to say. What we see as now in the market, at least in Sweden, is that prices, I mean, they are still on a
If you look to the prices in a historical view, they are on a reasonable, okay level. Log prices has come up substantially. I thought about 15%-20% in 1 year. I mean, 70% of the cost for a sawmill is related to raw materials. I mean, that put the pressure on the profitability in the sawmill. That you can also see now when, I mean, when more companies will release the results, that they will be very close to zero cash flow. I mean, that cannot continue for a long while, of course. I think we have found some kind of balance in the market now, and we will remain on this level.
Of course, again, you don't know what will happen with cost inflation, interest rates, and all that kind of things. Personally, I think that we have reached the bottom.
I understand. Thank you very much. We could see yesterday a smaller sawmill reported numbers in the red already in Sweden, you guys more efficient obviously and black figures still. Related to that the higher log costs, should we expect log costs to start to decline already now in Q1 or perhaps is it Q2? What is the outlook for pulpwood for this year?
I think that is tricky to say, really. I mean, we ourselves, we increased prices in the beginning of this week. Again, for us, it's not a very big issue because, I mean, we take 50% of what we need, we take from our own forests. I mean, we are in a rather good position in this perspective. Again, if you don't have a good profitability industry, then of course, prices on raw materials will start to come down sooner or later. It's hard to say when it will happen. Normally, it you have some kind of lagging effect of 6 months and it will be just now how to say.
I mean, in Sweden, we have also seen that Sveaskog, they reduced the harvesting level by 1.5 million cubic meters. We have 10 million cubic meters. They are not coming from Russia, Belarus and so on. That have also an impact. You have a slightly different balance this year in comparison with the past.
Right. the increase you made, I guess, you know, was that for log?
That was, yeah, that was both for sawlogs and pulpwood in the northern region. I mean, we have seen other companies, they have done more or less the same thing.
Thanks. The final question I have seems like Obbola has come off very well to production. Should we expect that 500,000 tons produced in Obbola this year still? Is that a good sort of outlook still?
If we can reach 500,000 the first year, that will be a big success of course. As said, I mean, the bottleneck just now is the recovery line and that one is now under construction. We have 200 entrepreneurs on site and also that part of the project is running well. That was positive. As mentioned, I mean, we took some extra, as you always have to do when you ramp up, you have to take some extra costs related to. When you start up, I mean, you struggle somewhat. It has been a fantastic journey so far. We have between 60,000 and 80,000 tons now out in the market of prime products and with a very good reaction from our customers. So far it has been a fantastic project really.
That is good to hear. Thank you very much.
The next question comes from Linus Larsson from SEB. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much and good morning to everyone. Couple of question on wind. Maybe starting off with Markbygden, if you could share with us what the EBIT and/or EBITDA was from that recently acquired operation in full year 2022, please.
If you look at the wind acquisition, the capacity is just below 200 gigawatt hours. I mean, it all depends on what electricity price you assume. If you take the price that you assume for 2023, multiply the volume, the margins for wind power is very high, is 60%-70% range.
The reason for us to acquiring just that project was that we have a good potential for repowering. I think that's most important. I mean, in, of course, again, depending on the prices and price development, but you have good conditions for repowering this area. You have good capacity in the net and so on. In 5, 10, 15 years, you can double or triple the capacity with, I mean, no big investment means that. That's, I mean, that is the big potential in this project. Also it will help to maintain our self-sufficiency. Now we're ramping up Sundsvall and Obbola production. Our electricity usage will increase. Because of the wind farm market, the big data will help to balance that again.
Right. Right. Right. but you're not share... Is it, is it hedged? Are you giving any kind of indication what to expect in the first quarter, what the contribution is from this?
It's not hedged. You can look at Nord Pool and look at the wind prices in the SE in one area to get a feeling of the numbers.
Are you planning on more similar M&A in the coming year?
As I said earlier, I mean, we plan to build up a capacity of, let's say 3 terawatt hours in 10 years. It might be acquisitions, but I mean, we are much more focused on organic growth. We think that we have a better margin in organic projects, and we are working hard on that one.
Mm-hmm. What's the timeline, do you think, on that when... I understand it's to do with permitting processes, et cetera. When will you start investing in repowering in, for instance, Markbygden?
I mean, that depends on the price development and what kind of conditions you have. I mean, as always, we take it step by step. I think if you can take 3 terawatt hours and divide by 10, that is more or less the target we have.
Okay. No CapEx relating to this in the coming year at least?
You can just multiply with a, with a, you know, approximately the CapEx cost per terawatt hour or gigawatt hour and so then you get a feeling of it.
Right. Okay. What's your CapEx guidance for the group as a whole for 2023?
If I start with current CapEx, we had this year, we had just about SEK 1.4 billion, but we have some CapEx that went down to the other, to 2023. We were expecting SEK 1.5 billion. I would guess around SEK 1.6 billion in current CapEx for 2023. If you look at our strategic CapEx, we have around SEK 1 billion-SEK 1.5 billion left in our ongoing decided projects in Sundsvall, Obbola, the biorefinery in Gothenburg and some forest acquisitions. It depends on if we do any other investments, but SEK 1 billion-SEK 1.5 billion on already decided CapEx.
For twenty twenty-three, that is?
Yeah.
Okay. Okay. Excellent. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Our next question comes from Oskar Lindström from Danske Bank. Please go ahead.
Yes, good morning, gentlemen. Couple of questions. First on the forest land market in Sweden, what was the what did you see in the market in the second half of the year and what's your outlook or your expectation for 2023? The second question is on, cost inflation outlook for 2023 and especially concerning chemicals, which I believe is often quite closely tied to energy. You know, how do you see that momentum developing? Just a third question on the, Markbygden wind farm. I mean, so you have no immediate plans for any investments there, is that correct?
I start to comment on the forest prices, if you compare the prices for the first 6 months compared to the second 6 months, prices increased slightly during the second half of the year. So far we have, the prices have continued to increase on a high level. I don't know you want to comment, Ulf?
No, I'm fine.
For the second question on cost inflation, as Ulf mentioned, pulpwood and sawlog prices are continuing to increase during the beginning of this year, that's of course our biggest cost. We get half that back from our own forest. If we look at chemicals, the chemical prices are still very high and continuing to increase, especially sodium hydroxide. As you said, it will also depend on development of energy. If we look at transportation cost, and oil, they are starting to come down, also OCC prices have started to come down. They're now at the index around EUR 65 per ton. It's a mix. Some costs are still going up, some have peaked and are starting to come down.
About third question, we have no immediate plan for investments in Markbygden. I mean, it is a rather modern wind park and now we will learn how to operate it in the best way and but no investments during the coming short term at least.
Thanks. If I may, just a final question on the sawn timber market in Europe. Are you seeing, sort of, some sawmills starting to take downtime or reduce production significantly? I know there were some announcements during the second half of last year, I'm not sure to what extent they actually came about.
I mean, it's hard to say, but I believe, maybe around 10% during the fourth quarter and, as someone mentioned, I mean, now we see red figures and negative cash flow, I mean, that will not continue. Then I think we will see more closures. You have a rather I don't know if I have seen this before when solar prices continue to rise and at the same time we have more or less, we are in the bottom in the price for solid-wood products. The combination here is not sustainable, I would say. That's the reason why I think that we have, we have reached the bottom, when it comes to prices for solid-wood products.
I think also we have some kind of lagging effect, when it comes to prices for sawlogs. Again, it is impacted now by, not the least by, the reduced harvesting level at Sveaskog and again, we have a different situation also when it comes to the Russian flow and so on.
Thank you.
Our next question comes from Cole Hathorn from Jefferies. Please go ahead.
Morning. Thanks for the color. Could you give some views on what segments or areas you're seeing on demand for the containerboard markets? I know you mentioned deliveries down -8 and production down -10 across the industry to kind of balance inventory levels, but any color you can talk about on the end markets for demand on containerboard? Linked to that, what are you seeing from imports from the U.S. players? You know, the import data hasn't really picked up as much, and I'm just wondering if there's any particular reason or your thoughts on the imports from the U.S. as well. Thank you.
I mean, it's hard to say really. I mean, the figure that we have got is that e-commerce went down 6% during last year and that is also at least estimation for the first half of this year. You saw the graph on box consumption, and that one also came down on the other end more to the trend line. I think maybe we see more. Yeah, it's hard to say what will happen there. It is a rather balanced situation when we compare what we see in box demand with the reduction in Kraftliner. As I said, some companies, they have already started to reduce capacity here. The inventory level is on a high level, but it was positive that we had a rather stable situation over Christmas.
Normally, you have a negative seasonal effect when it comes to the stock level, over Christmas, but this year was rather stable. When it comes to the import, I believe that we have more or less the same flow from U.S. down to the southern part of Europe as we've had before, and that is not no major volumes. It's rather tiny flow, I would say.
Maybe just an open question, but you know, the cost curve for containerboard effectively steepened, and players that are lower down the cost curve are much better positioned at the moment. How do you see this industry reacting? Will it be kind of a two-tier market where the lower players can, you know, run to demand, keep good operating rates and, you know, the high-cost players set the price and will have a lot more variable production with energy volatility and just remain under a lot of pressure even though, low-cost producer can still earn good margins? How do you see the dynamics playing out? Thank you.
I mean, I don't like to comment too much, but you can look into the figures that will be presented now coming weeks. I mean, you can see that we still are on a rather good level when it comes to our containerboard business, and we disclosed it very transparent. You can see other place where... They have become close to, yeah, single-digit figures and... Then, of course, when you're cash negative, then you start to take curtailments. No doubt about that. What we see as now, and that is a different situation in comparison what we had six months ago, and that is the situation for Testliner. I mean, I think we peaked,
in the cost for energy peaked in August, September last year. Now we know that natural gas prices, they are on a, let's say, decent level at least. As Andrean mentioned, I mean, the price for OCC has come down from EUR 180 down to EUR 60 or something like that. I think it will not decrease much further. I think we are more or less at the bottom. Still I think the Testliner producers today, they have a rather strong profitability in comparison with Kraftliner producers. Of course, depending on what kind of sites you have and cash cost position and so on, but in general.
I have to quickly comment on the cost position. I mean, Obbola was, even before the investment, the largest Kraftliner machine in Europe. After the ramp up, it will be even bigger than the competition. We have a good cash cost position. You can also see it, as Ulf mentioned, if you compare our EBITDA margin to some other players.
You have to keep in mind that during this ramp-up period, normally you have a negative cash flow during a ramp-up period. We have delivered a substantial cash flow throughout the whole project. Of course, we will have some kind of impact of the during this ramp-up phase. I mean, it is. If we see something that is wrong or not perfect, then we stop and we take care of that. We start up again. That is what we have to do now during the ramp-up phase.
Thank you.
Our next question comes from Christian Kopfer from Handelsbanken. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Thanks, thanks, operator. I'd like to add one follow-up question. I think you talked about the repowering potential, and we have talked about it before as well. Have you received any initial response from municipalities and so on? I mean, still you will increase the turbine size is quite material, I guess, and it, and the windmills will become quite much much bigger. Have you received any response to those projects that you are planning to repower?
Do you mean in general or do you just mean Markbygden?
Yeah, in general.
Yeah, yeah, in general. Okay.
Yeah.
I think that, again, it is not so easy to get the permission to build up a new wind farm. From my point of view, I think all including politicians, they realize that it is much easier to get the permission to replace old inefficient turbines with new and bigger in already existing places. I think that might not be a big problem, I would say. Of course, you need some kind of permission process. What we are fighting for just now is to reduce the number of years in order to get the new permission. I think that should be done in 6 months or so. Just now we don't know what kind of time it will take. I think in that perspective, we have a good response from politicians and we also have ongoing discussions here in this field.
Just finally then, because I guess what or when you built or when the operators built the wind farms initially, they had one, I mean, they had to build a transmission according to the turbine size, right? Does this mean that you have to invest quite significantly into new transmission from the parks?
that depend
Yeah, that's a good question, and that depends. I mean, that was the reason why we went for Markbygden. I mean, you have a higher value in a wind farm where you have a stronger net and a strong capacity in the net because then you don't need to take this kind of extra investments. If you have a limitation in the net then of course, then you need to do extra investments, and then you can also be dependent on other actors. That's the reason why we choose the Markbygden, and that's also how we try to choose other projects. We try to find projects with good net capacity in order to have the flexibility.
Yep. Yep. Thank you so very much.
Thank you.
Thank you. As a reminder, to ask a question, please signal by pressing star 1. Our next question comes from Martin Melby from ABG. Please go ahead.
Good morning. My questions have been answered now. Say, the startup of Obbola CTMP and the biofuel, could you indicate which quarter that will have an impact on EBIT, please?
If we start with Obbola, I mean, we are current running at around the same volume as the old machine, slightly lower in Q4. I think as we mentioned, Ulf mentioned that our target is around 500,000 tons on Obbola for this year compared to 450,000-460,000 tons last year. We're gradually ramping up Obbola, and when the volume increases, we'll also get a EBIT contribution. If we look at the biorefinery in Gothenburg, that will be finalized during the end of the year. That will be starting Q4. We'll get some volumes from the biorefinery. CTMP, I mean, we are just starting to ramp up now, so we will not expect any significant contribution from CTMP during Q1. Now, it'll be fairly similar to what we had in Q4.
Then again, you have to keep in mind when you ramp up, you might see some surprises and things like that, and we have to fix that. I think don't be too positive to what kind of impact we will have this first year. Give us this year, I think next year we'll see substantial impact on the result.
Exactly. there was no positive effect in Q4 from the startup of the 2 ones?
No, there's a rather a negative effect since we have startup costs. As Ulf mentioned, we run, and then we find something this way to be fine-tuned, and then we stop, fix that and then start the machine again. You lose the volumes, but you also, you're not running on optimal costs when you have to start and stop, and that's a normal part of the ramp-up. The investments have affected EBITDA negatively during Q4.
And again, that is very positive long term because that has created a good foundation for a very successful project, and that goes for both the Obbola and also for the CTMP project and Bollsta and so on. I mean, basically this is very positive good news. We have some extra costs earlier than we thought, but that is due to the fact that we are ahead of plan.
Excellent. Thank you.
Thank you. There are currently no further questions in the queue.
That concludes the presentation for the full year results for 2022. Thank you very much for listening in, and welcome back in April when we present our first quarter results for 2023. Thank you.