Good morning, dear listeners. Welcome to Klaipėdos Nafta investor relations conference. I'm Paulius from Nasdaq Vilnius, and I'll be moderating today's event. We will start with a presentation from the management, which will be followed by the Q&A session. Please be informed that this webinar is being recorded and will be available for a rewatch on Nasdaq Baltic YouTube channel. As always, I encourage everyone of you to share your questions in the Q&A section at the bottom of your screen, and you can submit them either anonymously or with your name. With that said, I'm pleased to introduce today's presenters: the Chief Executive Officer of Klaipėdos Nafta, Darius Šilenskis, and acting Chief Financial Officer, Vaidotas Dirmeikis. Darius, please, the floor is yours.
Thank you, and good morning to all participants who joined us today. As usual, we would like to start our presentation by reminding our vision and our mission, but expecting that there is at least one new participant in today's audience who is not yet aware of the purpose and the strategy of KN Energies. Soon. So one more time to remind that our vision is to be at the forefront of energy transformation in the region and globally, to support it for our customers, and to become climate neutral ourselves latest by 2050.
While our mission stands for offering services to our customers for a wide range of various products: liquid energy products, petrochemicals, feedstocks, and of course enabling decarbonization in the region and being ready to provide services for our customers in a future energy mix by handling, storing future energy sources and future energy fuels, and continuing to assure energy security in Lithuania for the Lithuanian state, for Lithuanian businesses, and of course for Lithuanian and maybe even regions, people. And finally, we are continuing our, let's say, global footprint or global presence direction and developing LNG terminals and other sustainable energy infrastructure projects. So going further, as usual, I would like to highlight the main events which took time during Q3. And during Q3, we have finalized the selection of operations and maintenance service provided for our FSRU Independence following the takeover.
I'm pleased to announce that after a rigorous international tender, we have decided to continue our partnership with Höegh LNG. We possess extensive expertise in operating this type of floating terminals as being actually the biggest FSRU owner in the world, meaning having also the biggest experience in this field. Also, we now regulated activities operating FSRU in Lithuania. Another good news came out where a regulator approved a higher WAC starting in 2024, and this will allow us to ensure needed investments into this crucial for the entire region energy infrastructure and also to think about sustainability-related investments, which we will definitely need once we will become full owners of this asset. By understanding that during the regasification process, there are quite a lot of emissions.
Klaipėda was also visible in the LNG world with another great event where KN was hosting global LNG terminal managers in an annual conference here in Klaipėda. Last but not the least, we are finally changing our legal name to KN Energies, which is a natural continuity of our strategic changes together with a new strategy. It is not a rebranding, but I think it's very important for us because we are quite a long time already not only Klaipėda and definitely not only oil or nafta. Let's move to a short business overview before we will get to the numbers. We will start. I will start from going through the key highlights from liquid energy terminals. Continuing diversification and variety of provided services and handling liquid fuels, petrochemicals, and biofuels was again a key driver during Q3.
And also, let's say, our newest development activities in Marijampolė started to contribute to this business segment's performance, let's say, more tangible. Also, recovery in mainly petroleum fuels consumption was also one of the factors positively affecting the result during Q3. Bitumen infrastructure, which I can say it's still quite new, but it performs really well. And after the war has started and Russian bitumen was restricted or even banned in some regions, growth of the services in this area was quite significant where our transshipment in bitumen infrastructure was 42% more compared with the same period 2022. Let's move on with our business stream and talking about regulated activities. The amount of gas actually provided to the grid from our FSRU Independence was quite similar to previous year's figures.
In comparison with the trends in Europe, with other terminals in Europe, we were one of the leaders of available capacity utilization. Actually, you know, we are matching all possible demand in our market. Also, I mean, about 80% of the entire gas flow, which was in Lithuania, came through our infrastructure. Talking about the prices of gas, gas prices stabilized to close 40s level. This is the reason of record high storage levels in gas storages across Europe, meaning that even though the winter is coming, shortages are not expected. Talking about our commercial LNG, let's move further. Talking about our commercial LNG activities, the main message here is that we are continuing to grow and increase our revenues from this business stream.
And revenues were growing from our commercial LNG activities, which includes both global LNG projects and also small-scale terminal activity in Klaipėda. So revenues were growing by 35%, which again confirms that our strategic direction to monetize our know-how pays back. Okay, so talking about the following slide, since we are obliged to provide ESG-related data and we are one of the forefront with CSR reports already for the second or third year in a row, we decided to include some information to investors into our quarterly presentations. So it's not a question about the importance of such, let's say, activity since we are still operating or a lot of businesses are related with fossil. And that means that an important part of our activity is continuing efforts to further minimize our climate footprint.
Despite huge actually progress during recent years on energy efficiency and reductions of emissions from our activities, we are managing further to decrease our CO₂ footprint in comparison to the same period last year. We have managed to minimize emissions within nine months of 2023 by an additional 9%. I would like to remind that our strategy is to become climate neutral by 2050. Until 2030, the interim goal is to reach 30% ambition on emissions reduction, which, as I said previously, taking into consideration that we are becoming owners of FSRU is quite a challenging goal to achieve. Talking about the other part of ESG, about the social part. Emphasis on the social component of ESG is also one of our key areas of attention.
Efforts in safety, culture improvement, and investments into this area allow us to continue safe and reliable operations in all our terminals. We use TRCF as a metric to measure our performance. I believe that with the reserve of optimism, of course, we are in a good position to reach ambition for this year, which is below 0.81. About methodology, there is a description of how it is used, how it is used, how it is calculated. But in general, it's the number of recordable incidents per 100 full-time workers during a 1 year period. It's an industry best practice. We decided also to use the same KPI, which represents the status of progress of a company in a field of social and safety part. Talking about statistics, so the entire KN group managed to work without any lost time incident for 250 days already.
As far as our strategy, 2050 defines clear ambition in the safety area. We will continue improvement in this field by dedicating proper resources and competencies and gaining additional knowledge from the best industry practice and professionals. Finally, in the governance part of ESG, the main highlight for the period which we are presenting today and the main achievement is actually that we received an A rate from the State Governance Center for the period 2022-2023. By methodology of this center, it's in general results achieved within Q3, Q4 of 2022, and Q1 and Q2 data is taken into consideration of 2023. We have managed to improve. The previous year it was A minus. Now we are back to A. We have managed to improve significantly even to the highest rate in a transparency dimension.
On this good note, I would like to pass the word for Vaidotas and to go through the numbers in a more detailed way.
Good morning, everyone. Thank you, Darius, for passing me the floor. I'm happy to report on the positive trends in our financial performance. During the first 9 months of 2023, the group has continued to maintain the improvement in overall financial performance. Liquid energy terminal commercial LNG activities have been the key drivers for success. It's very pleasant to see that the efforts which we are putting into efficiency of operations and at the same time efforts which we are putting to expand our footprint and reach globally, they are starting to pay off, bringing us better results. Revenues for the first nine months were up by more than 7%, EUR 1 million compared to the same period in 2022.
The main elements of this were EUR 3.8 million in LNG terminal as a regulated revenue. A key factor for change in the revenue was a significant increase in demand for regasification services in the terminal started in 2022 due to the war in Ukraine. Also, a change in a regulatory regime with the increase in the pricing to 1.0 pricing level to 1.41 EUR per megawatt hour. Also, during the first half of 2023, the company received almost EUR 1 million income related to penalties for unused capacity. However, as the profit from regulated activities remains limited to the regulated rate of return and temporary excess profits, according to the regulation, current regulation shall be paid back to the consumers in the future periods.
Plus EUR 1.9 million in liquid energy terminal segment revenue, mainly revenue increase mainly influenced by an increase in liquid energy product tank rent and handling gasoline, diesel, especially diesel related to dedicated to Ukraine, and also liquid biofuels. Another driver was a EUR 1.4 million increase improvement in commercial LNG activities segment revenue in addition to KN's LNG terminal operation income. LNG-related projects in Germany where we are commercially operating two of the three terminals and consulting revenues in Italy were received. At the same time, we have a slight increase in EBITDA by EUR 0.8 million, the main drivers being EUR 2.4 million improvement coming from liquid energy terminals and demonstrating a more than 40% increase, achieved mostly by diversified growth in revenue and implementation of cost efficiency measures. At the same time, stabilization of energy prices in the region and globally also made a positive impact.
Commercial LNG segment's profitability has improved by EUR 0.8 million, mainly with income from projects in Germany and Italy, as mentioned before. Unfortunately, the negative impact of EUR 2.5 million for regulated segment, mostly due to higher expenses. The regulated segment costs increased by EUR 6.1 million, of which EUR 2.45 million is an increase in the cost of emission allowances. Since our activity level is higher, we need more allowances to purchase more allowances. Also, EUR 1.0 million accrued customers' compensation that are recognized in 2023. FSRU expenses are higher by EUR 0.6 million due to inflation and higher OPEX maintenance costs. If we jump to net profit and loss, the appreciation of euro against the US dollar has a major effect on non-adjusted net profit during the nine months of 2023, according to IFRS.
A total analyzed exchange loss of EUR 700,000 less the fair tax was recognized this year, comparing to the loss of EUR 35.3 million during the same period in 2022. After eliminating analyzed currency exchange income of a regulated segment, its adjusted net profit amounts to EUR 1.1 million, EUR 1.2 million. The net profit of oil segment increased by EUR 2.5 million compared to the same period in 2022 due to already mentioned reasons. Orinta, if you could jump to another slide. Increasing other cash flows, mainly due to currency impact from lease liabilities, generated the positive effect of EUR 5 million. The recent health, nine months of a year, they are less intense with investment in projects. First CAPEX lower by EUR 1.3 million. If we can jump to another slide to discuss leverage metrics.
So our cash flow of EUR 44.5 million was deposited to short-term deposits, generating quite similar return. At the same time, no significant changes in the capital structure except for additional partial loan drawdown to finance reduction of the security supplement in the regulated segment. Also, during 9 months of 2023, EUR 53.4 million lease liabilities were settled during this period. And if we jump to the final present slide of financial presentation. So our gross profit margin has mostly maintained similar level compared to 2022. Net profit and EBITDA margins are slightly lower compared to previous period, mainly due to previously mentioned decrease in regulated LNG activities result. If we exclude regulated LNG activity results, group profitability ratios are on the recovery path.
Return on equity, return on assets, and P/E ratio for the 9th month of 2023 are affected by significant impairment losses recognized in Q3 of 2021. So that's all from my part about our financial performance. Looking into the future, we foresee that positive return continuing into the year-end. And we will gladly answer your questions together with Darius.
Thank you, Vaidotas. Thank you, Darius, for the comprehensive presentation. Now we will proceed with the questions. Before that, I would like to remind you that you can submit them in the question box at the bottom of your screen. The first couple of questions were submitted in advance. Let's start with the first one. How capable is the company of achieving its objectives in the 1-5 year range, taking into account geopolitical threats?
So I will take this question on me. It's quite a philosophical question because the level of threats or challenges in the geopolitical arena, which is neighboring our, let's say, country, is unpredictable. But the answer is very short from our end. We are capable. Of course, new strategy requires revision of the capacities, resources, and competencies, which we have. But I strongly believe that this company is ready to resist any challenge. Since the last 3 years, we survived COVID. We survived the Belarusian crisis. We survived losing Russian, let's say, flows. We adopted organization to, let's say we made organization leaner. We made organization much efficient. The good example was when I was talking about its CO₂ emissions. So yeah, this year, it's only 9%. But in general, within the last 3 years, it was actually by 2 times reduced energy consumption.
So we are ready to compete, I believe, from the terminaling companies, at least in this region, we are best positioned to, let's say, handle with threats. Of course, it's not my duty to comment risks like conventional war risks, which are depending on analytics. We are probably still on the table, but I believe this will not be the case, and we will be able to continue our activity smoothly. But maybe this question also involves some comment which is needed about safety of our infrastructure. So it's worth to mention that during this year, we significantly improved the status of physical safety maturity and status of all our terminals located in Lithuania, including anti-drone solutions and including underwater protection of our, let's say, marine infrastructure. So once again, we are ready.
Thank you, Darius, for the answer. In terms of the strategic objectives, a question is, are there any plans to expand beyond existing activities? If yes, to which regions?
Question which is, let's say, the easiest answer is to get aware of our new strategy. Still new. I'm saying it's still new because it's less than a year. Yes, our ambition is to enter new energies, let's say, business lines, which means hydrogen liquid carriers and hydrogen carriers. It is also participation in energy storage activities and ambition to have a CCS infrastructure, carbon handling infrastructure in one of our terminals. So it's many new topics, also including our ambition to, let's say, expand our liquid terminals' presence. And from our presentation, you've probably seen Marijampolė, our latest development, which is close to the Polish border, is doing fine. And we have a strategy as well to, let's say, expand activities, not limiting ourselves to Klaipėda, Subačius, and any other locations. Talking about regions, yes, our ambition in global LNG terminals development is quite a wide one.
I think the most preferred regions are still Europe, Latin America, and Southeast Asia. We are really looking for opportunities in Latin America. We are present in Europe. We are also present. We are a commercial operator of 2 out of 3 presently active LNG terminals in Germany. We supported Snam terminals in Italy, etc. And of course, still continuing to look for any other opportunities in the markets which are acceptable in terms of the risk for us.
Thank you for your answer. Let's proceed with the last question, at least for the moment. Are there any changes in the dividend policy foreseen, such as interim dividends two times a year?
Maybe.
Yeah. Vaidotas, please.
I can jump to this question. So in general, we do not foresee, at least so far, interim dividend option since the size of our company, the amounts would not be meaningful. But we are constantly looking into ways how to expand our value proposition for the shareholders.
Thank you for the answer, Vaidotas. With that said, it looks that we've covered all of the questions. If anyone has one still, please submit it. As all of the questions are answered, on behalf of Klaipėdos Nafta and Nasdaq Vilnius, thank you, everyone, for being today with us. The recording of the presentation will be available on Nasdaq Baltic YouTube channel. Darius and Vaidotas, thank you for the presentation and also answering the questions. Everyone, have a great day and goodbye.
Thank you, Paulius.
Thank you very much. Have a wonderful day. Bye-bye.