[Foreign language] Ladies and gentlemen, good morning. We are going to announce the Q3 results for Grupa Kęty S.A. On behalf of the company, we have the whole management board of Grupa Kęty S.A. and the president of management board, Mr. Rafał Lechowicz, who heads the flexible packaging segment. Rafał Lechowicz. We are going to start today's meeting as usual with the presentation part and after that, you will be able to ask questions, and the gentlemen will seek to answer them. Mr. Dariusz Mańko, my co-president of management board, will start. [Foreign language]
Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. The third quarter of 2022 is over. A good quarter for the company.
The company, PLN 253 million EBITDA, PLN 171 million net profit, which is an excellent result, an excellent quarter for the company. Another excellent quarter, actually, with a safe level of debt. We paid another tranche of the dividend, PLN 168 million, so the debt is at a decent level. Well, in a nutshell, at this day and age, and in this context, which you know perfectly well, the company is in excellent shape and is doing very well indeed. However, we must not ignore the fact that the market has changed. It has changed dramatically since the first half of the year. From a very, very high level of orders, we entered the second half of the year, H2, and obviously the number of these orders on the horizon is smaller.
At this point, how do we approach it? How do we go about it? Well, we approach it this as a natural response of the markets after what happened earlier, namely the unnatural demand, which in our opinion was unjustified. The periods of wait of our customers for deliveries were very long, and we had to work at full capacity. We did realize, and everybody had to be prepared for this, that the correction would eventually come. Are we actually lamenting this? Well, not really. We're not doing that.
There comes the moment in life when we have to face the correction or you have to face this and, well, the company in these difficult conditions will definitely keep generating excellent results and excellent profits. We're not worried about this. It's always the case that when a correction comes, some good signals appear for the company. We're already recording this. The main raw material the group's activity is based on, namely aluminum, we're observing a decrease there and the appreciation of the euro against the zloty, so exports over 50% in the whole group, exports are actually favorable to us. Obviously, there are some negative aspects related to utilities, gas, electricity, prices of energy.
This is obviously a disadvantage, but as I have mentioned, we've been working for quite a long time in this business and we've been coping also with some difficult challenges of the overall economic cycle. For us, this economic situation, this cycle is no surprise. It comes as no surprise. We are being reasonable, we are being prudent, and so we might expect a slightly weaker Q4, but I believe that next year, in 2023, we will see a certain recovery and everything will come back to normal. Well, maybe not back to the crazy demand from Q1 or Q2, so H1 in other words, but to reasonable levels with which we will be able to work calmly.
Other important things, we are working in the working capital area, and here there are some certain shifts, certain adjustments in the investment field, as I have told you, some production. These key development projects are being continued in any case, and I believe that we will have to prepare ourselves to work with a smaller volume of orders and we are expecting this year 2023, to be completed in accordance with the forecasts, with the outlooks we presented to you earlier. Some interesting facts also. I wanted to give you some relevant facts. For the first time, we actually entered the integrated report competition and the best annual report, this is the actual name and of the whole competition.
Our team, our extensive team, Michal, you see him here, but also other people, I would like to congratulate them, and I would like to thank them for doing an excellent job. It's actually not a huge team, as it sometimes happens in our group. We do this on an in-house basis. There is no huge group of people, but there is a whole lot of enthusiasm. The whole management board that was before this, the team, because they've done an amazing job really. Jumping on the bandwagon, so to speak, as newcomers. At this point, I would like to give the floor to Piotr in the Extruded Products Segment.
Thank you, and I'm obviously available should you have any questions. Hello, Piotr Wysocki, Extruded Products Segment. A couple of words about the macro situation. As you see in the chart, the quotations of aluminum prices in 2022 from the peak caused by the war at the level of $4,000 really. That was the peak. Now we have $2,200, so it's going down. Although well, the market is quoted in dollar, and the U.S. dollar is currently it has a high price, but it. This is the reason for this. But the billet premium, which is early this year, late last year, levels unseen in history, $1,600 per ton.
Now in a couple of months, this has gone down to $1,020. These are the most recent quotations we can see in terms of the billet premium. Obviously, high prices of electricity, of gas, and this affects us and this has been affecting the whole of Europe. The European market is remaining under strong demand pressure, and this is becoming a difficult. The market is becoming difficult and, however, we are winners in this situation. Two important things that happened this week. Sanctions imposed on Russian aluminum. This is being discussed or sanctions to be imposed on all Russian production on the leading Russian company, RUSAL or Oleg Deripaska, the owner directly. I will only say one thing. For us, this is a totally neutral thing.
A couple of years ago, RUSAL accounted for 50% of our purchases. We would cover 50% of our needs by buying from RUSAL. This went down to about 12% this year. We coped without buying from them. After the war broke out, we basically abandoned all cooperation with Russian companies, and we have managed to go through this year without purchasing even 1 ton delivered by RUSAL. The sanctions imposed on Russia are, for us, a totally neutral aspect. What other important things have been going on in Europe? A quantum leap in imports from Turkey. This Russian aluminum, which has not ended up in the European market, has been redirected to Turkey at very, very low prices. If it can be sold, then sold.
You know, any quantity they can sell, they sell it. This cheap Turkish aluminum, t his cheap Russian aluminum is actually processed into profiles which end up in Europe and work is underway. Here on the Polish side, we work with the Polish Aluminium Association. The European Aluminium Association is also working to stop this inflow of Turkish aluminum profiles to Europe by introducing, for instance, customs duties on aluminum profiles from Turkey as restrictions. Lower volumes. Lower volumes mean that we are working at the level of high stocking, high inventory, the first half of the year. The first quarter can be divided into excellent months, July and August, despite the summer holiday season. Excellent sales figures and a slightly weaker September.
Generally, the whole quarter, we're happy this was an excellent quarter. An increase in revenues, thanks, for instance, to an effective selling policy, higher prices, and an expansion of the selling network, if we're talking about exports. If we look at the structure broken down by individual sectors, we have decreases in interior decoration and construction. However, there has been a nice recovery in transport and automotive. What is interesting? In September, for the first time, our export sales were higher than domestic sales. Obviously, Germany, there is talk about a tough market. This is the largest market in Europe. Our policy from several years ago has yielded fruit very nicely. We developed our sales services there, and we see the effects here in Poland.
Sales are going down and the whole of export is actually larger than domestic sales. To go back. Right. You also see wholesale, stockholders, and there they are dedicated profiles. These are hard alloys, and this results from the global situation in the market. After the war broke out, there was a significant stop in deliveries of hard alloys from the Russian market. This market is behaving totally differently compared to the others. Today, hard alloys, there is a boom, really. This is one thing, this stopping of deliveries. Second thing, the whole armament industry, which has a huge demand for hard alloys. Hard alloys are doing really nicely, and we are selling a lot, and we could be selling even more. I've already talked about markets, perhaps let's continue.
What does it mean that it's lower? Well, we're not working Saturdays and Sundays. We used to work in a four-team system, but we have come back, I believe, to a healthy level. It's hard to actually maintain work on Saturdays and Sundays due to the employee market. For instance, people do not necessarily want to work every Saturday, every Sunday. There are, you know, obviously holidays. This is all in line with the labor codes. Only Saturdays and Sundays is when we don't work. Production capacities are used at the level of 74%, and I believe that this is an excellent use we are making of our production capacities.
Obviously we also have the establishment in Ukraine, which is working to very limited extent, we have to say this. It is working. There is production there, but to a very limited extent. Now, as far as investment, the investment plan is concerned and its implementation. Key investments, there is the press, 2000, 4000, the presses. Obviously this is all in line with the schedule. Slight shifts which allowing us to obtain better pricing, better savings on this project, and I guess Rafał will tell you more about it. The production tools, this is following the volume. The level always reflects the volume we are having. These tons we are extruding and other projects we are running in line with the budget assumptions.
Some interesting facts I wanted to give you for the Fisker project. Now we are past the preparation phase. The pre-series production is launching in November. I guess this is 50 cars, 50 sets we need to produce. The demand, we know this, and we have feedback from sellers from the make. There is huge interest actually, and we are ready for series production in series. Production in series in line with all the projections, all the plan actually implemented for this make. It should launch late June, early July. The volumes are much higher. The 50 cars, however, will be produced in November. We seek to.
Now, as far as the environment is concerned, as far as sustainable development is concerned, we have obtained the environmental declaration for aluminum profiles made with the billets produced at our foundry. I would like to boast a bit. Our carbon footprint for our profiles is 3.3 kg of CO2 per kg of profile. Compared to the European average, which is 9. We are the leaders in Europe in terms of carbon footprint for our profiles. Now, some important things that have happened in last quarter. The trade show in Düsseldorf in September, the first time after the COVID hiatus. The whole aluminum industry met for the first time after a couple of years, and this was a very interesting meeting place.
Talks about the directions for growth and not even the short-term ones, but the longer-term perspectives, the long-term forecasts for aluminum and had to confirm that there is one trend, that aluminum is a raw material whose consumption will increase virtually in all sectors of industry. That's it, I guess. Thank you.
Hello, good morning and welcome everyone. Tomasz Grela, a few words about the results of the Aluminum Systems Segment. The first quarter as for sales is a level of PLN 600 million. It's 8% more than the comparable quarter of the previous year. Unfortunately, at the volume level, it's sales lower by 16%. This has impacted the results of EBITDA at the level of PLN 89 million, compared to 107 last year. As a moment ago I've said, this was impacted by only matters of lower sales, level of sales in terms of volumes. As for our sales structure, it's at the similar level as until now.
This product structure and the direction structure, I would say very similar, with slight increase of export sales this year, which is a good forecast for the future because considering the comparable euro and dollar exchange rate, it seems that it's a very positive trend. As for the market environment, as for national sales. We see continuous stable sales at the level of the Aluminium Systems Segment. As I've clarified many times, we work in the scope of three segments. It's the Aluminium Systems Segment, Extruded Products Segment, Flexible Packaging Segment in the basic market. What is destined for house and apartments and also sales for network customers, chain customers. The companies which through national and foreign sales produce the ready product, the finished product.
As I was saying, sales in this segment, Aluminium Systems Segment, seems to have a very good high level. We don't see here in the future, we don't foresee any problems here. We continue to obtain interesting projects in this scope. You can see here in the photos presentation, very impressive facilities constructed with our material. As for the basic customer market, so what goes to the market of windows and doors for houses and apartments. Here, of course, as the whole industry, construction sector, we keep noticing, we see a strong, I would say, slowing down of sales and also the forecasts for next month. This is caused, of course, by the situation in the market, higher credit costs, loan costs, and higher prices of energy, lack of possibility to obtain loans. All this impacts the construction markets.
We are here in a similar situation as the whole market is. Here we also keep observing significant stuff with lowering of sales. As for the direction of net sales, here the customers to a high extent are customers who export their products. After one, two months of such stagnation, which we were observing, it seems that now everything has kind of come back to the right track and the sale of our product to export markets is also starting to develop very dynamically and it's probably, inter alia, the effect of money from the National Recovery Plan, which was very quickly distributed into matters of changes connected with us adapting to lower energy consumption. It's mainly countries such as Italy, the countries of the Benelux, France.
This program started operating very quickly and this is visible in their sales results. As for the sale in the foreign markets, which we also present here, several of the facilities selected from the recent time. Export sales, as I was saying, is developing quite better, a little better than the national market. Very positive signals from the whole market, the Balkan market, so the market which until now we have not been present in. It seems it's a market of the future from our point of view and very good response from the markets of the Middle East. Very good meetings we have, very trade shows, trade fairs, projects that are planned together. Also we've got an order from the exotic New Zealand.
It seems that the distance from that location is not favorable for us. Nevertheless, as we have been showing you many times, our products reach virtually every continent. What we also observe, it's a trend, unfortunately. It's not the only situation of foreign sales, but generally as for matters of lowering credit limits for our clients, unfortunately, we have to face that. It's not the first time we are facing such a situation in the recent over ten years. We've had such periods happening many times, we will have to simply make our liability policy more restrictive, but this should not impact the sales effects. Our next element is the price pressure from the side of the competition.
As Piotr mentioned, for sure, we are noticing significant drop of aluminum prices in the market. In our case, unfortunately, this is accompanied by high dollar exchange rates, so the possibilities for maneuver are smaller than those possessed by the Western competition. This is the situation we are facing. Also, additionally, as Piotr mentioned, once again, I wanted to underline that we, as opposed to our foreign competitors, Western competitors, as the war erupted, we have stopped, ceased any operation in the eastern Belarusian market. From that moment, we have not bought any material at all from Russia, and we do not buy any profile sections based on the raw materials from Russia. Whether they are transported through Turkey or any other country, if they're from Russia, we don't buy them.
It's our strategy, and perhaps, due to financial matters also, in this context, perhaps our competition now may lower these prices in the market, whereas that's our decision. I think, I mean, the quality of our product, the quality of our service is really great, so I think we won't be forced to perform any price correction here downwards. Also, information about the first sales of our products, fireproof products. As you know, as part of the investment held this year, we have started the production of fireproof glass. It's a process which we started in the beginning of the year, and while constructing the plant and equipping it with the most modern line for production of fireproof glass.
In the recent months, we had numerous tests we had to perform in order to certify that glass. We've separately certified the plant, separately certified the products based on our glass and also finally certified our customers. Unfortunately, that's the four-tier path, and it elongates the introduction of a product to trade. At this moment now we are practically at the end of all these formalities and as we were mentioning, October is the month in which from our plant, the first glass, fireproof glass produced in our plant will leave our plant, is in October. We're really counting on it that next year the sales will significantly contribute to the sales in the whole Aluprof Group in this scope.
As for other investments, as for the most important ones, we have started the assembly of the vertical paint shop number three in the Bielsko Plant. I think that in the coming months it will be possible to finish this assembly of this production line to pass the test and that we will be able to, it will be possible to be operated 100%, which will allow us to redirect the orders from foreign, external paint shops to our own paint shop, which is very significant at the current difficult times. The last investment connected with the extension of our plant in Złotów.
Please be reminded that it's an investment based on constructing a new production hall, equipping it with a vertical paint shop, with vendors, which in order to create a very similar service center in terms of warehouse and logistics, similar to that we have in Bielsko. We have finalized our negotiations. Soon we are going to make the decision about selecting the final contractor, and I believe that at the beginning of next year is the period when we will be able to start this construction and make some decision about perhaps shifting, delaying this connected with financial matters forces us to that. We shall keep watching that.
As for some curiosities, perhaps some of you have already heard, ladies and gentlemen, that in September we had our the summing up of the Aluprof contest. We have concluded that contest, the Facility of the Year. I believe this is the most important event, not only in the aluminum industry, but also in the construction and architectonic industry in the country. 500 guests, most important, most significant prominent architects from the country and abroad, most important investors. It seems to us that this event once again has reinforced the position of Aluprof as the leader in the sector, in the industry, and it shows that the facilities constructed with our systems are the most important ones constructed in the country.
The final piece of news I want to share with you is the next showroom we have opened in Prague. Prague, in the map of our European sales, Prague as the capital of the Czech Republic is a natural choice for us. The Czech market and the British market are two most dynamically developing markets. Therefore we decided to first of all start and open in the Great Britain and in Czech Republic showrooms, where we will be able to professionally run trainings and also show our customers the advantage of our products over our competition. That's all from me. Thank you very much. I'm open to your questions.
Good morning. Rafał Lechowicz, Flexible Packaging Segment, ladies and gentlemen. In the third quarter, we were dealing with spectacular increase by several dozen percent increase of the value of sales and also the profit generated by the segment. The situation makes us happy the more that these results were obtained in an unfavorable market surrounding. In the third quarter, there was a rapid drop of demand for polypropylene films in Europe. This situation entailed also equally dynamic decreases of the levels of the raw materials used for the production of this film. The scale of these drops you can see on the right side of the slide. The chart granulate PP on the right side.
This situation in connection with a full portfolio of orders after the second quarter allowed us to limit to a minimum the impact of the market drop on our achieved results. Here, I would like to strongly underline that several dozen drop of prices of polypropylene film in comparison to those achieved in the first half-year in 2020 to the first half of this year will surely impact in the coming quarters and will impact the value of the sales and also the profitability achieved as part of our segment. Similarly dynamic as part of the BOPP segment. Similar drops you can observe on the chart on the left side of the slide, referring to the prices of polyethylene granules.
On the basis of that, in the second segment, the segment of packaging, the majority of multi-layered laminates are produced. In this case, however, the impact on the price is not that strong because polyethylenes most frequently are only one of the many layers in the produced packages. Additionally, what is also stabilizing in this business area, the fact that also stabilizes prices here is the fact that packages have a much higher added value than BOPP films. The remaining substrates in the production process, such as aluminum foils, paper, and EVOH, are constantly and hardly accessible, and therefore, their market prices are relatively high. Can I have the next slide?
As I was saying in the beginning, these unfavorable circumstances, external circumstances, have not prevented us from achieving record best results of the first quarter. In this period, our sales has increased by 1/3 compared to Q3 2001. Once again, in this year, it has achieved a level close to PLN 400 million . What is even faster, over 60% more, there was an even faster increase of operational profit, over 60%, and we have achieved a record as for the first quarter, PLN 80 million versus PLN 49 million in Q3 last year. EBITDA has increased by over 50% to nearly PLN 90 million , whereas the net profit by over 60% to a record of PLN 63 millio .
Here, I would like to kindly remind you that from the beginning of the year, we have generated already net profit at the level of PLN 212 million, which is over 25% better than after the first nine months of the years 2020, 2021. Ladies and gentlemen, since the profits were increasing much faster than the value of the sales, this means, of course, that we have been operating higher margins. That was indeed the case. This parameter at the EBITDA level achieved 22.4%, and it was 3.1% higher than the same period of the previous year. Still, there is an increase of the export. It is now nearly 60% of the total turnover in the segment.
Please be reminded that the markets that are most important for us are the German, the Netherlands, and the Swiss and Italian markets. However, the biggest increases we achieved in the Ukrainian market, where the sales were over three times higher than in Q3 2021. Can I have the next slide?
Right. We continue to operate with a very high level of utilization of the production capacities we have. 89% is the ratio, and it was three percentage points higher compared to the same period of last year. As far as the implementation of the investment plan is concerned, it's going in accordance with the schedule, and I would just like to remind you that the expenditures concern mainly investments maintaining or sustaining the production potential. This is all, as far as I'm concerned. If there are any questions, I'm obviously available during the conference as we go along. Thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen, good morning. I will now attempt to sum up in several slides the consolidated financial results and what has already been mentioned here by the previous speakers. This was a quarter in which we observed many changes, turbulence in the trends which, for several years have been very favorable to us. The market has been demanding. I'm talking about the market environment, about the demand, mainly in the construction area, so the Extruded Products Segment. We also recorded an excellent increased situation in the Flexible Packaging market because it's resistant, this is resilient to these market turbulences. I'm talking about the sectors concerned and the turbulence in this market. As far as the quotations are concerned, the quotations of basic raw materials, they are decreasing.
The Polish zloty is becoming depreciated. In the Polish zloty, aluminum in combination with the billet premium demonstrated about 12% increase trend. Nevertheless, we have seen some increases in sales revenues despite the certain decreases in the aluminum processing segment. PLN 1.5 billion in the quarter, a very high result. EBITDA, which we have a couple of million PLN above the excellent result of last year. However, we see a very clear reflection in terms of the composition of the breakdown of the profit between the individual segments. Around PLN 45 million lower results of the extruded products out of the flexible packaging segment. That's that.
We recorded an operating activities result just during the quarter. The macro environment, higher interest rates are influencing this. Our debt increased compared to the previous year by PLN 140 million. This is about 12%. However, the majority of the increases in financial expenditures, this is related to interest, and this is the cost of interest, as we all know, nearly four times the increase. Nearly PLN 200 million of gross profit, and a lower effective tax rate around 13% in this quarter. As we signaled early this year, selected investments in the Aluminum Systems Segment and in the Extruded Products Segment will be able to benefit from the tax presentation.
Deferred tax assets, we saw an effect there and led to a reduction of the tax burden in that quarter. PLN 170 million in net profit and nearly PLN 600 million in net profit for nine months, so that's comparable to last year's result for the whole of 2021, actually. Next slide shows the liquidity situation. Cash flows, very important in the market period we are dealing with now. The first time, actually, we saw a quarter in which the operational cash flows were correlated directly with EBITDA, PLN 208 million of cash flows on operating activities, including PLN 41 million related to an increase in the demand of working capital. However, I would like to remind you that in H1, the increase in working capital was PLN 400 million.
This is the first quarter of that kind, and September was the first month in which we saw a reverse trend in terms of the balance of net working capital. Investments, as we already mentioned, with the previous quarter, nearly PLN 100 million expenditures in this quarter. This reflects the schedule of CapEx implementation envisaged for this year. As a result, debt in the quarter increased by PLN 85 million. Excellent operational EBITDA made it possible to pay the first tranche of dividend, PLN 168 million, and in part to finance investments, and the remaining part is being financed with third-party debt. Now, our situation at a glance in terms of debt from the point of view of nine months. We see that debt is increasing by about 1,000% year-on-year.
However, EBITDA is also increasing significantly. If we look at a twelve-month period, YTD, net debt to EBITDA are below one, so this is a very safe level. We need to draw attention to the fact that we have to have it at the back of our mind that on the eleventh of October, we paid out the second installment of dividends, so PLN 37 million will also be influencing the debt level in Q4. No changes in terms of the term or currency structure of our debt. As I mentioned during the previous conference, we started renewing our borrowings. This happened to some extent in Q3, PLN 220 million.
I would just like to remind you, we informed you about the increasing of the credit balance by PLN 20 million with PKO BP. This quarter, we informed you about the renewal of the loan with PKO BP and increasing the limit thereof and also investment financing for the Extruded Products Segment. Work is going on in line with the schedule, and we hope that the situation will be equally stable as we reach the end of this year. Debt evolution in the period of nine months, as we already mentioned, for the period of nine months, operational cash flows were PLN 350 million.
This already takes into account the PLN 450 million spent on net working capital needed in response to the scale of our activities in relation to quotations of our products, price quotations of our products. PLN 242 million spent on investments YTD, and in Q4, this amount will probably be higher. The remaining figures, interest, the first installment of dividends I already mentioned. Finally, just above PLN 1 billion, the debt. But as I said, these ratios are safe. Finally, the final part, a brief comment on the outlooks as regards Q4. Well, the situation, as we know, is highly volatile. However, we are expecting, on a temporary basis that the demand restrictions will be maintained.
We observed it especially at the end of the last quarter, so mainly a reduction in the order volume, which has already been mentioned by the previous speakers. Nevertheless, in this tough situation, we'll see increasingly often margin pressure, because this will be a fight for volumes. We are expecting stable quotations of raw material prices. I'll just explain this. It's hard to predict whether they will be rising or falling in this situation because the decreases, the lack of demand would point to decreases, but a certain stability is also seen. Customs duties, Russian aluminum, so these are drivers of turbulence and these prices might be changing. We are assuming a rather stable level. Which means that in the operational area, we need to focus in this situation on ensuring the highest possible operational performance.
As the previous speakers mentioned already in Q3 we made some decision to adopt some measures to optimize our activity to make sure that our results are as optimal as possible in this situation, which is hard for us. We are confirming the implementation of key investment projects. We want to continue with that, but we would just like to inform you that in Q3 we performed a review and some streamlining of our schedule for the projects. Back then in early August, we talked about the expected CapEx for the year would be around PLN 450 million, probably. It seems to us that up to PLN 100 million, it might still be reduced by up to PLN 100 million.
CapEx for this year will be probably about PLN 350 million. Where does the PLN 100 million figure come from? Well, this is mainly Extruded Products Segment and the Aluminum Systems Segment. A slightly more Extruded Products Segment. Two reasons. Adaptation of investment expenditures to the scale of the business because that's what Piotr mentioned. Tools and equipment we use directly in the production processes, so the kind of turnover and recovery will be slightly shifted in time. Secondly, the savings we managed to achieve and seeing the progress of the implementation of the main investment, the production shop and the two presses, I guess we'll maintain this scale, so PLN 40 million-PLN 50 million.
Another part is the aluminum system segment and what Tomasz mentioned, we are currently approaching the finish line in terms of negotiation of the contract for building the complex in Złotów. Due to the fact that it is being implemented in such a difficult environment, I'm talking about Q3, basically finalization of this, the closing has been shifted, and so these million PLN will be shifted from this year to the next. As we said however, this corresponds to the market trends. It won't reduce our potential to slightly shift CAPEX, so this is not risky for us. As far as financing is concerned, I've already mentioned with the level of debt we have, we are basically approaching the end of the efforts to organize an investment facility.
Long-term, this is a long-term facility, and we've already paid the second installment of dividend. We continue to confirm that in the case of the forecast we communicated in mid-2022, it continues to be realistic. Looking at the assumptions underlying this, judging by the situation, we are on the safe side. Looking at the financial ratios, it seems that by the end of the year, we will have reached net debt to EBITDA 1.3-1.35. Thank you. Thank you for the presentation. Now we shall pass to the questions, and I have seen a couple already up in here. Unfortunately, they are not well in the FIFO or LIFO system.
The order is slightly random, but I hope that we'll be able to read all of them and answer all of them. The first question to Mr. Wysocki. Where does the +16 in terms of the adjustment on the segment results come from? This is the consolidated profit higher than the total for the segment. Yes, indeed. Thank you for this question. As you know, between the Extruded Products Segment and the Aluminium Systems Segment, around 20% of the Extruded Products Segment ends up in the Aluminium Systems Segment. In accordance with the consolidation rules, a part of sales performed in the quarter continue to remain unsold.
The Extruded Products Segment shows a profit on the sales performed, but a part of it is still in the warehouse of the Aluminum Systems Segment. This is simply the stock turnover and basically these transactions are gradually eliminated for the purpose of consolidation and the unrealized profit on inventory is also gradually eliminated. Early June, this profit we would eliminate was X, and at the end of September, we had basically PLN 12 million or so. This profit was about PLN 12 million smaller. We're talking about the stocks in SSA. This adjustment was smaller, so we eliminate less profit. This is simply, and at the end of Q3 was smaller. Thank you. Another question is about the investment program.
The slowdown, will it have any effect on the investment program of the Aluminum Systems Segment and Extruded Products Segment? And what should we expect in terms of investments in 2023 in these segments? Well, perhaps I'll start. As far as 2023 is concerned, ladies and gentlemen, we remember in the strategy, the amount was around PLN 200 or PLN 300-odd million invested for the year. We communicated that back then, but we obviously started the budgeting process, and several months from now, we hope we'll be able to to come to you with specific amounts. But I've already explained this. These are shifts which are essentially. It's a different investment phasing, basically. It's not about limiting its scope or its extent.
It won't really affect our operations to a large extent because this is simply a response to the market situation.
As I was showing in the Extruded Products Segment, the most important investments are the press, 2,000 and 4,000 tons, and they are being implemented, I think, during 2023, as will also be the finishing of this implementation of this investment. I would want to add that, due to some, let's say, movements, not scope shifts, well, we are doing this investment. We have got high savings thanks to those. Also, in our case, as I mentioned, investment connected with the extension of the plant in Złotów has been postponed from the current year to the coming year in the same scope as it was presented in the budget in our strategy. Therefore, we are not limiting ourselves here as for the scope, but simply the date of starting the investment has been postponed. Thank you very much.
The next question refers to the estimates for the fourth quarter. Last year, it was about PLN 200 million EBITDA. Is such a result possible to repeat in the fourth quarter of the current year? Ladies and gentlemen, well, actually, last year, all the segments have provided really good results, exceptionally good results. It was also a good period of really good market situation. Now we are entering the market this quarter in a slightly different situation. We also already see it in the results of the first quarter, so the reduction of volumes. Also, the current forecast for EBITDA is PLN 980 million. We have executed PLN 870 million. This means that there is a lack of, let's say, PLN 110 million.
Of course, December is a specific market. Also, if we look at the implementation of profit in the third quarter, we have to remember that September is a month that is a bit worse than July and August. On this basis, we analyze this forecast. I can only say that it seems for the time being, it seems that if nothing special happens, we are on the safe side of this forecast. Probably, EBITDA should exceed PLN 110 million, perhaps slightly, but it's this level. Yes, it will be lower than last year. This is mainly related with the Extruded Products Segment because as you remember, last year it provided PLN 75 million, but that was an increasing trend for the price of aluminum.
Now you've got a completely different situation, so it will be really difficult to repeat this result. Thank you very much. A question to Mr. Piotr Wysocki. The closing by Norsk Hydro of the Slovak plant, does it impact in some scope obtaining orders in the segment of extruded and drawn products? Because this plant has been supplying the remaining Hydro segments in billets. Well, the closing of the Slovak plant, it has not happened suddenly. I have to say Hydro is now one of our key providers as for billets. We had all this program planned, and I don't see any impact, negative impact in the future on the deliveries from this direction. This is generally closed by casting plants not due to the demand.
We are closing this casting plant not due to the demand, but due to the fact that Hydro wanted to be some, let's say, a green organization. Constantly, we speak about this topic of green aluminum is present in discussion and the Slovak billets produced in Slovakia by Hydro, all this energy was provided, was delivered from coal. It was based on coal. The closing of the production of these billets by Hydro closing, it does not impact. There's no impact. We have it supplemented from other sources, also by Hydro, and this whole program was elaborated and prepared a long time ago. It's not a sudden situation. I understand. This also has not impacted negatively their chain, right?
The stamping lines of Hydro had a negative impact on the purchase of profiles, right? Decision about the closing of castings of primary aluminum. It's not a decision that's made suddenly. You have to get prepared for that. Hydro, which produces profiles, it's, besides the fact that it's our greatest provider, it's also our greatest competitor. It has a stamping line, and suddenly they sort of divide their stamping lines and press shops from their billets. It was a program started in 2021. This program really worked well. Nothing bad happened. Thank you very much. Another question referring to the Extruded Products Segment.
Because we have mentioned the fact that we do not purchase aluminum from the RUSAL company, but and then the asker mentions that we mention direct purchases, right? And what, in the case of a situation, we buy aluminum from trade companies. Are we sure that they in turn have not bought this material from RUSAL? And in case of a lack of aluminum, will this our products with accessibility, availability? Well, are we sure? Yes, because we get the certificate of origin. In case of this raw materials, it's really important and aluminum, Middle East. So we have deliveries from the Middle East, from Africa, generally.
When the raw materials, so aluminum, the original material we buy through intermediaries such as Glencore, Goldman Sachs, but they also at the beginning of the war, Glencore announced that until the end of the contract, they continue collaboration, but they won't sign new contracts. Now we are sure that we do not possess Russian aluminum, official. We've got certificates of origin for each ton of aluminum of the raw material we purchase. Thank you very much. Another question referring to this Extruded Products Segment. In connection with the high demand for hard alloys, is there any plans for increasing the throughput and then the operation in this scope, for example, purchase of new presses?
Well, in the strategy that we have announced, we have not mentioned any purchase of any new press, and that's what we're gonna stick to as for hard alloys. Hard alloys are quite a shallow market, I have to say. This means that we sell about 1,500 tons. In the current situation, geopolitically, we could sell perhaps even twice as much. The question is, how long such a situation will maintain? We are not planning to invest in a new press, whereas we have other ideas for increasing the capacity in the hard alloy plant through some reworks of other devices, some modernizations.
Also, as I was saying, in the following year, perhaps, while signing the contract for 2023, we have some ideas here which would allow us to increase the sales of hard alloys without constructing a new press. Also, what's interesting, using one of them, all these soft presses we have. Thank you very much. I want to add that this 1,500 tons is, of course, per month. Yes, of course. Now, one more question, perhaps to Mr. Piotr Wysocki, and Mr. Piotr Wysocki is quite popular among the askers today. Recently, there was an article published that Turkey is investing in 100 MN presses for profiles, for sections. 500,000 tons per year is the capacity.
When can we expect that the EU will react with appropriate customs clearance, customs fees, considering the fact that Turkey is buying aluminum from Russia? Is there any formal proceedings in progress already? Here we operate through the Polish Aluminium Association with officials in Poland, and similar operations, similar actions have been undertaken by the European Aluminium Association. It's a really big problem in Europe. The European Aluminium Association is undertaking discussions. It has been discussing for a long time because this topic has been mentioned with the officials in Europe a long time ago. There is a matter of supplying, supplementing just certain data, some arguments, and they are really very active. The party that is very active here is Germany, German associations and press shops.
Spain really strongly feels this problem, is very active in lobbying in order to introduce some limitations. We don't know yet the form, but these discussions are in progress. What will be very important will be the meetings held, which will be held next year, next week, the annual meeting of the European Aluminium, which will take place in Athens in Greece. It's one of the main problems which will be discussed there, namely, what are the next steps that should be taken? As I was saying, it's a really long process. These discussions have been in progress for really a long time ago, several months before.
A strong, really strong, concrete discussions took place during the trade fair in Düsseldorf, the aluminum trade fair, where this topic was really strongly discussed. Thank you very much. Another question, the next question refers to the aluminum systems segment. What effects do we expect in the coming year connected with the production of fireproof glass, the scale of the sales profits? Will it be profitable already next year? Well, the scale will be as good as the market allows us and its development. As we were discussing, we noticed that the construction market has slightly settled down, I have to say. We are not afraid.
We have no worries that this product, which we have already produced and have certified, that there would be any problems to sell it in the national and the foreign markets. We won't present any specific numbers because this will be presented after the next year's budget will be confirmed. The situation we have, we as the owner of the system and the deciding company, we are the party deciding which glass will be analyzed in our systems and which will be certified and which will be present in the documents. We have therefore great advantage compared to any other manufacturer of fireproof glass, and I have to say that we are planning to use this dominant position we have.
Therefore, I am convinced that already next year will be a year when this operation will be for sure profitable as per the scale. As I was saying, in a moment, we shall present you specific numbers after the budget assumptions are passed. Thank you very much. Now a question to, once again, the Extruded Products Segment, and the question refers to the possible contracts with the military industry. It was mentioned that this, in this sector, really empowers the demand, is the source of demand, especially in case of the hard alloys. So a question from an asker, what is the scale of Extruded Products Segment for this industry, for this sector, and what can we expect here? If we're speaking about the military sector, we mentioned we mean only hard alloys. The question about contracts.
Well, we have got some contracts concluded. We are working on obtaining new ones. Here, we are more limited by our actual production capacity than by the market. What percentage this is for today? About 20-30%. We can, of course. It's a matter of only how much we dedicate to this specific industry sector, because with such high demand and our limited capacity, we select the best contracts, the best deals. This, you know, this. There's also a question about the price and where it is better to direct these tons we have. Thank you very much. The next question refers to the Ukrainian asset deductions in the third quarter.
There's a question for a comment, what we can expect in this scope, whether continuing solvings of the possible risks connected with meeting some obligations in the future. Well, we are running activity in Ukraine in a very safe, secure way. What we have been solving was mainly in the second quarter, simply regaining control and launching the production. In the third quarter, yes, actually, the solution was about PLN 5 million. PLN 3.5 million was the working capital, and it was rotation, so something which was risky, but simply we managed to either through stock or through liabilities, we managed to. The PLN 1.5 million was actually the shifting the write-off to fixed assets. This property was amortized, so it depreciated.
For fixed assets, we left these write-offs in the full amount for today, because with this scale, very limited activity, which Piotr mentioned, simply this write-off should be maintained. If the situation in Ukraine does not change significantly, well, we don't expect any room for some significant reversal of the situation of write-offs, because the situation is clear, whereas the write-off for fixed assets will maintain reversely. Thank you very much.
A bit of explanation. The PLN 5 million was basically a release, not an additional write-down. Now another question. For the extruded segments, just for a change, you know, for the Extruded Products Segment, about the Fisker project. Mm-hmm. So potentially, the outlooks in terms of the revenues, if we have full production capacity, you know, the director mentioned since the start of the year. Can we actually estimate the influence of this project on the revenues of this segment? Well, the project is being implemented mainly in our Slovenian company. You know, as you said, we are in the pre-budgeting phase, so we will have it all calculated very precisely. But now we are just, you know, looking at the number of pieces needed.
We're talking about around several dozen% increase in revenues in our company in Slovenia. From the point of view of the segment, maybe it's not huge. From the point of view of our Slovenian-based company, yes, it is a very substantial contract. Well, the largest one we'll be implementing soon. I can't really tell you about the exact pricing levels. It all depends because the whole production is based on the aluminum exchange, really. Also the fluctuation is actually in line with the changes in the market, in the exchange. Thank you. Now for the Aluminum Systems Segment.
In Q3, the segment, did it make any adjustments in terms of prices in its price lists or were the levels already seen in previous quarters? No, we didn't make any pricing adjustments. The most recent upwards price adjustments was the April one, and since that time, we have been working on the same pricing levels. Obviously, in terms of export sales, this has been having different influence depending on the exchange rate changes. The recent pricing shifts that have been appearing are actually related to promotional campaigns of newly introduced products. Well, it's a standard measure really to enable a newly launched product to make a presence on the market.
We do that, so that's a 5% promotional offer for newly launched products till the end of the year. Generally, as I said, the pricing levels have been kept at the same level since April. Thank you very much. Next question is about exchange rates. Foreign currencies, do we hedge against the USDPLN exchange rate? Because it has been mentioned that the decreases in global aluminum prices were actually amortized with the increase of the exchange rate USDPLN. This would point to the hedging not being sufficient and we have exposure to the U.S . Dollar due to the purchases of aluminum, due to the Aluminum Systems Segment levels.
The hedging policy there is actually in a horizon of 9-12 months. Currently, transactions, these are six-month transactions, up to 50% of exposure, which we are calculating. A certain part remains unhedged. If you look at the change of the pricing of hedging transactions, which we present in our financial statements, there are two types of these transactions. One is basically foreign currency, and so this concerns U.S. dollar to a large extent, and the second one is aluminum. On aluminum, we are losing because these are the decreases in quotations we've been talking about.
Forex, if you look at that, the quarter, that was for us, basically a favorable change in pricing because this means that we can buy the U.S. dollar in the future at a lower exchange rate than the one quoted currently. Thank you. Now a question concerning the aluminum systems segment. There are decreases in the sales of flats, residential premises being reported by real estate developers, and this is also predicted for the coming quarters. To what extent do the lower sales of residential premises by real estate developers translate into the aluminum segment and decreases there?
As I told you in my presentation, well, the real estate developer segment in terms of flats in our breakdown, this basically is the same group as the individual, as the sales to the individual consumers. The average Joe building the house and basically we've been recording the biggest decreases in sales in that segment. The situation will probably stay the same in the next couple of months until the market environment improves significantly. This is obviously a matter of inflation and cost of lending and high cost of construction materials. This all translates into the number of construction permits issued. I can't tell you at this point what kind of an increase or decrease we are expecting next year.
However, just like the whole construction industry and the whole construction market, we will be feeling this influence over the next couple of months. Thank you very much. Now a more general question. Mr. Mańko, the President, mentioned that the long-term forecast for aluminum consumption is to grow virtually in most, if not all industries. The same goes for copper, I suppose. The author of the question is wondering, so if that is the case, which metal will take the market away from which metal in that case?
This will come as a great surprise to you if I tell you that if we look at the automotive sector, then steel basically even you know windows doors even in cars aluminum is really driving out steel in terms of the materials used. I've heard also info that we are slightly saddened by the crisis and it has really brought us down. Since I have the mic I just want to tell you that we are here in a new room. There's translation into English and the room is impressive. Maybe you know we're not that depressed.
You know, however, our team has really been a bit bruised and battered. However, we want to keep moving forward nevertheless. As usual in Grupa Kęty, in such moments as this one, because we are definitely facing a difficult time, diversification helps. We are present in three segments, mind you, and there are three other segments which sell products in different directions. If that weren't enough, the level of development is very high. Please note that flexible packaging, we are working with the largest company groups. Actually making sure that this packaging is to make it more uniform, to make it more homogenous, to make it more degradable and to prevent a conflict with the natural environment.
Please note that packaging, in this case, in many cases, this is a leader in terms of the excellent brands. I don't want to name them. I don't want to do any good advertising here. What Tomasz Grela said, that in systems, you know, single-family housing, real estate development, this part of the market is definitely feeling the effects of the crisis now. Please note that this is all the hard work that this segment has been doing. The Aluminum Systems Segment has led to the fact that they even sell to New Zealand their products, and they are installed there. They are using what is going on in Europe, so large facilities in Italy, France, Germany, and other countries.
This is all conforming to us, and this is comforting, and for us, and this is a direction in which we may escape to defend ourselves against the decreases which are affecting other industries. For architects, you see, please, just mind you, I'm still lucky to remember this, architects who were honored to accept invitations to Aluprof, to that exquisite event, which is, in my opinion, one of the best organized and one of the best events, construction industry event in this part of Europe.
I have to say that back in the day when I started my work here, and I started developing the systems here, sometimes they wouldn't even open doors because they had excellent deliveries and service from our foreign competition, Western competition. Today they are honored to be our guests at this exquisite event, and they praise it, and they say it is the best organized event they've ever attended. Here again, I bow before the marketing department. They have an excellent power in terms of aluminum systems segment, and they do it abroad too. What Piotr said in relation to extruded products, yes, indeed, in construction industry, less demand, and interior decoration, less demand.
Automotive, on the other hand, Fisker is only one of the things that Piotr has mentioned, but there's a whole lot of new contracts for automotive that really are promising, and they do promise high yield in and high increases in the future. This is another good direction in which the Extruded Products Segment has been going in. Historically, we have been producing hard alloys and we currently have 100% of our capacity filled by the orders, so we can barely fulfill them. If we look at the group, the diversification in terms of the segments, diversification in terms of the areas in which the segments move, allows us to calmly look into the future. I
Perhaps I should say this at the very end, but since I have the mic, I will tell you right now that in tough moments, well, the best ones actually have their day, so to speak. There is a wide open door for Grupa Kęty. We can actually make this quantum leap again to be the best in Europe. Someone asked this question about aluminum from Russia, right? It seems to me well, we don't have any influence on this. This is only a question of the hypocrisy which is flooding not only Europe but the whole world.
If we say that we don't use Russian products, in our case, this is aluminum billets, then let us continue to deliver on this promise. We just need to say to others, "Don't be hypocritical. Please face this problem and struggle with it successfully and face up to the challenge." We still have Ukrainian families we are looking after, and we know what happened, not only in Borodyanka, where we have our plant, but in the whole of Ukraine. We have absolutely no doubt we won't be buying aluminum from Turkey or from Ukraine. Billets which are produced. What was that? Yes, Russian. Exactly. That's what I wanted to say. Sorry.
Neither Russian nor Turkish aluminum or billets built on the basis of Russian deliveries. My wish would be that you know, Brussels and the responsible committees and bodies I wish they actually examined this problem in depth and made this competition fair in Europe. Unfortunately, this is not the case. Yes, I've elaborated on this a bit, but I really wanted the things to be a bit merrier here. As far as the diversification policy is concerned, let's ask the other president, Mr. Lechowicz, who well, has been listening to our conversation calmly with composure. Let's ask him about the information concerning the BOPP film segment and the expected decreases in the future.
How might this translate into the results of the segment? How big is the potential in terms of the decrease in margin? In BOPP foil. We should actually separate the last three years which have been quite atypical for this segment actually in a good way. First of all, the start of the pandemic Q1 2020 then the blocking of the Suez Canal and the shortage of materials in the market. This is Q1 2021. This accompanied by high consumption continuing high consumption. The outbreak of the war in Ukraine in Q1 2022. All these phenomena led to panic in the raw materials market. The PP film is one of these raw materials affected by this panic.
In such situations, the segment tends to behave really well, and in that period, we achieved above average results. First, you have to kind of position it. What does it mean that results might drop in the future compared to the average, to the results recorded on average over all these years, or compared to the baseline created by the extraordinary events that took place over the last three years? If we're talking about the decrease compared to, let's say, normal results, let's call them normal results achieved in this business, I would like to refer you to the five-year strategy where the EBITDA margin is assumed at 13% in this business. That would be assumed. In this context, we're not expecting decreases.
If you ask me about a reduction compared to the baseline created by the extraordinary phenomena I talked about, when margin reached 30-40% at the EBITDA level, well, then we will see significant decreases in the coming quarters. It's more like about 12% than 24% in the future. I'm talking about EBITDA. And the contribution of the BOPP business, I'm talking about EBITDA to consolidated profit/loss of the whole segment. We need to realize that over the last period, it has been larger than in the packaging business. This is indeed an impact, a significant impact on the result of the segment in the coming period. What it will be exactly, well, I can't tell you at this point.
We will be observing this market, and we will be keeping you up to date. As I said, we're coming back to about 12% margin from 30%-40% margins.
Thank you very much. One of the last questions, are we planning an update of the strategic objectives, considering the inflation? Do we want to update these objectives, these goals, at least, by the amounts resulting from inflation?
If we update the strategy, then it would be an holistic update, I would say, not just focusing on one indicator. For now, in this respect, no.
Thank you very much. The next question to Mr. Piotr Wysocki again. Where do we have such a low carbon footprint from in the profiles compared to, for example, this average, which the director mentioned?
Well, generally, this is results from the technology we use or certain solutions. It's a very complicated, complex project. It's like calculating the pre-consumer, post-consumer scrap that's generated in our case. It's only on this third phase, as you know, because you have to speak slower. I'll say it once again. I mean, the technology generally which we use, it's not just some special technology. It's a technology which is applied here and there. Our advantage is that we return own scrap to our own melt. It's a complicated process of calculating which kind of scrap when enters this carbon footprint. Here we could, you know, you could write Ph.D. thesis based on this, but it's confirmed.
This carbon footprint in the amount of 3 kg is confirmed by independent external institutions, and we are the certifiers.
Thank you very much. Question to the financial director. Referring to the working capital in the fourth quarter, are we expecting any reversal of this trend? You mentioned that the trend is downward engagement in working capital, and whether the fourth quarter would be the first one this year where the working capital would release its cash for us.
Well, those were, ladies and gentlemen, those were our forecasts. Of course, the first signal in September was visible because in September alone, about PLN 60 million, this reversal of the demand, that was the amount. Take into consideration that
There was a slowdown of the month-over-month price drops for raw materials. August, September were the months when the scale of operation was adapted. Well, I would put it this way, that in terms of the direction, yes, downwards, but it's very difficult for us to estimate the amount. We are estimating that it may be a fluctuation about in the range of PLN 60 million. This is the scale. On the other hand, I would also point to the problems or perhaps limitations, restrictions, or let's call them challenges, which were underlined by my colleagues from each of the segments in the beginning, that in the market there is not yet we don't yet have stability in the market, right? There is really a lot of components whose accessibility is limited.
Here we have to secure the appropriate stock level, inventory level to make this production optimum. It's hard to speak about hundreds of millions of PLN, but the trend for sure, yes, probably up to several million, several dozen million. Thank you very much. This was the last question which I've got in my inbox. If any of the questions I have omitted, please can you repeat them to my email address? I will try to respond to such a question as soon as possible. Thank you very much for today's meeting. Thank you, gentlemen. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. The recording from the transmission will be made available in a few days on our website. As we have mentioned, it was being interpreted, so we're gonna have both a Polish and English version.
For the investors, for foreign investors, I hope that in a similar form we shall continue in the future, it will be perhaps more convenient for you than conferences through the Zoom app. Or perhaps even we shall return to onsite meetings. However, I think that the one we have now also have got their advantages. President, would you like to comment on something? Thank you very much. Thank you very much and see you next time.